Agent vs Lender

Why Become a Solo Agent?

December 30, 2020 Ron Pippin
Agent vs Lender
Why Become a Solo Agent?
Show Notes Transcript

If you're in real estate you've debated many times if being on a team or going solo is best for you. This week we speak to real estate agent Rick Southwick who has been on teams and now is a solo agent. He shares how being a solo agent has benefited him at this point in his career. Rick and Ron also discuss how the pandemic has changed the industry and what it may look like in 2021. If you are considering being a solo agent then this is the episode for you!

You can listen to all episodes of Agent Vs Lender on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Google Play. If you love Agent Vs Lender follow us on YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram for all bonus content. 



Ron Pippin:

Welcome to another episode of agent versus lender. And today we have with us, Rick Southwick from he's the Utah broker at EXP Realty. Is that right, Rick?

Rick Southwick:

Yes, that's correct, Ron.

Ron Pippin:

So tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us how you get started real estate. Just tell us who you are.

Rick Southwick:

Well, I'm I at heart, if I could do it, do it what I would love to do most, I'd be a full time ski bum. Skiing's one of my passions and mountain biking. So I live, you know, you and I live close by quick access to the trails in the foothills and I've got a locker at snow basin. So I can be there quickly and get a few runs in my spare time. But I graduated from Weber State got me kind of accidentally helping a fraternity brother, who was already licensed discovered really quickly I couldn't do very much without a license, took the crash course and got licensed in about 10 days. And I've been in real estate ever since I've been fortunate to be with three great companies. I worked with the Weber family at Cold Banker for a number of years. And then I was a partner and the really the first successful Keller Williams office KW success in South Ogden, I was there for a number of years. And then when I found this opportunity to open the XP realty for Utah, jumped on it because I saw all the great things. They had innovated, and were planning and it was a real small company at the time, but I thought it had a lot of potential. So I jumped at that opportunity. So I've been listening and selling here in northern Utah for over 30 years. And

Ron Pippin:

So you've seen a few things, man, 30 years, you know, I've been in 20 a little over 25.

Rick Southwick:

Long as me. Oh,

Ron Pippin:

yeah. Yeah. So it's gonna say it's rare that I hit find somebody that's been in longer than I have that still active. But you know, I got in. And so yeah, anyway, yeah. So good, good to see that you're still here still doing well.

Rick Southwick:

And enjoying it and having fun. I know, people talk about retiring. And I'm like, Why? You know, I love what I do. And and this is a great business. So

Ron Pippin:

yeah, awesome. So I'm going to switch it up on you a little bit. We, let's talk because you you've been at different offices, some really good offices to, by the way. And, they were fortunate to have you as part of their team. So let's talk a little bit about teams versus working on your own. Because now you're you don't have a team, you haven't built a team that you work with. And but you've worked at it, but you have had a team in the past. So tell us, tell us a little bit about the pros and cons of each of them and why you decided to go the way you have after so many years in business.

Rick Southwick:

Well, I had a successful small team in my KW days. And then when the recession hit, and kind of the bottom propped out everything. It didn't work any longer than, you know, the market slowed so dramatically. And people weren't. It just wasn't working. So I had no had to give it cut overhead.

Ron Pippin:

You probably had, salary people. Yeah, you know, I'm glad you mentioned balance. So I'm gonna

Rick Southwick:

