Real Estate Sessions Rewind - Michael LaFido, Founder, Luxury Marketing Group

00:00:00 - Bill Risser

Hi, everybody. Welcome to another Real Estate Sessions Rewind episode. This week, we will talk to our guest from episode 253, Michael LaFido. Michael is the founder of the luxury marketing group, and he's got a new book coming out, which we're going to cover in a shortcut next week. So I thought, why not kind of go back in time about four years ago? And let's get refreshed on Michael's story. So here you go.

00:00:24 - Michael LaFido

You can be a student of the game. I don't care if you're with colo Banker. You can learn from Remax. I don't care if you're a remax. You can learn from compass. I don't care if you're compassed. You can learn from XYZ. Be a student of the game. Grow. Your knowledge and your confidence will grow.

00:00:41 - Bill Risser

You're listening to the real estate sessions, and I'm your host, Bill Risser. With nearly 25 years in the real estate business, I love to interview industry leaders, up and comers, and really anyone with a story to tell. It's the stories that led my guests to a career in the real estate world that drives me into my 9th year and nearly 400 episodes of the podcast. And now, I hope you enjoy the next journey. Hi, everybody. Welcome to episode 253 of the Real Estate Sessions podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you so much for telling a friend today. I'm very excited. We're going to talk about luxury marketing, the luxury real estate market with Michael LaFido. Michael's written a book on the topic. He's also created a designation, the Lux designation, that's available in a few states now, and he's rolling it out more around the country. He speaks nationally on the topic of marketing for luxury properties, and he says, you can do it. Anyone can do it. It doesn't matter what kind of car you drive, it doesn't matter where, where you grew up, that this is a market that can be, that can be dominated with the right strategies. So I'm really excited to chat with him today. Michael, welcome to the podcast.

00:01:46 - Michael LaFido

Thanks, Bill. Excited to be here.

00:01:48 - Bill Risser

Yeah, I'm excited to have a conversation with you because when I found out you live in the Chicagoland area, I'm really hoping that you grew up there. Was that where you were born and raised?

00:01:58 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, I've lived in Wheaton, Illinois since 1984. It tells you I'm dating myself. But, yeah, 36 years have lived in about 25 miles west of downtown Chicago.

00:02:10 - Bill Risser

Okay. A good buddy of mine grew up in Elmhurst so you're close to that, right?

00:02:15 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, absolutely. Technically, my real estate license is hung with the brokerage in Elmhurst, so that's a great, great suburbanite.

00:02:23 - Bill Risser

Can I just assume that, you know, you were in total rapture with MJ and the Bulls in the nineties?

00:02:30 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, absolutely. I love that last dance series that they just had. And, yeah, I mean, I went to. Went to some great playoff games. I was at the playoff game when the Bulls beat the Knicks, when Jordan is, when he was retired and Scotty Pippen refused to go in. I was at that game and was at some other playoff games. I went to the game when the Bulls won. Their 70th in Milwaukee was the first time. And any NBA team has won 70 games in the regular season. Now, golden state won 73. They won 73 and nine. Now, they didn't win the championship. The Bulls won 72 and ten.

00:03:07 - Bill Risser

I knew that was coming. Yeah, I made sure I took my son, who was only five years old at the time, to a Clippers game because we lived in San Diego at the time. I took him to a Clippers game to see MJ. I just had to see Michael play, even though he was only five, you know?

00:03:24 - Michael LaFido

No, you're absolutely right. And I put walter payton up in that. For a Chicago fan, you know, great running back for the Bears. You know, it was pretty cool, because when khalil mack got traded to the Bears a couple years ago, I had the great fortune of previewing michael jordan's home for a potential client. At the time happened to be khalil. So that was pretty cool.

00:03:47 - Bill Risser

Wow. Nice. Nice. I like that. I like that. So I love you. If you listen to the podcast, I love talking sports. It's just too much fun for me to. To find out where everybody's kind of heads at, so. But I have to ask, is it Cubs or White Sox for you?

