From Recruiting to Real Estate: Karen Saez’s Rise in Northeast Florida

Tracy Hayes  0:00  
Hey, welcome back to The Real Estate excellence podcast. If you're new here. This is the show where we bring you the top minds and rising stars in Northeast Florida, real estate agents, brokers and industry pros who are making moves and raising the bar. Today's guest is a powerhouse in the Jacksonville market, bilingual, business savvy and driven by service before stepping into real estate, she built her foundation and corporate recruiting with Deutsche Bank, supporting teams across California, New York and right here in Jacksonville. She's also no stranger to entrepreneurship, owning and running her own bar before driving in full time into real estate now, she's thriving as a real estate advisor with the 904 home guide team at real broker, where she specializes in relocation seller representation and helping military families navigate major moves. As a former military spouse herself, she brings not just market knowledge, but empathy, strategy and serious negotiation. She's also stepping into leadership as the 2025 vice chair of NE Fars Young Professionals Network, known for her grit, creativity, people first mindset, she's helping clients write the next chapter of their lives, whether they're buying their dream home or cashing out at top dollar. Joining me today is Karen says, Hi, did I pronounce your last name correctly? Science, yeah. Who was it? The other day I had on, oh, it's Caitlin with market makers, and she told me how to pronounce her last name before. And then when I, I don't know, I had a brain came down to it. I had a brain fart when it came to the Showtime there, but Karen, I appreciate you coming on. Obviously, you know, I've been watching what you've been doing. Follow you on on social media, what you do. You do a great job with your with your stories in Instagram. We should do a little bit more on faith. You need to put some stuff over on Facebook. And your Facebook is kind of because when I want to send my cards out every month I look for pictures on Facebook, and I I have to go, yeah, yeah, you have to feed me some feed me some material there. But really appreciate what you're doing, and I'm excited. You just had a great month. So let's start off with that. Tell us what, what? You had some sales, and actually one sale got bumped out, a little bit. Two got bumped two, two got bumped out. So you would even had a bigger month, bigger month. Yeah, so what? What kind of started that? That started about 6090, days ago. What built up to having such a big October?

Tiffany Riley  2:28  
I would say, I would say, started about so last month was what October just finished October. So that started. One of them started since June. So I've been working with his clients for a while. Since June. They were initially, they're downsizing. So they were initially looking at condos. We looked at about 11 condos, and then quickly realized, hey, this isn't what we want. It's way too small. We're coming from like, a four or 5000 square foot home into a condo. So quickly we learned that. And then we started looking at homes, single family homes. We looked in E town, they said, No, this isn't a fit. Then they send me a house in Eton. They're like, yeah, we want to move any time I'm move in each and I'm like, it's E town said no, but they know what they wanted. And finally, we made it happen. So, yeah, that happened for a while, since June, I've been working with those clients. And then the other one was super nice and easy. He knew exactly what he wanted. We found it, and within 30 days, we closed on it cool.

Tracy Hayes  3:19  
And then, what were some you we were talking earlier as I saw some stats, and I don't know, like I said, Ricky caruther, Jared James, was talking about deals falling out. Some of these deals haven't fallen out. They've just gotten bumped for you, what are some of the reasons or challenges that you're having that other I'm sure some of the agents listening are having as far as the some of these getting bumped out a little bit, or you're having to extend the contract.

Tiffany Riley  3:44  
So I can talk on three of them, but I come to mind right away. Actually, four of them. People selling their houses has been an issue. So it's easy for like, for me, I'm great. Like, once you tell me what you want in a home, I'm able to find it relatively quickly. But it's the other side. Like, I have one client who's moving from Maryland, we've been under contract since July 19, and we're now in November, and she still has not been able to sell her house, so that closing has been getting pushed out every single month, and now we're looking at hopefully closing in December. But still, that's, I think that's a big hurdle that we're having to face here, is people selling their homes in order for them to buy a new one. Right in some cases, as you know, you can do bridge loans, but in this particular case, she's buying new construction, and she's not able to do that.

Tracy Hayes  4:32  
She's not able because I think I might have a solution for in case someone's listening right now and you're having a similar situation that Karen's having the product we have. We call it purchase edge here, and what it does is we will put a contract on her home. Obviously, we're doing the we're doing the loan that she's using to buy the next home, right? That's, that's why we're in the game as a lender. We will put a purchase home under contract. Contract and take it out of the debt ratio. Now, obviously she's if she needs a bridge loan and she's got enough equity, we've done that too, where we've given her, given her even a bridge loan against her home she's selling, so she can have at least a small down payment to get that deal to happen. But what it does, it gives you four more months to sell her current home. So so she she can close, if she was closing today, you know? Or what we would do seven days before closing. So basically, next week, we would put a contract on it today, take it out of the debt ratio, close next week on the home she's moving into. You still have 120 days from today. So basically, four more months to sell that home. Now, if no one wants that home and wants, yeah, ultimately, there it's, you know, yeah, it's 75 cents on the dollar. It doesn't sound attractive. But generally, in most cases, if you're able to, you know, I would call you say, Hey, can you sell this home in four months? Well, yeah, we probably could. And if we dropped it 10 or $15,000 it would probably go, she's just trying to get maximum. At some point she's gonna make that decision, and if you are comfortable with it, obviously makes them feel that, hey, we could sell this in the next 120 days. I just need to move now.