Yeah I had time assistance, and actually a buyer's agent who was on salary and, for a number of years, that worked really well. for both of us. She made me more money than I paid, and she had a guaranteed income. But that all changed. At the height of that I think I had four buyer's agents, I was doing all the listings and the two administrative persons. So it was you know, there was a lot of outgo every month and so I kind of downsized that I was involved with board leadership at the I'm gonna bring in the perspective from the mortgage in time. So I've always had an assistant. And for a while those were college students, that the person I have worked with me right now is now licensed and does a visit on her own and the mortgage side of it on teams and working on your own, I we've been together for six years and she's really a business partner. For a lot of people, I think it you have to either, at least from my perspective, look at the bottom line. And what are you netting? I mean, there are some huge teams out there. They're doing really impressive numbers. When you look at sales. volume and everything else. But at the end of the day, what I think matters is what do we take home. So if you're doing huge volumes, but you're not getting a whole lot, I can remember when I first started doing coaching and training with Mike Ferry, he didn't spend a lot of time talking about net. And remember the big agents that were, you know, doing a million dollars in commissions. And when you dug into it, they probably weren't adding less than 10% of that, which is still not a bad income, but it's a lot of stress and brain damage. So, from my perspective, teams work really well, for buyer's agents, it's a, if it's a successful team, and they can provide you good leads, that's a win. And I like remember when I was just pretty much on my own. And I would do kind of the more personal touch, I like to be myself, my business is primarily relationship driven, I have a lot of repeat clients that have worked with me for 567, I think my top clients have bought and sold with me seven times. And so, you know, I, I value those relationships, try and take great care of those people. And, you know, I think it's the kind of thing, there's plenty of room in this for everybody, but I think it's a mistake for somebody to try and kill themselves to build a big team. If they want to have a simple, productive, profitable life, you can do it pretty well as a solo agent, or with an assistant, maybe even one. And I think frankly, you can probably do just as well, referring buyers to other agents, rather than trying to manage it all on team. I'm sure that a lot of people would disagree with me, but I think, I think if you I think you can have a really successful life and some balance in it, selling 30, 40, 50 homes a year. And doing that without big team, you know, the the groups that do hundreds of homes a year and, and 10s of millions of kudos to them. that's a that's a that's an accomplishment. It's at this stage of the game. I'm I'm happy with a simpler system and had a good net bottom line. three four loans a month, and it was full time work man. And then then they started piling on then after 2007 after that crash yet they started pouring on more regulations and to this day, they're pouring on more regulations and so it got it got to be this big animal that was hard to manage and became more and more frustrating to manage and took more time. And so I got with a coach and we talked about that and so we I did start building a team I you know, I hired one person hired somebody to take and in, in probably in real estate, your first hire would be a transaction coordinator, I would imagine just to just to take off some of that that paperwork stuff you know, because I'm like, you know, probably you as well as I am more of a we're more of a relationship more of a state you know, I don't want to say sales guy, but we're more we want to go out and talk to people and we want to interact with people and I get bogged down with whenever I am trying to do do that, that behind the scenes paperwork stuff. Are you the same way or do you like that? No, I'm I'm really not I mean, I'm, I'm detailed when it comes to negotiating contracts and writing contracts, that sort of thing. But, you know, the compliance side of it and the tracking all the dates, I mean, the my my assistant, my transaction coordinator, my business partner, that's that's her forte so we make sure we get all that taken care of, but that's the kind of thing where I mean I what I calculate when I'm doing what I'm best at and that's meeting with people and listing homes and negotiating contracts. I can make an incredible living I think that makes writer you know, I earn a up there with with probably the best lawyers and things that I don't make that when I'm doing detail paperwork. You know, trying to input something into MLS, things like that. So if you can leverage it if you can, either have free time for doing productive time and you can compensate somebody else for those hourly activities, it's a win win.

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, I totally agree, man. It's like, you know, when you start making, whether it's $50, you know, whether it's$200 an hour, $100 or $50 an hour, it doesn't matter when you start making some decent money. And you start looking at taking that time, your time to do some of those, those, I have to be careful, can I call them menial tasks, but they're important tasks. But there are things that don't warrant 50 or 100 or $200 an hour, it's just like, if you can get somebody for 15 bucks an hour, then pay them the 15 bucks and free up your time to go get another listing or go talk to another buyer, or get up on the slope for a couple of hours. You know, that's, that's, that's money well spent. So it's, I think, I think you you hit that nail on the head is I don't, don't pay yourself $15 an hour to do those things, when you really should be doing the tasks, the things that are actually putting in the deals.

