Get More – From Your Brokerage

Lisa Durant: And the culture to go with what Laurie said. It’s a feeling.

Laurie: You cannot deny the feeling.

Leslie: You want to be here.

Laurie: It’s an overwhelming feeling that you can’t quite pinpoint but it just all makes sense

Leslie: I will tell you that Lamacchia Real Estate is like nothing I have ever experienced in other companies. Between the culture and the training and staff and the support, there is no other company like it.

Gerry: I’ve been doing this for 29 years. I had grown up in a second-generation real estate and Anthony has something very special here.

Laurie: The company, the support, the staff, it’s just the whole package that you will not find anywhere else. I’ve been doing this 20 years. You will not find it. You might find little parts of it, but maybe 20/25% of it.

Gerry: It starts at the top and it comes all the way down the bottom. When you know that the company cares about you, you care about the company and it’s just a repeating cycle. That’s what helps the whole thing to work.

Culture

Gerry: It’s very difficult in the real estate industry to have a culture such as this. We’ve only been here all of us, we’ve only been here for a few months and it’s like we’ve been here forever. At least that’s how I feel. The response is just second to none.

Lisa Durant: I also had worked for another company that was a really good company and I wasn’t unhappy there at all. It was a great company and I was doing good business but I didn’t really recognize how being 100%, there was some things missing there but you lived with it. It was okay. You made it work. Coming here to have all that together.

Laurie: We’re all competing against each other, let’s face it, we are. If you don’t think that then you don’t know what to think but we are, but it’s healthy competition. It’s good we want everybody to succeed. I have never heard that speaking of another company which we’re trying to talk about now, never had that. I have never been, it’s all congratulations. I don’t think I’ve ever got congratulations from somebody else I ever worked with.

Leslie: How neat is that?

Laurie: It makes you feel good and it makes you feel good to see the people you’re working with succeed because you know what? It’s only going to help all of us.

Leslie: Exactly.

Laurie: You have to have that mindset.

Lisa Gamberdella: It’s nice to be appreciated, to have that culture that we’ve talked about, that culture of just– We’re obviously newer to the company and you don’t feel it because everybody is very welcoming and loves having you there.

Lisa Durant: It is very individualized. As agents, you are doing your own business. However, the team atmosphere being that the management, the ownership, and the agents alike, we’re each other’s cheerleaders, and we want to support each other. We want to see each other do well. Nobody’s out. There’s no cutthroat here.

Laurie: With that being said, that doesn’t happen. 20 years doing this, that does not happen. It doesn’t happen. You’re always going to get a bad apple or you’re always going to get somebody that doesn’t belong. For the most part everybody, I feel belongs. They care about one another. They care about the success of one another. They care about whether you’re a veteran for real estate, or you’re a newbie. You know what? We’re all equal. We all started in the same spot. That’s huge.

Leslie: The marketing department does an incredible job on social media, no question. As individual agents, I don’t know how many friend requests I got from other agents within the company.

Training

Lisa Gamberdella: I very much appreciate the training he provides everybody because I think, every time I learn lots of stuff, lots of new ways to do things and build my business better. I said when I came here I’m going to do whatever he tells me to do because he obviously knows what he’s doing.

Leslie: And you do.

Lisa Gamberdella: You do, and the uncomfortable stuff like learning how to grow our sphere and make phone calls which I hate but I’m doing it because he told me to do it.

Lisa Durant: Pushing yourself to step outside of your comfort zone so you can continuously grow. A lot of brokerages and firms and I’ve worked for a few if you’re comfortable, they’re comfortable. Your name on the roster, you might do a couple of deals. You might 10 deals, 15 deals, whatever. Anthony wants you to, if you want to, step outside of your comfort zone and try things you haven’t tried before.

I’m teaching you, I’m giving you the tools to do this and you can really reach a much higher level. Which for me I’ve been in training, I’ve trained many agents but it was very basic. The training here is at a much deeper level and I’m learning things that I never even thought to train on.

Lisa Gamberdella: It’s continual.

Laurie: Just, it’s the little things.

Laurie: You’ve sold hundreds of properties you should have a list. You should have a sphere. We don’t do anything. We’re just busy, so now you can bet your butt that’s what we’re working on. We only have the clients in our back pocket. You have to do these things and it’s the little things. It doesn’t even register until somebody keeps talking to you about it. It’s like, “Oh my God, right.”