Tiffany Riley  6:11  
The problem is that I'm not her agent the sale. She lives in Maryland, so we, I referred her to another agent because the one that she had clearly wasn't doing the job correctly, yeah, lack of communication and some other things. So she's now working with the newer with a new agent, and hopefully we can get under contract on her

Tracy Hayes  6:29  
sale kernel, yeah, yeah, no. Well, the one I, one I just did last month, what they were down in Wellington. So we, the agent I was working with here, was not the agent there, and Tom, my partner, he just did one in Nashville, which he did do a bridge loan. They had plenty of equity, but because of their income, they couldn't afford both houses, and they wanted to move and and they were able to put that together. But it's so agents out there who are listening, if you have some contingencies, give me a call, because we could probably possibly put something together. Obviously, we want to get how much equity we're working with and and that sort of thing. So you're not so you can get the sale. Luckily, you've been, because a lot of clients are like, Oh, just rent. Hopefully you this one, of course, obviously you've been able to hold on and hold all the hold the builder, right? The builders been holding in place.

Tiffany Riley  7:14  
So, all right, the switch houses multiple times.

Tracy Hayes  7:15  
But, yeah, yeah. So, but these are any you got another story is

Tiffany Riley  7:20  
that another one is a same thing, new construction, but it's an independent builder, and we're just having a big issue with him finishing the work. So we were supposed to close October 17. They got pushed to the 31st so give him more time. Now we're November 13, and we still are hopefully closing tomorrow.

Tracy Hayes  7:37  
You would think they would would have motivation like, Hey, man, let's get this thing to closing. So I get my cash get paid right

Tiffany Riley  7:45  
for over a year, and it's for a dear friend of mine from high school. So it's obviously, all of my deals are important to me, but when it's like a close friend from, like, back in the day, from high school, it's like near and dear to my heart,

Tracy Hayes  7:57  
stressing, yeah, you're already stressing, no matter who it is, but then the fact that you know this person a little bit more personal, you don't want them talking stuff at the holiday parties about you. It's not your fault. Hopefully the home, hopefully the hopefully the builder is just really doing great work and just taking a little bit more time and just gonna get that much better of a home. So kick back a little bit. Let's tell us, get a little bit background on your story. You you're working as a recruiter. Is that what it was if I sell

Tiffany Riley  8:27  
Yeah, so I was a recruiter for Deutsche Bank. I was overseeing the operations division like I was overseeing a wealth management and a couple of our divisions for the bank right here, off of Gate Park, West and not far from here. And we recruited hundreds of people, we had to transfer them from California to Jacksonville, or we would recruit for positions in California, New York, and obviously here in Jacksonville as well. And

Tracy Hayes  8:51  
again, because this is considered Deutsche Bank, this is their US headquarters. Is here, right?

Tiffany Riley  8:55  
Yeah, they have a separate and I think the one it's in New York.

Tracy Hayes  9:00  
New York is the headquarters, but they have a big office here in Jackson.

Tiffany Riley  9:04  
So we had two campuses, I think now the close one campus, and now they're on the big three story building off of gay Parkway, right? That's the one I worked at.

Tracy Hayes  9:10  
What'd you think about that business? I mean, obviously there's, there's a little bit of salesmanship, but how far did you take it as a as a recruiter? So I

Tiffany Riley  9:18  
was actually, I started working for a staffing agency. So I was a recruiter for, like, admin, for coach. So I would hire, like, their call center people, and I would do the interviews under training. And that was really cool. And then Deutsche Bank found me on LinkedIn and recruited me to work for them as a recruitment partner. So it was more of like a like an upgrade, I guess you would say I worked really closely with Brian Faye, which is like the CEO of the Jacksonville branch here. And it was, it was a really fun job. I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed calling people and just saying, Hey, you got the job after going through seven or nine rounds of interviews. So that was really exciting. So I did the fun part of recruiting, right? Not the Hey, you're fired.

Tracy Hayes  9:56  
That's part of H, yeah, the HR part of that, that's HR, well, I. I think if you haven't been trained to interview, it's a skill that I think lot of young people should actually learn, because when they are on the they are not the actual interviewer. They're being they're inner they're being interviewed. They understand in are prepared in how to address the questions, right? You were a young person. Now, obviously you hopefully you're going to spend the rest of your life. Soon, you want to spend the rest of your life being a real estate agent. So you won't be interviewing, per se, for any jobs, but the skills that you learn there, and I would imagine that some of your friends who are being or are going out for interviews to try to get jobs, are you're giving them some tips. Yeah, I would just

Tiffany Riley  10:50  
amaze for them even, yeah, like I would sit there and redo the resume so they could get, you know, higher up, because we'd get 150 resumes for one position. Yeah, and a lot of them you're looking for keywords. But I'll tell you how I use my skills that I learned being a recruiter in real estate. I'm interviewing buyers, I'm interviewing sellers, whether we're a good fit for each other, because not everyone's going to be a good fit for me and I'm not going to be a good fit for everyone. So I'm able to translate those skills that I learned as a recruiter into real estate. Also, when I started interviewing brokerages and teams to work with, I was sitting there interviewing them and see how we could be a potential good match or not, yeah. So I was able to use those skills and, you know, move

Tracy Hayes  11:26  
them into, it's a, it's a, it's a great skill. I recommended anyone out there, or any, any young people, learn how to be an interviewer, because you'll be a better interviewee.

Tiffany Riley  11:35  
Yeah, and you have to apply your listening skills, right? Yeah, asking the question, and you got to be quiet, yeah? Just let them talk, because you're going to discover more things like a seller, you understand, why are you selling? Right? So you're asking them the questions, you're interviewing them, and then they're telling you all their pain points, and then it's your job to listen and to figure out how you can solve their

Tracy Hayes  11:53  
problems. Yeah, 100% works. So, yeah, no. So Solid pre real estate skill, no doubt there that was hugely valuable to you. I know you at a luncheon, you told us briefly about your your entrepreneurship into the bar. So tell us how you, how you went from the recruiter to the bar owner.