Rick Southwick:

No, absolutely. And I think in you know, right now, where we're at, where a lot of people are struggling and out of work in the restaurant, service industries are all struggling, I've, I've kind of taken a whole new look at when I am able to go out and eat or get takeout stuff. It's like, I realized, I've we've been I mean, there's, there's kind of this dual economy going on right now. And people like you and me are still a we're able to work and we haven't been shut down. And we can do a lot of one, we're set providing essential services, we're providing housing, that's important. But for all these people that are out there that are really really struggling, I mean, I'm more generous, consciously, with tipping and things like that, because I know that, you know, I met it used to be like, where they was a good service or not, today, I'm like, thank you for you know, providing me a meal. And I hope this helps and, you know, tipping generously and just kind of that law of abundance that the more I can give out, the more it's going to come back. And the more it's going to help other people. And we've I actually put out a thing a little bit ago on on Facebook, and I didn't originate it, but I saw it from some other people and I wanted to emulate because I thought it was really, really the right thing to do. You know, it's this has been a good year, in real estate. I mean, it's, it's been stressful. And there's a lot of boredom. And because because we can't go out and do all the stuff and see the people we like to see, but it's still been, you know, financially and materially pretty, pretty blessed year. And I know there are people out there that are out of work and struggling. So I put a thing out there of, hey, if you need help with groceries or whatever, reach out to me do it quietly. And nobody needs to know. I'm in a position I can help. And I want to help. I've actually had more people reach out and say, hey, I want to put some money towards this and send me checks that we've had, we've helped several families that with with kind of nice amounts of grocery money and Christmas money. And I'm still waiting to hear from some more people hopefully. And then I've been amazed that you know what, the rescue mission and some of these places they can provide a meal for under two bucks. So I'm like, wow, let's let me contribute there and help some people out. And what else?

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, so for anybody that's listening to this, you want to help Rick out, give them a call, man, because that's, that's such a good, that's such a good cause. So I appreciate you taking the time out of your out of your day. Because a lot of people think, you know, I'm doing well, I don't, I'm just I'm just gonna go on my merry way. And, and so I'm glad that you're doing that. So good for you, Rick.

Rick Southwick:

Thanks, Ron.

Ron Pippin:

So, we so we talked a little bit about the differences between teams working on their own, you know, I've I've worked on my own I actually like a team. But I have a team behind me. There's no way I could do what I'm doing today without without my team and and you're right some days there are some months when I go man that that salary that I have to cover and you know that overhead that I have to cover, you know, it worries me a little bit but but we're really conscientious about it. So it's worked out really well for me. But the main thing, the main thing for me is that it's freed up time, a time that I that I free up is like invaluable for me so I was I get you know a little bit more gray hair. Some of I still have hair, right? So as I go, you know, you're probably in that same boat with me to say, you know, I want to spend more time with family, I want to spend more time, I don't want to spend it all in my business. And so there's a cost for me to do that. And so I have my team, which is an incredible team. And so they take care of me and so that I can get out and do do some of those things. Other things. So that's, that's one of my benefits for me. And you're at home today. Yeah,

Rick Southwick:

I'm pretty much home every day where my brokerage I work with, we're a cloud based company. And so I can work from anywhere. And so I, I finished off an office at home. And this is where I run everything from. So

Ron Pippin:

that's awesome. That

Rick Southwick:

was kind of a challenge and a shift. But it's become become a pretty nice, nice way to live and work.

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, I'm in my office, I don't come to my office every day, I work from home a lot, too. But I'm in my little podcast studio here. And so tell me, tell me the advantage why. So I know your company is kind of set up that way. And, and about three years ago, my whole team decided to go remote. And so all of them work from the off from home. So we have, we still have an office, just not as big as we used to have. And it's worked really well. And just because in our industry, both mortgage and real estate, we can go everything is digitally signed these days. So we don't necessarily have to sit across them, sit across the desk, shake hands or bump elbows or whatever we do now. So tell me, tell me how that how that's worked really helped. That's what to your advantage working from home.

