95% of my Realtor friends will NOT take the time to read this post!

95% of my realtor friends will NOT take the time to read my friend Heather Cook's post below about Building Wealth through Stock Ownership.

5% will read it.....and 2% will have an Ahha moment and reach out to me to learn more. ??? Are you part of the 2% ???

The following was written by my friend and business partner Heather Cook!

This is a long post - and it’s HYPER educational (it’s pretty damn good too). ?? Stop here if you don’t want to get smarter today.

?? This post is for anyone - but if you’re an agent closing 30+ transactions annually, you have a team, or you own an Indy Brokerage - this is worth your time.

High D’s: Scroll down until you see ?? if you want to skip to the learning. You’ll benefit more from reading this whole thing though - it’s good food for thought.

What I realized in 100+ conversations with agents this year (especially the one I’ll tell you about further down):

MOST AGENTS THINK STOCK IS FLUFF.

Smoke-and-mirror, phony fluff. Like a vaca timeshare where you get a free ticket to Epcot for listening to a 90-min presentation. I’m serious.

They don’t understand how stock works - that stock is a tangible financial item, like a physical dollar bill. They don’t get how owning stock is a cool tool for building wealth.

MOST AGENTS DON’T EVEN CARE ABOUT BUILDING WEALTH! ??

They think talking about “wealth” is a bad thing. Should we just call it “money”? Would it make it more comfortable to talk about “money building” vs “wealth building”?

That’s ridiculous.

“I’m not doing this job for the money - I’m in real estate because I care about people”. - a lot of agents

“Bullshit”. - me

I care so much about my clients it HURTS sometimes. This is my business. My business operates to be financially successful to provide the most stability and the most comfortable life for my family possible.

??Caring about people and being financially intelligent can co-exist.

I can’t fault you for what you don’t understand. But I’m doing a disservice to you if I don’t explain this to you, because if you want to have any kind of independence in your future - you need to start building wealth YESTERDAY.

This lack of understanding is EXACTLY why most agents don’t prioritize an opportunity to earn things like stock, especially when it’s GIVEN to them.

Ok, so the agent I mentioned earlier. ?? A few years ago, an agent at another firm told me “I don’t need stock. My boyfriend is into stocks and he said my profit share has more value potential than stock and rev share at Real”.

This is a strong, phenomenal agent - one earning almost $9k (yearly) in profit share - which is a lot.

It isn’t about her decision to stay where she is - you should always do what’s right for YOU. It’s about her shutting it down - especially based on someone else’s opinion who isn’t even in real estate - and failing to do her OWN due diligence.

It’s like that saying - What if I fall? But darling - what if you fly?

Maybe I’m wrong about this - but darling, maybe I’m right?

This post isn’t about rev share - but for quick perspective, she’d earn 2-3x that in revenue share here (*monthly* - putting her at 25-30x her annual profit share amount), plus easily hit Elite, and benefit from $24k/year in stock awards, with the size of her network. IF she’d open her mind to ideas that didn’t exist when she joined her current firm - which truly WAS the best firm (in my opinion) to be at a decade ago.

I’m sharing that story in case that scenario is anything like you. And you made a decision to stay where you are based on nothing.

Real estate is evolving. Agents need to evolve at the same pace if they want to maintain the pace of their business in the future.

Today isn’t the problem. Tomorrow will be.

?? The mental hang-up for some agents: they joined their firm 11 years ago (or 8 or 6 or 10) when it was absolutely normal for the BROKERAGE to keep all of the company earnings. The brokerage had a brick & mortar building to pay for, staff, overhead - and actual recruiters ?? to PAY FOR. Cloud firms have massively little overhead; agents pick their business partners - agents keep the money that historically, a traditional firm would have kept.

The money is going somewhere either way. Here, it’s just going back to the agents. I’m down with that.

That feels foreign to some agents, because all they know is what they knew when they first looked at firms a decade ago. (Not to mention early cloud firms helped ALL cloud firms gain the reputation of “recruiting” firms).

I felt that way too. I was wrong.

(Write that down - I don’t say that often, dammit).

I digress. ??????

OK:

?? HOW STOCK WORKS AT REAL ??

(And why it should matter to you to earn it for free. ESPECIALLY if you’re closing 30+ deals a year, you have a team or you have an Indy firm).

?? You’re given stock when you cap.