Tiffany Riley  12:15  
So funny, girlfriends and I went to Tulum. So three of us went to Tulum, and we were all from Jacksonville, and I was like, we don't have any kind of cool bars in Jacksonville. We're all in our like, mid 20s. And I was like, We should do something like this in Jacksonville. So my girlfriend's boyfriend, at the time, he owned restaurants and whatnot. So I called him one day, and I was like, hey, like, we should maybe find something together. And like, I'll help you run it. You just be like, the, you know, kind of like my guide and my mentor, and then I'll run it. So that's kind of how it happened. He called me one day and he said, Hey, I know someone that's selling their bar. We're gonna buy it as an existing business. That's how much money you need from you. Do you have it? And I was like, Yeah, I actually do. So we went partners and that, and I worked at Deutsche Bank Monday through Friday, 8am till 5pm and then from like six or 7pm until two, 3am on the weekends, I would be working at the managing the bar all on my own, so I was exhausted, yeah, and so that's kind of how I became a bar owner. Again, learned lots of cool little skills that I use now. You know how to run a team, how to hire like I didn't even know how to bartend at all, like I never touched a drink in my life, like I would drink right a consumer, but never made them right. I put myself through a bartending course just so I could learn how to make the drinks, and I could train other bartenders, or just understand and know that they were doing it correctly. So that I did that for almost three years, and then I realized this isn't the kind of lifestyle that I want for myself. Great money I made my investment back in four months, which was amazing, super profitable business, but it just wasn't what I wanted. It was like I said it was making great money, but I just it wasn't fulfilling me, you know, sitting there serving alcohol and tobacco to people, and I just wasn't fulfilled. My son was six at the time, and I was spending a lot of time away from him, working weekend, so he would be with my mom every weekend, and I would be working at a bar nights, you know, just alcohol, drunk people. And I just decided this isn't what I want for myself anymore. I put the business for sale. It took many, many months, many tears. Finally Sold it, and then I just said I sold it in December, and I said, I'm just gonna get my real estate license. I don't want to go back to corporate. I just kind of want to do my own thing. And I got my license. A little bit of backstory, yeah,

Tracy Hayes  14:30  
give us the backstory. And what led you to real estate, what started to get you intrigued about so

Tiffany Riley  14:36  
my dad. I grew up in New Jersey, and my dad was a part time builder. I would say he would find a piece of property, and he would just build out he had his GC license, and he would build houses, not many, maybe four or five a year. So it would be around the whole construction process, how they would dig up the hole to put the concrete down for the basement, Jersey, right? And I would be around for it, all the framing, the drywall, all of it the painting. He would actually. He'd take me with him to select certain colors and certain things. So I grew up around real estate. Never, in my wildest dream that I think I'm gonna be a realtor one day, never. So I was always around real estate. I always liked it. I was kind of in, you know, like a little interest in real estate. He also owned apartment complexes, so would help him go like door to door. This was many years ago. So we would go door to door, knocking, asking for rent. My dad doesn't speak Spanish. Obviously I do, and so he would have some tenants that only spoke Spanish, and I was, like, 1213, years old, going around asking people for rent, or, like, translating letters for him in Spanish. So that kind of, that's kind of what got me, like, a little interested in real estate. And then once I sold the business, I said, hey, what can I do that's a business that I can just go all in on and something that I like, and I remember, like in real estate, and I sold my own house. I was my first thing that I ever did for my own was sell my own house. So I said, let me just go dive full force into real estate. And here we are.

Tracy Hayes  15:57  
Yeah, well, you got me intrigued now, because it's this that what you just said, I did not know you're, you're, you're, obviously, I assume your dad's American. Where's your I assume your your Spanish comes from your mom, yep, so she's Colombian. She's Colombian, okay? And I just find it, you know, because I've had some like Jocelyn. And then there's been some others that, you know, she didn't even know the language, even though she was born in New York, but she grew up in Puerto Rico, but she didn't know that. And just some great people that have come here and done some great things, you know,

Tiffany Riley  16:38  
actually, I wasn't born here either. I was born in Colombia, and I moved here when I was eight years old. Okay, well, another, same thing. Didn't under, like, literally, went to school, didn't speak any English, but I had, like, a private teacher that would come to the house, so I learned it pretty quickly, in about maybe six months or so, yeah, but it was rough, yeah, he walked around with a little translator, just typing in one little word and showing it to the my friends at school. And it was an interesting story.

Tracy Hayes  17:03  
No, that's another tidbit I did not know about you. I mean, because I really, I am working on my book about the show I'm loading. That's why you see all the lot of the blogs going out right now about not only the current people I've had on, but people I've had on a couple years ago. Is because I'm creating y'all on the blogs, and then we're gonna put but gonna put but the underlying meaning, or one of the biggest chapters, is going to be a grit, and the grit that a lot of real successful real estate agents have and and things they've overcome in their life, coming here and learning a whole nother language. Now, fortunate enough, it sounds like your parents were fluent in a sampler, is able to hire you, you know, a tutor, or whatever, to teach you that on the side. But still, that's a, you know, a huge taking on to learn a whole another language, and then the just your your stories, your willingness to go out, put go out there and put it out on the line, and that you did there owning the bar, I'm sure that taught you a lot about yourself. You had to learn a little bit. Not only were you managing people, but the people that were coming in, you had to learn a little that said you've had to take some of those skills to the real estate world as well. Oh yeah,