Rick Southwick:

You know, it, it was interesting, because when I, when I left the previous brokerage and launched EXP in Utah, I was used to I had always gone to the office, and I was pretty disciplined about that. And I I kind of felt like that was part of my success was I had a routine, I went to work and did everything from the office. So it was it was kind of a big transition, when I realized that for a little while that if you're working from home or working remotely, it's just a different set of distractions. Instead of having the non producing agent who hangs out at the office all the time and drinks coffee, and each doughnuts, stick his head or her head in your door and want to chew the fat for turns into 15-30 minutes. You know, I might get up and do something around the house that that needs to be done. Or I might just get up and walk walk out with the dog and just different set of distractions. Sure, yeah, it's the same challenge of staying focused and doing productive work when you need to do it. But it's, for me, I mean, I know some people, I've agents that haven't come and joined us because I can't work from home, I need an office. And there are plenty of places where you can use shared space or if you really want an office, you can certainly buy it or buy an office condo or buy your own building do whatever, I've just realized that for me that that's a that's an overhead expense that I you know, that's money I'm putting in my pocket now instead of paying to the brokerage that I was previously with. So again, I kind of I'm a much better manager of money today than I was as a new agent. And I think that's one of the challenges of, of the businesses that we're in and you guys in the mortgage world you a lot you guys have. I think the feds made most of you guys be on salary and stuff and you can't do the commission that we're still able to do and and that created some old tech challenged everything but you know, as a newer agent when I got the lump sums and stuff, it was like holy cow I'm I'm really in great shape and I manage the money a heck of a lot better today and control my expenses and working hard to to eliminate every debt I can and and and be debt free and live that live that nice net life. So

Ron Pippin:

yeah, that's awesome. So, housing, housing is an interesting thing these days. It's like, you know, back in 2007 markets crashing in on us and you couldn't give a house away. Housing First two houses were sitting on the market forever. And today, you can't keep them. Keep them listed. For more than a day or two, or, you know, maybe it's slowed down a little bit, maybe a week. So tell me where were you think housing is today versus before we went into COVID? Well,

Rick Southwick:

you know, we, we kind of had that initial slow down. And we're fortunate in the state of Utah that the realtors were able to lobby the governor and legislature and make sure that that the industry was designated as essential services. So we were able to continue to with caution, practice what we do and provide housing. For people, there are a number of states where they were completely shut down for weeks or months. I know New Mexico now is is currently under a shutdown, it just doesn't make any sense. And it's really hurting lots of people. But I, we have a shortage of inventory across the country right now, like, I don't think we've ever seen in the last 30 plus years. And a lot of it goes back to lack of new construction during the recession. And then in places like Utah, we have people moving here, I think people are leaving the west coast in droves. And they're coming into Utah, they're coming in Nevada, tons of people moving to Texas, people are going to Florida because of the advantages of taxation there versus the Northeast. So we're seeing this shift around the country. People ask, or they talk about are we gonna have a crash next year in real estate? And I think absolutely not, especially here in Utah, we've got this huge imbalance. It's, you know, I feel for everybody right now, it's a challenge as an agent, you guys, the mortgage industry still looks like it's really robust with with refinances going on, and with purchases. But if you're a buyer, particularly first time buyer, you know, there's 10, 20, 50 offers on our on an entry level property. So it's, it's not a lot of fun. And, you know, if you're, if your buyer needing a an FHA, VA Utah housing loan, it's hard to compete against a cash buyer or out of state buyer. That's that that's got a nice big down payment. So yeah, it's a it's a challenge. It's a struggle. We've got issues at the municipal level, with how fast we can get subdivisions and development approved. You've got one of the biggest challenges and we see it here locally, but and I see it on the on the planning commission that I serve on. Anytime there's a new development, not in my backyard. No, we don't want the density. We don't want this. And it's like, it's like developments a dirty word. Well, if you live in a home or an apartment today, you live there because somebody developed that it's no longer a farmer's field, or, you know, a scrub oak area, somebody took the risk and created something that you now live in. And that's what we need for our kids and for our grandkids. And, you know, renters being a renter is not a dirty word, if just about every one of us started out as a renter. And we're decent people and, you know, there's a few bad apples no matter where you go. But, and we need more apartments, we need more condos, we need more single family homes, we need more patio homes. So you know, everybody out there needs to chill out. And, and, and then the other problem we've got is materials costs and everything else