Lisa Durant: Could have been doing that.

Laurie: Could have been doing that.

Lisa Durant: That would make my life a lot easier.

Jean: The number of things that are available to us as agents, things like scripts particularly for new agents to kind of where to begin or what not to talk about when they go on a listing appointment or how to zero in on a buyer and make that buyer loyal to you instead of being wishy-washy. All of those things are readily available online so that you can do your own studying at home if you want to.

Lisa Durant: You are Lamacchia, you are working for Lamacchia Realty but he is very committed to the agents really becoming, taking what he knows, implementing into your own business and being your own brand. Which is really neat.  

Laurie: Basically, here’s everything but it’s up to you to continue. There’s nothing left. Here is everything. If you choose to take all of this.

Lisa Durant: You will be successful.

Laurie: – you will succeed. If you don’t, you won’t.

Leslie: They put out a schedule usually on the Friday prior to Wednesday training. It says we’re going to do this from 10:00. to 10:30 and we’re going to do this from 10:30 to 11:00. Then we’re going to do this from 11:00 to 11:45 and they follow the schedule.

Leslie: I had a home inspection last week that ran late. I was mad. I missed training. I feel like I missed out on a whole bunch.

Gerry: The training here is just—people are telling me, they’re like, “Why are you going to training? You’ve been doing this for 28 years, sold 1,300 houses, why are going to training?” Like she said, it’s the little things and some of the big things and you’ve got to—the industry is always evolving. It’s constantly moving. There’s always new things but you’ve got to continually be educating yourself.

Lisa Durant: As seasoned agents, you don’t have to go to the training. Nothing’s mandatory. Yet, everyone is saying this room has been full, and we’re watching the training sometimes live but oftentimes virtually. In every other office that’s live streaming from the main office in Waltham where it’s being held is filled with both new but many seasoned agents that are showing up.

Questions Get Answered

Gerry: I mean, you ask a question, they have the systems in place to get your questions answered. You know where to ask your question and you’re going to get whatever question answered in, I’m talking minutes as opposed to hours let alone days or weeks. Exactly.

Honesty

Tracey: The biggest impression is honesty. With Anthony talking to him before coming here, his honesty was really refreshing having talked to other brokerages and they always think everything’s going to be roses if you join their team, it’s going to be great, it’s not. I mean, there’s a learning curve no matter where you go and he was very honest about there is going to be a learning curve and to get on board it’s going to take time and I really appreciated that.

Seeing the whole team that he works with, they all care and they’re all very honest with any questions, there’s no fluff. It’s like, “This is what it is, these are the rules, this is how we operate for everybody,” not separate for different people and that kind of thing, very straightforward.

Lisa Gamberdella: It’s very refreshing the way he runs the business. It’s very transparent which I appreciate. If he’s changing something, he tells you why. It’s not just, “That’s because.” It’s, “Here’s the reasons,” and “Here’s how it affects everybody.

Communication

Leslie: There is a team member for everything, like five full-time marketing people and accounting and referrals and relocation. There are people for everything and they all get it, they’re not just people doing a job, they understand the whole mission statement and the culture of the company. It’s amazing.

Lisa Durant: Whether you’re talking to Anthony or you’re talking to an admin or somebody in marketing, they all share the same message and one voice. You’re not getting a different answer from somebody else which is really, really nice. They know what they’re talking about and they talk to the agents. The communication is phenomenal from the team.

Lisa Gamberdella: We have experiences where you never quite knew things like when we’re going to get paid and things like that. Things like that are just very upfront here. You know it from the second something goes on your contract, how it’s all going to go. All the support you get, you know exactly who to go to when you need something or who handles this or who handles that. Previously, I feel like we didn’t really have that. We get all in and you wait and wait and wait. It could be three or four days, it could be weeks that you just never know. I had a closing on Wednesday, I was paid on Friday. It’s just that clear-cut.