Tiffany Riley  18:19  
they met a lot of people. Actually, two people that knew me from the bar became my clients. One of them was a young military guy, and as soon as he followed me on Instagram, as soon as I sold the business, and he realized that I was in real estate, he asked me to help him buy a house, right? Va, loan zero like nothing out of pocket. So it turned out great. And then his dad wanted to buy a house, so I helped him buy a house as well. There was another person that wanted my help and helping them sell his house. And yeah,

Tracy Hayes  18:46  
well, I'm a strong believer in I think we don't test our young people enough anymore to take on challenges because we're afraid they might fail when that's actually better for them to fail than to just try something and it's easy for them, and they succeed and get all the accolades very easily. It generally doesn't last long. But when they're when they're actually challenged out there, whatever it may be, you know, it just makes them a better person. And I think you've been you've taken on challenges, and I'm sure, like you said, there's you were in tears selling the bar, you've put yourself in situations and have come through. But now, now, as a real estate agent, you're going out there to meet a new client, you know, and everyone's different, as we know, every transaction is different. I say that all the time, every client's different. You don't know who you're going to be working with, necessarily, but you have the confidence. I'm going to figure this out on you know, I'm going to, I'm going to make the leap, and I'll figure it out on the

Tiffany Riley  19:49  
way down, exactly. Yeah, that's how everything is in life. You just have to go out, put yourself out there, try it out, and you have to give yourself no option but to succeed. Yeah, the bar was that. I don't know what I was getting myself into. I. I said, I'm just gonna do it. My mom was against it. My mom said, Why are you doing that? You're wasting your time. You're wasting your money. I said, Nope, I'm gonna do it. And I did it four months later. I said, Look, I already made my money back. It's been the same way. But real estate is a little bit harder, because you don't make money right away if and so now talking about real estate a little bit. When I first started, I started, I sold the bar in December. I took like, three weeks off, didn't work, went on vacation. It was great. And then started January, and I hit the ground running with real estate. But I wasn't used to having a schedule, right? Or I didn't know what kind of schedule I should have to be successful in real estate. So the first two months, I didn't make any money, zero, yeah, like, no money, because why? So I was going to Pilates at 10, and then I was going to lunch with a friend, thinking, Oh, this is networking. This is going to get me somewhere. Those friends didn't buy for me until I

Tracy Hayes  20:49  
started. You can't go out with the same friend all the time. They get once every few months, maybe once, I

Tiffany Riley  20:56  
learned that, and I was like, hey, like, it's been two months into this, and I'm not making any money, like I gotta figure something out. I started going to classes. I started watching stuff online, buying courses to teach myself a little bit more about real estate. And then I just became a little bit more structured, because if not, I knew I wasn't going to be successful at

Tracy Hayes  21:14  
it. Now, did you start off with the nine of with Mike right away? Or where'd you start off? I started at

Tiffany Riley  21:19  
Coldwell Banker as a solo agent. The realtor that sold me my house here in Jacksonville was with Coldwell Banker. So as soon as he found out that I got my license, he invited me to a, like, a marketing class at Coldwell Banker, right? They have, or, I don't know if they still do or not, but when I was at Coldwell Banker, they had a great, great training program. They put you in this training program for like two weeks, and they teach you all the contracts they teach you scripting, they have great marketing materials. So that's kind of why I was drawn to global banker. But I was a solo agent, so getting my own leads was all up to me. I wasn't buying any leads. I had to, like, grind and get my own leads.

Tracy Hayes  21:54  
Alright, so let's, let's dive into that a little bit, because I think it's very important, because I often think that, yeah, there are some new agents. I'd like to think some of the people listening to show are thinking about getting in the real estate. But then again, there's also some people who've probably been with their initial brokerage now, and they're not really blossoming like they they would hope to, if you were to do it again, this is the question, first question I want to ask, if you were to do it again, knowing what you know now, how would you start differently? Would you have done something differently?

Tiffany Riley  22:29  
I think so. I think I went with Coldwell Banker because of friend work there, instead of putting myself first and figuring out what I needed, the marketing like I said, it was great, but it was in my style of marketing. So maybe I would look for a brokerage that offered either my style or marketing, or I would hire somebody to do my marketing for me. So that's what I would do differently. Again, interview, yeah, you're not they're not interviewing you. They want you to work for them, right, or with we know what their brokerage so you're interviewing them. Go out there, meet as many brokers as you can, interview with as many of them as you can, and figure out what you really want out of a brokerage and start with that. I

Tracy Hayes  23:06  
want to still stay on the subject, but you just said something that I think is very important, and one of my last guests. Well, two guests ago, Kevin Guzman, she's the Regional Vice President with Caldwell, banker war guard in Manhattan. Okay, so she's dealing with a lot of high level people selling lot of high volume things, and one of the things we talked about is finding the marketing that works. How does she as part of retaining people in the brokerage, you've got to obviously add value to all these, you know, 120 people that she has, you know, basically, I want to say reporting to her, but she, well, she reports to right? She's helping them. And, you know, we've talked about breaking down the importance of finding what is it? What marketing is your way of marketing? What's Karen's way of marketing is different than Mike's way of marketing. For example, what was it that you made that statement that their marketing wasn't quite what is, what is your what have you found your way to be?