What this means: Once you cap (you paid-in $12k, which is $2.5-3M in sales depending on commission rate), Real says “Hey, good job!! We’re proud of you, and appreciate your hard work and our partnership. Here’s an award of 150 (currently) shares of stock.” ??

(You keep 100% of your commission for the rest of the year, too).

That stock goes into an account for you where it sits until it “vests” in 3 years, while you’re continuing to work and earn MORE stock. You can’t touch that stock until then. In 3 years, you get an email notification saying “Congratulations! Your Share Awards Have Vested!” ??

Once it vests, it’s yours. To keep. Forever.

??The stock is worth the current stock price - not the price Real paid for it.

??The amount YOU get is based on the current stock price the millisecond you sell it. You can cash it out the day it vests, or sit on it until you’re ready to retire - it’s yours to do whatever you want with it.

??You’re given stock when you hit Elite.

This is a big deal for agents closing 30+ deals annually, or agents with teams. You don’t get a ?? here for hitting Elite. You get a shit ton of stock ??.

??If you’re a husband & wife team - both of your deals can count towards this, and you can share ONE $12k cap, allowing you to hit Elite WAY faster.

What this means: When you close 22 transactions post-cap, Real says “Wow! You’re a badass! Congrats on hitting Elite Status! Here’s a $16,000 stock award. And since you know a lot about real estate - if you teach a monthly zoom class to help our community become better agents, we’ll give you another $8,000 stock award”.

That’s generous af. Real is generous like that because they appreciate strong agents building and helping our community.

That stock goes into your stock account, along with stock you got:

? For capping (which vests after 3 years)

? For bringing an agent to Real, after their first deal closes (we aren’t just looking for bodies with a pulse here)

? plus the 10-20% bonus stock you get for your stock purchase plan award (which only takes ONE year to vest ??).

(This isn’t including a dime of revenue share, which is a totally different topic).

Little by little - without any more effort than selling houses like you’ve always done - your stock begins to vest. And wealth creation begins.

A cycle starts. A little stock vests after first year. Then in 3 years - it really cranks up.

That’s where me and Brad are right now. We’re 3 years in, and my new favorite thing is the “Your Share Awards are Vesting in 30 Days!” emails. The stock we were granted 3 years ago is all starting to vest! ??

We have seen the hypothetical “you can build wealth” scary scenario that sounds too-good-to-be-true come to life.

And it’s cool for us that we are seeing our stock vest at a time when Real stock is in growth-mode. ??

“But I don’t like recruiting” - some agents

My response: Good. We don’t recruit here. We attract - it’s QUITE different.

??The stock awards for attraction are the LEAST amount of awards Real offers.

??Our capping stock award is DOUBLE the stock award for attraction.

Our #1 focus is our agents success.

Not “recruiting”.

None of what I’m talking about right now is reliant on you bringing a single soul to work with you. It has EVERYTHING to do with YOUR personal production.

You’re selling houses now anyway - right? What are you getting BACK from your brokerage for that - seriously?

I know you - I know you’re thinking “but my Broker is so nice”. That’s amazing - bring them with you. They’ll fit in well here. ??

Let’s chat if you’re open to it. In absolute confidentiality.

Ask me questions. Run scenarios with me. Look at our cool tech. We actually have a Wealth Plan Calculator and I can use numbers based on your actual data to see where things are going to be in 5 years. Hang out with our crew and experience a tiny taste of the collaboration and community we have. It’s different here.

Some agents are already in a position to see a significant, IMMEDIATE benefit from what we offer: team owners, Indy brokerages, growth leaders - when they make the move. They’d have an immediate 5-6 figure additional income stream for doing nothing different than they’re doing now - with a lower cap.

You need to be looking at new models in brokerage that work FOR YOU. Tamir works FOR US. Sharran works FOR US.

They’ve created a really unique environment where we can grow together - like a massive “community table” where everyone brings an amazing gourmet dish and it’s shared with anyone who wants it.

Take your future seriously.

You don’t want to look backwards in 10 years and have another 10 years to make up for the path to financial independence that you could be - and should be - creating now.

-By Heather Cook Real Broker

If you got this far.....you are definitely part of the 5%.

Are you curious to Learn More? Would you like to plug some numbers into our Wealth Plan Builder and see what the next 5-year time horizon could hold for your business?

Text me at 614-323-1249 Andrew Robnson

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