00:04:02 - Michael LaFido

You know, I'm a Cubs guy, but I. The White Sox had a no hitter. Yes. I like to sign when they won the World Series in zero five. I'm a Chicago fan, but when they play each other, I'm definitely a Cubs guy.

00:04:13 - Bill Risser

Okay, cool. I like that. You. You're into sports, did you. I'm just gonna guess you played some football in high school?

00:04:20 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, I played high school baseball and football and a little basketball, but I was a scrapper in basketball, but, yeah, football is. I was a baseball guy up until high school, that was my favorite sport. And in high school I went to, you know, some high school football games and I fell in love and football has been my sport ever since.

00:04:37 - Bill Risser

Yeah. What was your position in high school?

00:04:39 - Michael LaFido

I played strong safety, defensive back, and then in college, I played college football at Northern Michigan United University, division two, and I played cornerback there.

00:04:48 - Bill Risser

So you're a wildcat, is that right?

00:04:51 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, Wildcat. That's where Steve Mariucci and Tom Izzo went there. Jerry. Jerry Glanville, a former Falcons head coach.

00:04:59 - Bill Risser

That's right.

00:05:00 - Michael LaFido

Yeah.

00:05:01 - Bill Risser

That's cool. So, Michael, let's talk about, first of all, you know, playing, you say division two, I don't care. You played college football. That has got to be a thrill. It had to be an incredible adventure. I mean, talk about that a little bit.

00:05:17 - Michael LaFido

Yeah. So, you know, I do believe that sports, there's more life lessons in sports and then maybe the classroom. Right? So I'm coaching my kids right now, and I think there's so many lessons in sports. So, you know, some of my biggest mentors were my high school football coaches. And so I was very fortunate enough to be on a state championship team in high school. And then I played junior college football. You talk about non glory football, you're playing in front of the same number of people that you probably played in front of 9th grade freshman football. I mean, literally family. That's it. You're playing for the love of the game. And I was very fortunate enough to have enough highlight types even though I never started a junior college game. Now, again, we, we were on one of the best junior college. We never lost a game in two years. We were basically a division one factory. We had amazing athletes there. And, you know, you talk about what life lessons you have. So I literally recruited myself. So when I was, I sent out my highlight tape to schools including northern Michigan, where most of the time they're recruiting you. I was sending out, just like I recommend the real estate agents today when they prospecting to cancel their expireds. You know, I had to differentiate myself, and I did reverse prospecting. I did reverse recruiting back then, and northern Michigan, Washington called and I thought they were going to be like everybody else and say, hey, thanks, but no thanks. But he said, hey, we're interested in bringing you up and offering you. So that was pretty cool.

00:06:46 - Bill Risser

Do you watch football today? You must watch it differently than all the rest of us because you've played the game at a high level and a cornerback of all positions. I mean, on the island. I mean, when you make a mistake at cornerback, everybody sees it. If you make a mistake at offensive guardhouse, not many. The film room sees it. How do you handle that?

00:07:06 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, that you definitely have football knowledge just based on that. Bill, you're absolutely right. The way I tell people is, you know, my mom who still says, what were you on offense and defense, you know, some 20 something years later, you know, people that are watching a game, they don't know much about the game at all. They don't. They might not even know offense or defense or position names, but everybody knows when a defensive back makes a mistake, particular cornerback, because it's usually six points or a big score. So every play you had to be on, you had to be knowing what the tendencies are and pass, run, read your keys. And that's what made it so, you know, competitive for me because I wasn't the most gifted athlete, but I had to study the game and no film and no tendencies. And again, that translated into, I was a teacher right away out of college, and I was a part time real estate agent. And then, you know, now fast forward, I run a luxury consulting company and speak across the world. And those lessons that transfer over to.