Systems and Getting Paid

Lisa Durant: There’s no wondering like when we log into our system, our CRM, we know what we’re going to be making on that next paycheck, how much we’ve made here today. If you’re trying to reach a financial goal, this is how much more business you need to do in order to make that. It’s in your face every single day. There’s no guesswork and I felt like in other companies especially when it comes to pay and we as agents work really hard and sometimes you’re in a transaction, I’ve been working with a client now for six months because it’s new construction. When that closes, I want to know that I’m going to get a paycheck and working for some firms, it could be two weeks because they don’t have an accountant. They don’t have an accounting team.

Leslie: Or there could be magic math.

Lisa Durant: Or could be magic math. Here, you know what you’re getting and the system tells you. These are the documents that you need to have in order to get paid. They remind you, your administrator reminds you if you have all this done, you’re going to get paid in 24 to 48 hours, simple as that, you don’t have it done, do it. Then you’ll get paid.

Splits

Lisa Durant: There are some companies that will pay you the sky and the moon and the stars, they’ll give you like the highest split you can imagine and it’s really hard for agents to perceive doing business anyplace else because they’re giving me this crazy high split and I couldn’t–

Leslie: Or a signing bonus.

Lisa Durant: Or a sign-on bonus. You really need to look beyond just a number which I think a lot of agents get stuck on that. I’ve said over and over again, since being here I’m so confident that I’m going to do a lot more business than I’ve done in the past, which ultimately I will make a lot more money-

Gerry: And have more fun doing it.

Lisa Durant: – and more fun doing it. There’s so much more to business than just–

Gerry: Just a split.

Lisa Durant: We want to be financially successful, let’s not be foolish here, and the splits are very good, they’re very competitive but there is just so much more than a split so I would say keep your mind open.

Services

Leslie: I will tell you that one of the best services that I think this company does is the pre-list. They have two guys who will come to the property, do the most professional photos and they both know what they’re doing in the real estate transaction to begin with. They get it but they take great photos. They take huge pride in capturing each room just right. Then they do the floor plans so people can see a picture of what the house looks like and how it flows from room to room and that gets turned into a video and it gets turned into a whole package.

I believe the statistic is that 96% of our office listings go through prelist services. That’s a big deal and I can’t tell you the first time that I had a prelist on one of my listings, those sellers were blown away at the process. Like, “Wait, do I have to pay for this?” “No, it’s just part of your listing. We cover that through our fees.” They were so impressed and they could not wait to share the photos, the floor plans, the whole package, with all of their people which of course is more marketing that we don’t pay for. That you never know who you’re going to reach or what connections may happen.

Laurie: Here’s this, it’s all done and here’s this it’s all done and oh, my God. Then you can focus on your clients. You can focus on getting more business. Just having that admin do three or four things for you it’s like the world.

Lisa Durant: If you’re going on vacation and you have something come up, sometimes when you’re on vacation as a real estate agent you’re never really on vacation but there are things that come up that you can’t not– You can’t just ignore a home inspection. If you’re a listing agent, an appraisal. We have a program and we have a system in place where you can just put in there. “I have an inspection on x-day and another agent can grab that.”

Lisa Gamberdella: It’s almost like Uber

Lisa Durant: It’s almost like Uber and take care of it for you. You know that you’re getting a licensed agent who’s assisting you on that. There’s a small fee involved and even the fee piece is put in place.

Leslie: Yes and automated.

Lisa Durant: You know exactly what you’re going to pay that agent because fees are all set by the company. You need someone to do a home inspection, this is much is going to cost for their time and it’s automatically sent out to them after they do it. Those are services as an agent you’re often scrambling, “What am I going to do about this? Who’s going to help me?” You’re asking everybody, “Can you cover my vacation next week?” There is something in place here to help you out.

Tracey: The gentlemen that do the prelist take a great a deal of pride in their work. The most amazing thing was there was some dust on the sign that was being hung up, he immediately went back to his truck, “I don’t like dust,” and he gets out cleaning wipes and he goes and he cleans the sign and make sure it’s sparkling and shiny. Did a fantastic job with the photos, the floor plan. Time-suck. Doing your own photos, editing them, running them through Photoshop to make sure that the light’s right and everything, they don’t look gross. Everything is straight is a huge time-suck. Honestly, having a prelist is massive. It is just so helpful.