Tiffany Riley  24:09  
If I can, I would say more personable, just the colors, the fonts, simple things like that. You have to figure out what grabs people's attention. You have to study a lot. You have to ask chat GPT. And I feel like coal bank, coal banker was just, here's what we have. We're going to use the same colors for our branding, for cold bankers branding, and that's what you got to go with. And so I was like, Oh, well, I don't really like this dark blue. It's too dark. Like, I want something that's more, you know, neutral tones, or whatever my branding was, and they didn't have that along with other things. So I was like, Oh, I think it's best for me to part ways and go somewhere else, and then again, within my first year, I felt like I could still learn a lot more, so I decided to join the 904 home guide team. Mike had been a great cheerleader since literally my first email. I sent out just saying, because I started sending out emails to all as many agents as I could, where I sent so many that I got. Right? My email blocked me, but I would just say, hey, like, you know, I'm a bilingual realtor. If you guys have any clients that speak Spanish, send them my way. I'll pay your referral fee. And that was my email. And then Mike saw that. He was like, Hey, let's connect. Let's grab coffee. Again. Me not knowing anything, I was grabbing coffee with everyone that offered me free coffee. So I was like, Yeah, let's meet up. I don't know who this might guy is. Meet Up. Met up with Mike, and he was a great cheerleader. We followed each other on Instagram. He gave me some great tips from the get go. Never pressure me into joining his team or anything like that. Every time I said hey on Instagram, hey, I need a window repair person, he would be the first one in there, sending me a name and a phone number. So I was like, I like that. That's really nice. One day I met up with him, and I was like, Hey, I think I want to join your team. I want your guidance. I want your expertise. He's been highly successful in real estate before real estate. He owned a staffing agency that one of my friends from Deutsche Bank worked at, so he had a good references. And I said, I want to join him, learn from him, and see how he got to where he got, because I want to duplicate his systems and his processes, right? And that's why I joined the nine, four home gate team. Yeah, and it's been great.

Tracy Hayes  26:04  
I imagine because you're young. Well, I think everyone does, because you're a young person. You just have more you're out and about and so forth. You're a lot of your girlfriends or whatever. Ask you about real estate. What would you say are two or three things that someone who is thinking about getting into real estate needs to know

Tiffany Riley  26:21  
how serious are you? Number one, because, like I mentioned earlier, you're not going to make money right away. People think that all you have to do is open the doors and show pretty houses and then you get a check. It's not like that. People have to trust you. First, I have had friends that haven't bought from me because I was too new in the business, right? So they decided to go with someone else. So how serious are you? You have to understand that you have to have maybe some savings or some cushion, because it is expensive. You have to buy lock boxes. You have to pay for your brokerage fees. Some brokerages have monthly fees, so you have to invest a lot into it up front and understand that it could take you a little bit before you start making money. Don't be like me. Don't just go to coffee with everyone to try to actually be purpose with your purposeful with your business. So I think I would ask that question, like, how serious are you? And is this your plan B and C, or is this your plan A? Because if it's you, I give it, go all in. I will help you. I will guide you to, you know, to as much as I can and go online. There's a lot of YouTube videos. There's a lot of training for free online. Do your research and just go all in and figure out what works best for you.

Tracy Hayes  27:25  
Did you Well, I guess you had, you had the agent that sold you the house at Coldwell Banker. So you obviously, I imagine you spoke to him before you even got went and took the test. No, I didn't. You didn't you went, Well, I

Tiffany Riley  27:39  
got laid off at door shipping during covid. Okay? And that was, like the turning point that I said, I can't rely on working for someone else, like, I have to rely on myself, right? I had a mortgage, I had a car payment, have a I had a four year old at the time, like, and I'm a single mom, so I said, like, 100% all of this falls on me, and my son depends on me 100% so I can't sit here and work for a company. And I didn't know I was gonna get called by gonna get called back. Luckily, I came back three months later. But during those three months, like it was 100% on me, and like me making money,

Tracy Hayes  28:09  
that just blows my mind of an institution as big as Deutsche Bank, because I imagine in Germany, they would have kept them on the payroll,

Tiffany Riley  28:16  
maybe, but it was covid time, nobody. We went to hiring freeze, they cut our pay down to 10% Yeah. And I always live below my means. So I said, You know what? 10% is fine. My mortgage is low, my car payments low. Like, I can survive with that pay cut. And then they call me one day, HR, and I remember exactly where I was sitting, the conversation I had. HR, my manager called me and they said, I'm sorry, but we have to let you go. And as a single mom that like 100% your child and everything relies on you. Like, that was really hard. Yeah, that's when I was like, I'm gonna get my license. I didn't call anybody. I just said I'm gonna get my

Tracy Hayes  28:46  
license. Yeah, no, that that's, that's commendable. I mean that about you in your journey. And I have, I really haven't heard a failure, yet somewhere along there, there had to be some sort of thing that you did wrong. Oh,

Tiffany Riley  29:07  
I can tell you transaction. Yeah, tell us. Okay. So it was, it was a, it was a condo that looked like a townhouse. So to me, I looked and I was like, it's a townhouse. I didn't know anything. I was listing it, and we're, like, going through it. I got multiple offers, and I was like, oh my god, this is so exciting. Like, I have like, four offers. Surely one of them's gonna work. Well, I call my trainer. My trainer didn't answer. It was over the weekend,