00:08:09 - Bill Risser

Real life, we hear that time and time again. When you hear an athlete talk about post, post their athletic career, even hall of famers come out and talk about how important those lessons you learn, right? When you're all working together, you got 50 guys all trying to achieve the same goal, and everybody's got to have each other's back, you know, and that, you're right. That absolutely directly applies to the world of real estate.

00:08:37 - Michael LaFido

It really does. It really does. You know, working with personalities, types. Right. You could write books in real estate, right? Horror stories, client funny stories, whatever. As real estate agents, you know, dealing with people from different backgrounds. I played junior college ball, and, you know, I come from Wheaton, Illinois. There's not a lot of minorities in Wheaton, Illinois. I had some african american teammates on my football team, but I went to junior college, and Caucasians, whites, we were the minority, and it was predominantly african american teammates. It was great. It was great to learn, and it prepared me as a teacher. It prepared me for dealing with clientele from different backgrounds, different languages. And again, you can't learn that stuff in the classroom.

00:09:22 - Bill Risser

So you were going to be a teacher from day one. Is that where you're going in education? Was your major?

00:09:27 - Michael LaFido

Yeah. So I looked at, you know, you know, when I was struggling, what I wanted to be as a sophomore in college, my football coach, who also was my guidance counselor said, you know, think about people that have been influential in your life. And they were all teachers or coaches. So I knew I wanted to be a teacher and coach from that point on. So I graduated with a double major in health education and physical education and my first job in 98, I was a high school health and physical education teacher and a freshman football coach.

00:09:54 - Bill Risser

Wow, that's great. You, you mentioned you're coaching your kids. Are they playing? They're playing ball already.

00:09:59 - Michael LaFido

Yeah. So they're playing. They haven't done tackle. My oldest was going to do tackle this year, but because of Covid-19 but they did flag football, and I was their coach last year. It was a blast. We, we went undefeated, and I was the d coordinator and we had seven games and we had six shutouts. So I'm a pretty intense coach, but, but I have high expectation of my kids and my teammates. But more than any, I want effort. I don't care if we win or lose. Like, I just coach them in baseball this year. And we were four and six going into the playoffs. We won the first game, and then we played the undefeated ten and zero Cubs team and, and we were up going into the fifth inning and we ended up losing eleven nine. But I was so proud of the kids because they didn't blink right. And I, when my kids are pitching, you know, and say, you know, finish, finish, right. I want them to finish. Just like in life, you got to start something. You got to finish. Or when my kid's pitching against their number one hitter, I'd say big on big. Like, this is what you play for. Like, you want to go against the best. Like, these are things that you learn about through sports that I can't tell you, Bill, I was at Inman, New York, I guess it would have been 2019, and I had somebody come up to me like, oh, Mike, there's someone I want to introduce you to. Well, it was a real estate agent in Atlanta, and she's like, man, I wish I would have met you. I had an opportunity to list a $10 million plus home. It was pretty much a shoe in because somebody referred me. It was a PGA golfers home. And because of fear and limiting beliefs and the what ifs, she didn't even take the listing. And so, like, I, again, if she, and she may have been, I could be wrong, but if she was a high school athletic, played even, you know, even fifth grade, 7th grade athletics, and she took something from life back then. Like, man, I remember this time we played this team and I didn't blink and I went forward and like, those are things that you can transfer from sports to real world.

00:11:50 - Bill Risser

It's so funny you say that. I still remember to this day, my baseball career ended fairly early, but in the majors, so we're twelve at the time. Right. But Donnie Coons was coming up and his older brother Doug had the record for home runs and I was pitching. It was the last game of the season. It was the last at bat because I had come in in relief. And if he hits one more home run, he breaks his brother's record. And it was something in me that said, is not going to be off of me. I can. And he did not go yard on me. It felt so good. Yeah. Take something out of that. I think that's, that's awesome. You've said part time real estate. So how did that, how did real estate get in your life?