Ron Pippin:

in

Rick Southwick:

life force tripled this year, you know, so the challenge of the numbers of homes and then affordable housing. And that's what makes you know, Utah and the rest of this country so wonderful, is our private property system. And we need these housing units for people to rent and to buy that that's how for the vast majority of us that's how we build wealth. That's how we take care of our families. It's it's the founding you know, it's not it's not the stock market. I mean, stock markets are another option but whether the world's in chaos or booming, you know, having a roof over your head matters and, and I guess that's one of the things I just love about this, about this world that we're both in, you know, mortgage and real estate, but really helping people find a place to live and invest and, and, you know, whatever your household composition looks like, you know, grow that raise a family have a career. I mean, I've been doing this long enough that I've seen, you know, friends and clients that were start young starting out, and now they've, you know, they've gone from that first home into something else, and some of them are ready to retire. But it's such a core part of of our communities. I guess it you know, it's what I really what I love about it is, is it's just interwoven with everything we do. So, you know, Home Home matters. And, and, you know,

Ron Pippin:

yeah, so, yes.

Rick Southwick:

All right, I kind of got got wound up. Im passionate about it.

Ron Pippin:

you know, that's perfect. Yeah. So the housing, so, you know, funny thing is, is housing is no matter what happens, whether, you know, you go into a recession, you go into something, everybody still needs a roof over their heads, everybody. So, what you said about building wealth, and is, to me is almost secondary. Although for you, for a lot of us in good times, that's, that's a primary concern, we want to we want to buy some additional, we want to buy investment property, one, buy some of those kind of things. But for some of us, it's just like, we just, we just want to buy a house. And, you know, and and if we go into recession, that's gonna be one of the last things that goes, I mean, you're gonna, you're probably going to get rid of your second car, and you're going to get rid of some things before you get rid of your house. Because then if you get rid of your house, and we're going to go rent and rents aren't any cheaper, rents are more expensive. So

Rick Southwick:

that's probably my biggest worry for people going into next year. There's those federal eviction moratoriums, and they're, you know, there are people that just are not able to work because of COVID. And if they get evicted, I don't know where they're going to go. I mean, there aren't any vacancies I really worried that, that if, if, if Congress doesn't do some stuff, and and we don't get, you know, get these vaccines out fast enough and get things back on track, that we're gonna have a whole bunch of people thrown out on the streets, and I don't know where they're gonna go. I mean, you know,

Ron Pippin:

the bad thing about these these eviction retort, moratoriums, the the forbearance programs are, it's just like, I think some of the some of the people that are, that are taking advantage of those are thinking that, well, you can't evict me. So now I'm going to just behave badly in all different circumstances. And so they're going to get, even if they're caught up, even if they can get caught up. So going back to the forbearance, seeing, if they don't get caught up, they're going to be behind, and now it's going to hit their credit. And, and then if they behaving badly, the real the the age of the, whether it's an agent, or whether it's a landlord, or whether it's a, you know, a company that's managing that, that property, they're probably not going to give them much of a break, because they've been behaving badly. And then they're not going to get a good reference. So they're gonna have not gonna have references, they're gonna, they're gonna have hints on their credit. Because of this, you're right, they're gonna have a real tough, tough go finding any place to go. So I'm really worried here very shortly as to how many of those people are going to be affected, and what they're going to do.