Tracy Hayes  29:30  
my Coldwell Banker, no, the trainer, Coldwell Banker, no,

Tiffany Riley  29:34  
I was, I was at another brokerage for like, just this transaction. After this transaction, I'm going to Coldwell Banker training. Okay, I'm not gonna say any names, but that's all right. I started somewhere else. Anyway, I called my trainer. Trainer didn't answer, and she said, Hey, Monday, hey, sorry, I might lift my phone at home. I'm like, it's like, 2020, 2021, whatever like, and don't come back for it the whole weekend. So anyway, I ended up. Listing this, this condo as a townhouse, obviously, with title like all the all the things, the legal back end, paperwork, it all fell apart because they realized, hey, this isn't a townhouse, this is a condo. So it's whole different process. And the whole thing fell apart. We were, like, five days from closing. Everything fell apart. I was actually in Tulum, that trip that I told you about, went to Tulum. I was in Tulum expecting to close on this while on the trip, and I ended up losing it all. The seller said, I don't want to work with you. You don't know what you're doing. You're a professional. How did you not know that it was a condo, not a townhouse? And I said, because it looks like a townhouse. And so, yeah. So that was my first failure, and after that, I was like, Maybe I'm maybe I'm not cut out for this. Maybe this isn't for me. Very next month, I got a buyer lead close on it, 30 days, I was like, Wow, this wasn't as bad as I thought. So, yeah, that is one of the first stories that

Tracy Hayes  30:52  
I haven't I haven't gone into I was doing this for a while because I, like I said I did. Got all my transcripts. I'm here mumbling, and I want to write a book. And during this time was also, you know, I'd like to go out and speak. And one of the things I speak about is the grit of real estate agents, right? And I call it every, everyone has to have their LLC, right? Said, everybody, well, LLC, no, you have to have love, laughter and consistency. So I'm gonna break it down. Obviously, the first question is very simple, in the in the in the love laughter, consistency. Why do you love real estate?

Tiffany Riley  31:32  
I love helping people again. Like I said, from recruiting, I love helping them find a job and just hearing, oh my gosh, like I got the job. That's so exciting. So I felt like I was part of, like, their family, almost. Family, almost in real estate, it's even more emotional, and I feel more connected to them. Because when I walk into a house with a buyer, first time buyer, second time buyer, whatever the case is, and you just look at them and you see that sparkle in their eye, like, you know that that's the one, I literally get the chills every time because I look at them and they're like, this, is it like? And I can just we talk about stories. I'm a big, like, visual person, so we talk about, like, this what you can do for Thanksgiving, and this is what you can decorate and you can do it. So I love doing that aspect of it, and helping them buy a house. When it comes to sellers, whether you know it's a divorce, which is very unfortunate, I get to be that support system for them, and I get to say, Okay, this sucks, and you're going through a really rough time right now, but here's what you can get out of this. Let's sell your house. Let me take that burden off of you. I'll manage the whole process for you. I'll make it as simple as I can for you, so that you walk away and you feel more at peace during an uncomfortable situation. Same thing with the death of a family member. So I like being there for people and helping them after we close, like my clients can tell you, like, I am still their friend. Like, we still go to lunch, I'll bring them donuts for Christmas, I give them ornaments, like, I make it special, so that they know that I'm still there for them. And it wasn't just a transaction or paycheck for me, it's more of like a you're my family now, yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's why I love real yes, no. Great for them and like, family.

Tracy Hayes  33:01  
You know, if I had a statistical data sheet, that's one of the the expressions that a lot of the best that I've interviewed answer is the post closing relationship part that they are still reaching out to you. Obviously, you take it upon yourself. You you would obviously, you're dealing with a lot of different people, but you take it to take a little bit of time to still stay in touch with them one way, shape or form. Maybe it might be just social media, and we'll get to that part, because I know you spend a lot of time on Instagram, the laughter part. So we got the love the laughter part, and this may be the story you just told us, but I always feel in life when you're, you're taking on your next challenge. You know you're taking maybe, maybe it's you, like you said, I know you want to get into luxury, and you're, you're going to now that person with that 234, $5 million home now is calling you. So you're a little more nervous than that person selling the 300,000 because this is, I know that's the area you want to get into, because you told me, and it's not a it's not a big deal, because we look back at those other mistakes we made in life and how we still are here, right? How we made it through is there's one. Is there a story that you can think of, that you kind of revert back to, maybe even tell at cocktail parties as a joke that you laugh about besides the condo townhouse deals.

Tiffany Riley  34:27  
I can't I think that's like, the funniest one that I can think, well,

Tracy Hayes  34:30  
that's a great learning lesson

Tiffany Riley  34:34  
now, but I'm like, Oh my gosh, yeah, so

Tracy Hayes  34:35  
embarrassed, but it is a common mistake for any agent listening out here. Just because it looks like a townhouse doesn't mean it's a single family home attached, because that's what a townhouse is. Is when lenders, because we go in there, you know, we can click template, the one other drop down we have is attached or detached, and a townhouse is a single family home attached, versus a condo. They could look like townhouses, but they're zoned as a condo, because it's the way the associations built. Lateral links, I just did a deal in there last month. Lateral links, they look like condos. You would think they're I mean, I'm just saying they look like townhouses. You would think they're townhouses, but they're actually zoned as condos. So it's very important to know the difference. Yes, the fees are generally a little bit higher, but you definitely that's a learning lesson. Never forget, consistency is the c part. What do you think you're doing in the I'm sure this has probably evolved over time. What are you doing now in your business consistently, whether it's something you do every morning or you do once a week, or whatever it is, but you're doing consistently you feel moves the needle in your business.

Tiffany Riley  35:42  
Needle in your business. I think checking the hot sheet first thing in the morning, like, I go to the gym, I come back home, I shower, change, and then I check the hot sheet, see what's see what's new, see what's, you know, sold, see what's expired. So I can tell my my clients, either buy or sellers. I'm like, hey, this just happened in your neighborhood. Remember that house we looked at? The price just went down. So I'm able to talk to them and be that expert, which is why they're hiring you, right? Because they think you're the expert. And Zillow shouldn't tell them like you should be the one telling that person, hey, the price just dropped $5,000 on this house, so you've been interested in or, Hey, this house expired. Let's see how we can maybe talk to the seller.