00:12:28 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, it's funny story. So the summer before my senior year at college and this, in the summer months, I worked, I worked for a buddy of mine's dad, and I power washed and stained decks. So literally, you'd be out in field power washing, getting dirt and grime on you, and I'd be collecting the checks that, you know, I'm making up the number, I can't remember, but let's say I was making $12 an hour and, you know, I'm collecting $300 checks, $400 checks, and I did all the work and I knew I was going to be a teacher. I'm like, this would be perfect. So I got it. That summer when I graduated, I started my own deck cleaning business. It was called deck Reshine. Made about as much in one summer as I did my first year teaching. And two summers later, I was power washing a guy's deck in Naperville, Illinois, and the last name was Darfler. And he says, hey, have you ever thought about getting in real estate, Mike? I said, no. He goes, well, I run a real estate brokerage, and my best real estate agent is a, is a teacher and a coach at North Central college in Naperville. The next, you know, that's where the gentleman lived. And two months later, I got my real estate license. And the way I looked at it, Bill, was if I could sell one home a year, that'd be the equivalency of me coaching a couple sports. And I was cool with that. And there was a gentleman, God bless his soul, he passed away. But Bob Glover, who was a teacher with me at Glenbard south in Glen Ellen, he was a agent, real estate agent at Colwell banker. That's where I hung my license originally. And Bob said, hey, Mike, sometime you're going to make more money selling real estate than you are teaching, and you might consider stepping away. And I'm, like I said, there's no way. If I could sell 30 to 40 grand in real estate a year, that's the equivalency, my part time business, I'd be happy. Well, sure enough, you know, a couple years later, I was the second leading producer for the entire midwest for realty executives making high six figures. And I stepped away from teaching in 2000. 920. Ten.

00:14:23 - Bill Risser

Yeah, you stepped away. We're going to get you back there in a little while, though, because the teaching. The teaching never leaves the teacher. I don't think, ultimately. Right.

00:14:32 - Michael LaFido

It does. And so that's where my consulting and my coaching and my lux designation comes in, is I'm speaking across the country. My course is approved in Texas and Georgia, and we're looking at Florida and other states because it's in my bloodline. I want to help people. Even when I'm coaching eight, nine year olds, if I can make somebody believe in themselves, feel better about themselves, like there's, there's something for me that, that is invigorating about this. I read a quote today from Maya Angelou. I'm probably butchering her name, but she says, I've learned that people will forget what you said, people forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. And, Bill, there's something about that. Like, I love inspiring adults, educating real estate agents, you know, helping them increase their average sale price, because I do believe, you know, if an agent is more successful, they're going to have less stress at home. If they have less stress at home, they'll have healthier relationships, they'll be a better parent.

00:15:32 - Bill Risser

Yeah, it's a big circle, and that's just going to make them a better realtor. Right. It's just this great cycle that you want to get into. I've had agents in my role with fidelity say to me, you know, Bill, what's the secret to getting in the luxury market? And, and my answer was always like, know somebody in the luxury market and go work with them or, or have a sphere that's already kind of luxury based. But I think you're going to tell me something different. And this is, you've written books on this topic, right, about how could I? And how did you do it? Let's start there. You know, what, what, what was that? Driving force, that. And what was that tactic or that strategy that helped you?