The Leadership Team

Leslie: Anthony has a great mind, knows his stuff but he’s always thinking ahead. So I heard a speaker once that talked about in hockey, you don’t want to skate to where the puck is, you want to skate to where the puck is going to be and that’s Anthony.

Tracey: He’s paying attention to what’s going on not just letting his team members underneath take care of everything. Everybody who is up there at the top, sold. They’ve had experiences that we all have on a daily basis. They’ve been through it and they’re stable. They’ve all been there for a long time. They’re able to answer any questions, but he seems to have very firm ground growing the company and keeping that whole upper level that’s there to help us, that’s when we send our help e-mail. It goes out to everybody up there and having them all on the same page no matter what question is, getting an answer very quickly. It’s huge because—

Jean: You don’t get seven answers. 

Tracey: You don’t get seven different answers. You don’t get, “Oh, well, that person is no longer with us,” Or “Well, we changed that policy,” but you didn’t tell anybody. That’s very frustrating as an agent. I really like the stability of the upper-level management. When I talked to an agent who had come from a franchise like five years ago. My question was, “Are they still this nice?”  and she actually looked at me wide-eyed and then she busted out laughing. She’s like, ” Yes, they are.”  It’s weird. They’re still this helpful and there’s five years later, this nice and still this helpful. That’s huge.

Leslie: The caring, the fact that Anthony knows everybody’s name and the staff just wants to help. They’re seriously very, very impressive.

Brand

Gerry: The marketing is second to none. Anthony at the company, the marketing itself as a company has done a great job marketing itself, name recognition, brand recognition, especially in Massachusetts, is right up there if not better than most that are out there. The longtime big-time names and that sort of thing. Name recognition isn’t a problem whatsoever.

Leslie: You go on a listing appointment especially and I’ve been in this area for a long time as many of us have. I don’t know if you’ve had the experience but they’ve known who I am, they’ve called my cell phone because they want to talk to me but then I go and meet with them and say, “Well, now I’ve migrated to Lamacchia,” and they say, “Lamacchia, We see him on TV all the time, do you actually know him?” “Yes, we see him all the time, I could text him right now.”

Gerry: And he’ll text you back in two minutes.

Leslie: Exactly. To consumers, that’s a big deal because he is a brand, he’s not franchised but he’s a brand, he has built this reputation for himself and his company that now we all get to share and that’s pretty cool.

Lisa Gamberdella: I have an agent this weekend in an open house, I’ve never met him, I’ve seen his name around, telling my clients that they’re getting the best of the best because I work with Lamacchia and I’m like, “I’ve never even met you and that’s awesome.” He couldn’t say enough good things about everything.

Gerry: It’s like taking all of the good things from a franchise, you’ve got the connections, you’ve got some training and learning but the referral network relocation that is one of the big things when you’re with a big franchise, we get that. Leading RE basically is the makeup of quality, independent brokerages and we have this connection like the franchisers would have. What’s nice is that they’re all like-minded in the fact that their quality, independent, so they have the flexibility to not underneath this corporate umbrella. It’s all of the good things that you would get with a corporation not the bad things.

Lisa Durant: It’s an opportunity to assist clients across the entire nation not just locally. The opportunity to have excellent marketing materials, branding, and we can truly connect our customers with the top agents throughout anywhere not only in the US but nationally. What I think is really awesome is Anthony is very committed to making sure that us as agents, develop our own brand.

Advice for agents watching

Leslie: If you want to build your business, if you want to have success, if you want to have a good lifestyle too and be very respected and be part of something huge, this is the place.

Gerry: Don’t wait. Meet with him. Come to some of the events. Come to some of the training. One of the nice things too is that the training isn’t just for the Lamacchia agents. They put on training at off-site locations and invite agents from other companies, “Come see what we’re doing.”

Lisa Durant: It’s hard to understand what you are missing out on if you’re not a part of it so by coming to the live trainings he does. crush on real estate in different locations on Friday nights at a local restaurant. Nobody’s going to promote that you were there, we’ll respect your privacy but you will learn something, and you’ll get a little taste of what we are so happy to be a part of and so proud of. This just doesn’t exist in other places, and it’s hard to understand that unless you’re really a part of it.

Laurie: Take an hour out of your time. Set up a meeting, and, please, go. You will not regret it. Period.