Rick Southwick:

me the one thing is difference now versus the recession is most people who own a home, even if they get into a jam, they've got equity. I, the data that I've seen suggests that there's not going to be massive amounts of foreclosures. And for the few that might end up in that circumstance, they can probably sell and salvage some equity and move forward. And I don't think mean housing is one of the strengths the economy right now. It's it's not it's not the bubble. We don't have. We don't have all those those 100% financing loans that were around back predating the recession,

Ron Pippin:

but we do have some 100% financing, but pre recession It was like if you could do a heartbeat you could fog a mirror man.

Rick Southwick:

Right? Oh, the guidelines are a lot stricter. You've lived much longer borrower today to get get that type of loan. So hopefully we've learned learned some lessons from that. And we won't have a repeat. So yeah.

Ron Pippin:

So this has actually been really good Rick, tell I'm going to go back to your brokerage a little bit. Just because you just piqued my interest a little bit when you were talking a little, a little bit about you and why you are on your own versus having a team now. And I think you said that there were some things your brokerage does a little bit different than maybe some others that could help out that agent that just doesn't want to do the team and just, you know, maybe maybe cut their teeth already and doesn't need that doesn't need that team mentality to mentor them for a while or to provide those leads, or I don't know, maybe I'm taking gonna kill me, but some of those things that are different about you about your brokerage? Well, you know,

Rick Southwick:

I mean, XP Realty, that is the company that I'm the broker for, for the state of Utah. Actually, we have some huge teams, and we support teams, just like every other company does. In fact, some of the biggest teams from KW and some of the other companies have joined us because we offer so much more to the agents. We just had the number one team with Remax inCanada join a guy who does has done billions in sales. I mean, he's got a nationwide team there. And we've had, we've had a lot of independent brokers Come and join us because they're tired of owning a brokerage and running a brokerage. Some of the things that are different about about EXP, we're a publicly traded company, we're traded on on NASDAQ. And so all of our agents have the opportunity to buy discounted stock with part of their commissions, there's a half dozen different ways that agents get stock awards, if you cap our cap is pretty competitive with most other companies caps, but when you cap and then go to 100%, you get a stock award. If you do another 20 plus transactions on top of that, in the 12 month cycle, you become an icon agent. And you're eligible to have up to your entire cap awarded back to you and stock that invest three years later. So I you know, those stock awards are pretty significant. So you, you could almost end up netting 100% with us through these various programs. We also have a revenue sharing program that kind of shares, multiple levels for agents who helped grow the company by attracting other agents. So we really have the opportunity to create a half dozen different streams of income for an agent who does nothing different than what they were doing at any other brokerage. And so there's a there's a legitimate opportunity to to build a retirement to have an exit strategy to build wealth. I mean, that and the stock has done extremely well. You know, it's no different than any other stock, it goes up, it goes down. But as the company has grown over the past nine years, it's gone from a penny stock to being listed on NASDAQ. And so we have people I mean, I saw it, I watched a post last night of a guy in Atlanta and he and his wife had just sold enough stock to pay off their mortgage. Right, since they joined EXP so good for them. I mean, it's really changing people's life. So one of the things I'm trying to do is, is get in business with a lot of good agents who are good at selling real estate, but maybe they want to have some additional opportunities. So if anybody's out there that would love to hear you know more about what we offer.

Ron Pippin:

I'd love to share it.

Rick Southwick:

We we have a virtual platform that that we own the company and they're doing it's company called Verbella and it's a essentially similar to a gaming platform and we actually hold national and international meetings on that everyone has an avatar. That's how we hold our state sales meetings, we do trainings through that. That Verbella is being used by the NBA to provide meetings are actually doing concerts. In Verbella the Department of Defense is using the Verbella so it's really a kind of a neat platform that adds value to the company and it's a great way for our agents to work and collaborate. Our staff is we're supporting 40,000 agents in eight countries now with about seven 100 staff people that the guy who processes our commissions for the agents here in Utah, he's a, he's a marine veteran, he lives in El Paso, Texas. So I can walk into our virtual office and talk with him I, that virtual platform is more responsive, I can find the staff I need when I need him much easier than trying to walk down the hall and find him in a physical office. So it's really kind of a cool collaborative environment. And it's, it's benefiting a lot of agents and really changing lives in

Ron Pippin:

cool ways. Yeah,

Rick Southwick:

thanks for asking about that.