00:16:09 - Michael LaFido

I guess a couple things. So being a former athlete, right. You know, success is a journey, not a destination. Like the film doesn't lie. You mentioned that. Right. So we play Friday night lights, high school football, and, you know, we had high expectations. Our coaching staff. We took second in state my junior year, my senior year, we ended up winning state undefeated. But you'd feel good about the win on Friday night and Saturday morning. You come in as a team, you watch film, and the coach would light you up or maybe embarrass you indirectly by calling you out, like, hey, Mike, why was your head down? Or I put you in a perfect position to succeed and you missed a tackle. And so as an athlete, the drive to be the best, to be better, is always there. So when I was, you know, as a high school teacher, going to conferences, going to football clinics from a real estate agent, I remember early on I invested in coaching by referral only, and Joe Stump was who I invested. And I remember taking sick days and going up to Lincolnshire, Illinois, and being around full time real estate agents. And here I am, a part time agent, you know, dressed like a gym teacher, but learning from best practices. So, you know, then luxury, then fast forward to luxury. But doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out in a commission based industry, if you sell higher priced products, you make more money. And so, you know, I knew that there was a void in luxury. I was coaching luxury agents and I realized that there was a void out there. You had the million dollar agents, no offense to them, out in California and LA or out in east coast, but. But the average agent couldn't relate to them because they didn't live in Beverly Hills or they didn't live in the Hamptons. So for the blue collar communities or for the everyday person, and here I am, Midwest and Chicago based. And a lot of people could relate with my story more so than the top luxury agents in those areas I mentioned. So I kind of shifted bill everything from just helping agents and inspiring agents to really more luxury specific. But the stuff I teach relates to all price points, but we do focus on luxury.

00:18:13 - Bill Risser

Okay, that makes sense. You mentioned your designation, the Lux designation. Talk that that's got to be, first of all, that, where'd that idea come from? Because there had to be this moment where you went, you know what? I think I could do this and then talk about the process, because I'm sure it's not just as easy as, yeah, hey, here's a class, and I'm done here. Give me my designation.

00:18:36 - Michael LaFido

Well, there's right brain people and left brain people. Right, your left brain on your analytical, your spreadsheet. I'm a right brain guy and most real estate agents are. So I'm creative with our videos and outside the box, but, but putting together a course, writing books. You know, I've written books. You know, that's not easy to do for somebody that's high energy and a little add like me. So it certainly didn't happen overnight. And it's just like anything else. You've done over 250 of these. And if you listen to your first one, it's compared to the one today. Right. It's night and day. Same thing with us. And so we launched, our designation at the time was called marketing luxury expert. When we launched it, we launched in Dallas, Texas, to a re Max office, Remax, DFW, and Mark Wolf, he has over, I think, 300 agents and very successful remax franchisee in the Dallas Fort Worth market. We had over 100 agents at our training and at the time they were launching a luxury division. And maybe you know the name, maybe you don't, but, but Judy Ledore, she helped brokers recruit agents. And re Max is a big client of hers. She speaks at four reals. And she told Mark, hey, you got to talk to this guy. Because Mark was launching an internal luxury division and he was thinking about, and it's a great designation. I never badmouthed the competition, but he was thinking about having the luxury institute to teach their designation course. And Judy highly recommended me. So he interviewed me and we didn't have any, and we still don't. You don't have to have sold luxury homes to take our course to get our designation. And that was a big difference of our course and the institute's at the time. But Mark had us down and we helped him launch his luxury division. And we've done three reiterations and updates to our designation since we launched it four years ago. So again, it's that athlete in me, always getting better. We went from 14 modules to 16. We just helped Keller Williams launch their luxury division in Mexico. They had us down at their family reunion in Mexico, and we taught our course. We've had interest from others speaking different languages, taking this more global. And so we're looking to continue to grow this bill. And it's practical. I believe people that take our course say it's practical. In other words, you're a newer agent. We speak your term analogy, but it's also advanced. You know, I'm a luxury agent in Beverly Hills or the Hamptons or. I believe that they'll learn something from it as well.

00:21:08 - Bill Risser

What are some of the myths about the luxury market or even agents that succeed in that market? There's got to be a few that you see.