Tracy Hayes  36:17  
Or house just came available in the neighborhood you're looking at, right? Because that's very demanding here,

Tiffany Riley  36:22  
too. So I think that's number one. Number two is just staying top of mind, like reaching out to them if they had surgery. I'm like, Hey, how did your surgery go? And I put everything. I put everything on my calendar. Someone has a graduation, I put it on my calendar. Or, which is cool about an iPhone, is you can schedule your text now. So what I do sometimes, as I'm thinking of it right then and there, I schedule out a text to go out on X date at x time. Hey, how was your graduation party? Or how was this and that somebody, one of my clients, just had a he was competing for, like, a bodybuilding competition. Friday morning. I was like, hey, good luck in your competition. I didn't write that Friday morning. I wrote the, like, five days before, right? But I hit send, and then he got it right then and there. And I looked on my phone, I forgot I scheduled that. So I think just remembering their their milestones, if you see something on Facebook or on Instagram, reach out. Don't just give it a like comment, say something, say top of mind. So they remember you, and they know that you're you care about them.

Tracy Hayes  37:13  
Now that the scheduling the text message is as little as some people may think that is, it's actually brilliant, because you're seeing that and you're going like, oh well, geez, okay, it's competing Saturday, but all sudden, Sunday or Monday comes by, and you forgot that. You know life. Everyone has life. We have other things going on. You got a kid. You're we're kids are taking us all over the place, right? We got so many other things. You got another listing appointment, whatever it may be. And you forgot, even though you wanted to, but you wanted to three days before it happened. So scheduling it is brilliant. I mean, even just to put the happy birthdays in there and schedule those to go out there, because you did think of them. You just may, you just wanted to make sure you didn't forget them, which is, that's really the important

Tiffany Riley  37:58  
that used to happen all the time. Like, I would be like, Oh, I gotta remember to do this. You get busy, you get a phone call. You're on the I'm on the road all the time, so if I'm driving, I'll do it later. And then you forget, yep. So the easiest thing to do is just to either put it on your calendar or just schedule the text to go out rather than or the email, whatever. As little as it may be, it makes a difference.

Tracy Hayes  38:16  
Don't discount a small that that little message may be handwritten, whatever

Tiffany Riley  38:22  
works for you. Just make sure that you make your clients feel important and seen

Tracy Hayes  38:26  
that. That's that's a well, let's, since we're talking, we're, I think you're going to lead into social media. You do a lot on Instagram. You do a lot of stories. Tell us what I think I hate, I hate when people ask this question. I don't think it's a valid question. Are you getting any business from it? Because I don't think you know all the time whether or not your business came from Instagram. You may have met the person in the bar, but because he was following you on Instagram, that when he had the transaction, which, who knows how long you know time was last time you saw that person? But because he's following you on Instagram, and you're telling, you know you're giving, you know you're you, I know you give some advice, or what you do. A lot of the stories of, hey, this is what I'm doing today, type of stuff. And that stayed top of mind. And he said, Hey, I need a real estate agent. I'm going to call Karen. I follow her, and I see your stuff all the time. She's always reminding me she's a real real estate agent. So I think when people say, Oh, are you getting any business from it, you really don't know if the business came from it or not. So I

Tiffany Riley  39:31  
actually asked, like, hey, what made you think of me? Or I've actually okay, so yeah, I will tell you a story. I someone messaged me my first like social media lead, someone from California. He worked at Coldwell Banker. He messaged me on Instagram, and he said, Hey, my parents want a home in Florida. Can you help them sell it? And I was like, Is this real? Never met them. You don't follow me. I don't follow you. Just found me on Instagram, right? Sure enough, he I looked him up and everything. He worked for Coldwell Banker. He put, you know. Realtor, Jacksonville, Florida. My name popped up. My picture, whatever it was, popped up. He messaged me. I listed his parents.

Tracy Hayes  40:05  
He searched an Instagram for realtor, yeah, interesting. Look

Tiffany Riley  40:09  
at my name. And this is a good advice for newer agents, for for agents that are on social next to your name, like my name says Karen. Say is Jacksonville realtor. So whenever you're looking at my story, if you see if I watch your story or whatnot, it'll say Karen sai is realtor, Jacksonville realtor. So he must have typed something in there. I popped up. I worked for cold banker. He worked at cola banker. He was like, Oh, let me reach out to her. I still had to interview with him and his parents, and I got the job. So I listed his parents house. So that was one, another one earlier this year, a agent from California. Same thing. Found me on Instagram, and she reached out. She had a client that was selling her investment property in California, and was coming here to buy two properties. So I helped her buy two properties, and I'm actually selling off market her investment property, another investment property for her right now. So I've gotten repeat business.

Tracy Hayes  40:58  
I've never used Instagram as a search mechanism. I guess that's probably why I'm like mind boggled by it. I use

Tiffany Riley  41:04  
it all the time. If I'm going to Nashville, I put Nashville, and you look at the reels, what comes up, and you start scrolling, and it's like, Tiktok. I don't use Tiktok, but I know that I probably should. But people search on there all the time. Jacksonville, real estate, realtor, buyer's agent, something along those lines.