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, that's awesome. I've known Rick for quite a few years and he's a good friend of mine until you get just and because he's a good friend of mine. I want to help him out. But I wouldn't I wouldn't have them on even if he was a friend. If he really wasn't doing what he said he was doing so so I would recommend him to call him man if you're if you're looking. And whether you're in you're obviously if you're Utah he's he's like over the over the state of Utah, Utah broker for HP. But even if you're in another state, call him and he'll he'll get you hooked up with who you need to talk to, to get going.

Rick Southwick:

Let that's one of the other interesting things about this, about this company and about our structure Ron is we've got agents that are building networks through the revenue sharing program. That literally mean it's building a team with no overhead and no responsibility. nationally and internationally. We're in Australia, we're in South Africa, we just opened in India, France, Portugal. I mean, it's it's really exciting to see what's going on that we opened we opened in five countries this fall, doing it all virtually no EXP staff people flew anywhere I was I was astounded. I really thought they'd have to slow down and actually they they've been doing more because this because with COVID this this virtual platform just facilitates my way to to transact business and and build build teams.

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, so you know if there's any one bright spot out of COVID that's definitely one of them. I think people are businesses are realizing we don't need all this office space. We don't need we don't need this overhead. There's so much that we can accomplish. And mice You know, my team included we're all virtual. I'm, I'm like one of the few few people on the team that actually comes to the office nobody else wants to come. But I have I have I have some in other states too. So part of my team is also in other states, but most most people that are doing or doing financing methods would never know that much less

Rick Southwick:

no its seamless. No now you can do

Ron Pippin:

those cool. Well, Rick, how does people get how would people get hold of you? If if they want to? Want to talk to you? I can see it right there. I can see it. Yeah, yeah, my

Rick Southwick:

my cell you can you can call or text me at 801-391-7425 My email is Rick.Southwick@EXPrealty.com. So there's all kinds of ways to connect, but I you know, and and the other thing that we've, we've developed as a company as we've got a very robust mentor program for new agents and an entire training series that's cloud based for new agents.

Ron Pippin:

So I didn't know that that's good to know.

Rick Southwick:

Yeah, we actually have, I think, over 70 hours of live training in the EXP world, the virtual platform every week. So we have our top agents, the icon agents, are teaching classes and doing panels on a weekly basis. And that the company, mindset, the company culture, because everybody has some ownership in the company. And the more the more successful that every one of our agents is, it adds value to the company and stock. So you talk to an EXP agent, and they will tell you all their secrets, everything they're doing what's working well, how they do their business, whether it's you know, and REO or or new construction or multi unit or beachfront condos, whatever they're doing, they will tell you what works, what doesn't work. It's the most collaborative environment I've ever been in. And just kind of fun thing.

Ron Pippin:

That's awesome. Yeah. So can you get hold of Rick, give them a call and And also, so I think that'll wrap it up. You have anything else you want to

Rick Southwick:

know, Ron, thanks for the opportunity to get together and talk about what's going on.

Ron Pippin:

Yeah, appreciate you being here.

Rick Southwick:

I know you're you've been doing this a long time and you're deliver great service and take good care of people. So you know, Ron's a star in the mortgage world, and great, fun to see and appreciate the time and

Ron Pippin:

appreciate you being here, Rick. So if you want to get hold of any of me or my team, the best way to do that is just call 801-628-7667. By the way, we can lend in all 50 states. So you know, if you're an agent or a consumer that wants to talk to us, doesn't matter what state you're in, we can we can help you no matter where you're at, in in the in the United States. We're not like Rick, we're not in other countries. But you know, we are here in everything in all 50 states. So that'll wrap up this that'll wrap up this session of agent versus lender, and we will catch you again next week.