00:21:16 - Michael LaFido

There's five common myths. And I actually just covered this with maybe, you know, Aaron Luden with Orlando real producers. I got a training with Michael Mayer from seven levels of communication just last week doing this. And so number one is you have to be licensed x amount of years before you can sell luxury. That's false. You could be a newer agent and be luxury, but I. Most people think you gotta have some gray hairs before you can sell luxury. Number two, you have to come from wealth. You have to live in a luxury home. That's false. Number three, you have to be with a certain brand. Hey, I can only be with Sotheby's or compass or fill in the blank to sell luxury. False. Number four, you got to drive a certain car to sell luxury. I mean, that's false. And number five is you can't compete with x amount of already luxury late agents in your market. In other words, builders. 13 luxury agents already in your market. There certainly isn't room for a 14th or there's five. There's not room for six. Those are all false. False, false. I call those limiting beliefs. And so I tell real estate agents, grow your knowledge and your confidence will grow. So grow your knowledge by listening to Bill's podcast, by listening to our podcast, luxury listing specialist, reading books by. You can be a student of the game. I don't care if you're with colo banker. You can learn from Remax. I don't care if you're remax. You can learn from compass. I don't care if you're compass. You can learn from XYZ. Be a student of the game. Grow your knowledge and your confidence will grow. If you're more confident, Bill, you do more prospecting, some more lead generation, you'll, you'll go to broker tours. You'll, you'll take that listing. I have a winery. I'm selling a winery outside of Galena, Illinois. It's two and a half hours from Chicago. I didn't even know we had wineries in Illinois. It was a referral from an era agent down in Florida. And my philosophy is have car, will travel. I believe that. I'm a marketing agent. And if I do my due diligence and I understand local trends and the schools and the unique features of the home and the location. I can market that home better than a local non marketing agent.

00:23:27 - Bill Risser

Right. In my 20 years in the business, it seems to me that marketing is a word tossed around a lot in the real estate space that very few realtors are good at doing. Very few. Do you agree with that?

00:23:43 - Michael LaFido

I would agree. My tagline in my consulting business and even my home selling business, it's not the market, it's the marketing. And I believe an agent's job is to position the home more effectively so more buyers can visually see themselves buying and moving in and buying the home. And, you know, I was selling a house in downtown Chicago. It had a twister themed bathroom. In other words, like the Twister board game had red, yellow, green circles. I was the second agent. You know, there's an old adage in real estate, you want to be the firstborn, second wife and a third real estate agent. Many times I'm the second or third real estate agent. The first agent didn't show any pictures of that bathroom for good reason, right? I mean, I know 999 out of 1000 buyers wouldn't want to touch that bathroom, no pun intended. And I looked at it as an opportunity, Bill. So I had my professional photography company take a photo of that bathroom. I matter of fact brought out the board game and placed it on the bathroom countertop. And it was part of the photo in the MLS because I believe our job is to get more eyeball traffic. If you get more people looking at the home, more people talking about it, more people raising their hand, you'll have more qualified shows showings. The more qualified showings you have, the higher probability the seller's going to net more money.

00:25:01 - Bill Risser

I add into that loop. I've talked about this before, but like writing good copy or being a graphic designer, I mean, these are all really important skills that I think some agents try to do. That stuff's got to be outsourced. You mentioned you're a professional photographer. You know, you, you know your limitations. Yeah, you know, and you, you probably outsource that, that stuff.

00:25:20 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, absolutely. So I'm a big believer. Like, you know, I know your audience can't see what I'm doing, but if I were to hold up my phone like we are basically in a tinder industry, people are either swiping left or swiping right on your listing. In my listing, they don't care. I could literally bring in some of the best copywriters in the world, have the best description. They're not reading it, Bill. If they don't like what they see in the photos. And so most agents, they either show too much or not enough. Okay. And so it's our job to highlight the best features of a home and downplay the least favorable. And most agents are terrible at that and they're terrible at having that difficult conversation. If I was coming into your office, Bill, and I was taking photos of your office, I might suggest less is more. So let's take some photos down, let's do some of this and let's do some of that. But most agents don't want to step on your toes or offend you and they don't feel confident explaining and articulating that. And so guess what? They position the home poorly and you get less showings and less offers and lower offers.

00:26:25 - Bill Risser

How has Covid-19 affected your world in the luxury side of things? How's the high end market handling this?

00:26:33 - Michael LaFido

The luxury market, not just in Chicagoland. Like you, I have a podcast and I have fingers on multiple pockets across not just the US but the world. The luxury market in most major markets is actually stronger than it's been in years. Again, not the downtown areas, not the vertical living condo market in Chicago, but the single family homes in the suburbs. Just, you know, within a half hour out, Chicago are thriving. I had an agent from Houston I talked to the other day. She's had more showings on her million dollar listings in the last month than she had in the previous twelve months combined.

00:27:09 - Bill Risser

Do you see those people in those towers moving out to a place where I got more room in case I got to do this again?

00:27:16 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, I see people moving out. I also see an influx just like the commercial I think you mentioned earlier, fidelity is doing a lot of more zooms and people aren't going into work. I think the commercial, the office space and residential condos are going to struggle for years, maybe moving forward. And so I feel like there's going to be an increase in short sales and foreclosures in the downtown market because people can't sell them.

00:27:45 - Bill Risser

Yeah, that's going to be tough. That'll be tough to do so. Yeah. And you know, Florida and Texas I think are the two places that are probably going to benefit a lot as well. Right. Luxury markets here are extremely busy.

00:27:59 - Michael LaFido

Yeah, I think you're going to see tax friendly states. Of course, Florida, you got no state income taxes. And same thing with Texas. I think, you know, even smaller markets like Colorado and Denver and the national market and Arizona, I think you're going to see Carolinas. I think you're going to see better climates and more tax friendly areas are going to benefit because people are tired of just burning their money and giving it away in some of these cities that are run by higher tax philosophies.

00:28:31 - Bill Risser

Michael, I've had you the half hour and I know you've got some work to do, so I want to just give you the final question we've asked every guest. That's what one piece of advice would you give a new agent? Just getting started.

00:28:45 - Michael LaFido

You hang out with nine top producers, you're bound to be the 10th. Who's in your inner circle? Who are you learning from? Zig. Ziglar said you hang out with nine dead broke people, you're bound to be the 10th. But, but who are you surrounding yourself with? What are you listening to? If you want to be a top producing agent, if you want to earn x amount of dollars, you got to observe them. Tony Robbins says success leaves clues. Go figure out what someone else successfully has done and model. So that's what I'd recommend to your listeners. You know, there's tons of free content out there. We interview people just like you do. There's tons of free content out there. Success leaves clues.

00:29:25 - Bill Risser

Michael, if somebody wants to reach out to you or, you know, find out about your designation or find your books, this is your chance. Where should we. And we'll put links in the show notes. So they have access to all that stuff.

00:29:35 - Michael LaFido

Yeah. So our designation is just luxurylistingspecialist.com, luxury listing specialist. There's an FAQ section that can learn about it, what's covered. There's 16 modules. You can learn all about that there. We have a free Facebook group luxury listing special. So I'm a big believer in free. We have our podcast that's free. They can go to luxurylistingpodcast.com, or it's on Stitcher, Spotify, iTunes, and, you know, they could always shoot me an email. Bill. Michael, arketingluxurygroup.com comma Michael at marketing luxury group. You know, people can google you. They can google me. There's enough ways to find a. Yeah, that's great, Michael.

00:30:11 - Bill Risser

This is great. I really thank you, first of all for sharing some of those football stories. That's amazing. And I love, I love how that's become just a part of who you are. And I really look forward to kind of running into you again at a session somewhere when we're back seeing each other face to face.

00:30:26 - Michael LaFido

Absolutely, Bill. Appreciate what you're doing for the industry and keep raising the bar.

00:30:30 - Bill Risser

And likewise, thank you for listening to the Real Estate Sessions podcast. To leave a review or rating, go to ratethispodcast.com slash resessions. You can also subscribe to the podcast at your favorite podcast listening app. Finally, you can go to the realestatesessions.com and subscribe to our email newsletter and be notified whenever a new episode is released.