Tracy Hayes  41:21  
Alright, so go a little deeper with your with your your poster. When you start doing your caption, is there certain things you're also putting in there? Besides, obviously your name has Jack's realtor next to it. But are you? Are you also, is that search in Instagram also looking at the caption and information that you have

Tiffany Riley  41:40  
there? I think it looks at the hashtags more than anything. I get some reels that do really well. Others don't do so well. I feel like a lot of my carousel posts lately so we have like, multiple photos those are performing better than the reels that I've been posting. As of lately, I've been asking Tracy b t for like, SEO prompts and things like that, just so they can perform a little bit better. So that's been helping stories, polls. Like, if someone comments on a poll, I reach back out to them. I individually text them or not text them, but reply back on a DM and I'm like, Hey, thanks for responding. What did you think about blah, blah, blah. And we like interact that way.

Tracy Hayes  42:15  
I probably go to Instagram more. I do do a lot on fit well. A lot of anything I post on Instagram goes to Facebook. But what I find myself doing, because I want to, is I want to see what you guys are doing, right, and I want to interact with you and that sort of thing. And what I catch myself doing is when I go to Instagram, and obviously you got the little circles at the top with every you know, so which you are, oftentimes the first person. I'm like, Okay, what's Karen doing? I start with your story, right? And I find myself all sudden, I get caught in the stories, you know, going along. And then I go, man, I haven't looked at any of the, any of the true feed posts. And so I stopped myself there and start going down through the through the different feeds. So, you know, the stories are, are important, and obviously you're putting a lot out there, in there, and I think that's people are spending. I don't do they actually really track. Is there a statistic that you can actually get on how many people are, how much time people are spending on your stories?

Tiffany Riley  43:17  
I don't think on stories, but it tells you the amount of there are stats that you can see on there. How many are new followers? How many are obviously the existing followers? How many people clicked on your profile from your story, right? So that's why it's important to do both, like do stories for your followers, because if someone's not following you, they're not going to watch your story, obviously. And then also do just regular posts on your feed, because non followers will see those posts on their explorer page, right? So that's

Tracy Hayes  43:41  
why it's important, because they want important, because they want to follow you, then they're going to get you in the stories you're going to get, or suggested to see watch your stories. What do you think you know in your experience and you know, like, I think any of the social media you have to go through a fail forward type of thing. Like, what is it you're doing that you feel gets you the most attention, if I can ask it a better way, as far as Instagram.

Tiffany Riley  44:09  
So I feel like I could be a lot better on Instagram, if I'm being completely honest and I want to get better doing more on Instagram, I honestly talk myself out of doing a lot of videos. I'm like, oh, I should do this. And then I'm like, no one's gonna care about that. And Mike tells me this all the time, just post the damn thing. Yeah, yeah. And I talk myself out of doing a lot of it, to be completely honest with you, but I feel like when I talk about personal stories, that's why I don't just post, oh, just closed. If I post a photo of, you know, a client closing on a house, I talk about the story behind it. What? Like the condo one? I'm like, Oh, we looked at several condos, and then finally we found a house that they liked. And I feel like those that people can relate to. And it's like a story type of telling people really are attracted to those. They comment more, they engage a lot more with those, versus you're just sold, just listed. Nobody cares about that, right? Right? Like, I.

Tracy Hayes  45:00  
Yeah, maybe someone in that neighborhood might see that, yeah, 100 100% because I was just thinking, when you're talking about that, because I'm doing a lot of study on the podcast outreach, right? And I'm listening to this one guy grow the show, Kev Michael is his name, and he's now, you know, a podcaster, are really being the audio podcasts have flatlined, where the YouTube people are watching them more, and they're whether it's and actually on TV, phone, second, obviously. But the different things in the in as I got some questions here, we talked about what's trending, and the one way he said he was getting trending questions, he didn't actually say not to do chat GBT and ask him or go to Google and that, you know, whatever the analytics they got is actually go straight to the straight to the source in which you would you're a source of what questions have you had from your buyers or sellers recently? Because if they're asking you those questions, there's probably 1000s of others that have the same, similar questions, which will rapid fire through the ones I've got here, which is what chat GBT is saying, what people are asking about real estate in Northeast Florida, as far as as far as you know, our conversation today, and to when you think about that, she's that's the third person this week. It's asked me some a similar question like that. I need to do a video on it, right? That's that should be, what? What should we think? So? A little tip

Tiffany Riley  46:28  
there. Sorry, real quick. The one that does really well is, if you're talking about like, I did one post where I took the girls out and we did a girls night. So I went to like, three or four different places. We just got an appetizer and a drink from all of them, and I went around different spots here in Jacksonville, I posted that girls night out, that's still till this day. And I did that like last year in December, till this day. I'm still getting likes, shares. I've gotten a few followers from it. And I don't, I mean, I do it more stuff to get like, obviously, people to come to my page and follow me, and then see that I do real estate, and then hopefully do business. 100% Yeah, but yeah, seeing those like things happening around Jacksonville, like those get a lot of engagement because, because maybe you don't know about Catalina, and I did, and I posted about it. Now you know about it, right? I mean, yeah, so just helping small businesses within Northeast Florida, and just telling people what's out there,

Tracy Hayes  47:15  
well, 100 100% and we should be doing, as business people that in the business that we're in be doing more Google reviews and all those types of things. But yes, I think for for you, especially being a young person, you're out, you're, you are, you know, doing girls night out and that sort of thing. Yeah, it's, it's definitely going to attract people in there. And obviously, you know, tagging these restaurants and these places is in the point being, is what you said, is to get people to start following you. Then they'll fall into your real estate videos and go, Oh, she does real estate. I mean, I don't think people understand the value of of the video of seeing like watching us today. People who are watching us are their brains are not differentiating that this is a video versus us, like you and I are sitting in the same room together, that they're building a relationship, and you are building a relationship with these people who start following you, for sure, even though they've never, may have met you face to face yet, but hopefully in that real estate need that's they're gonna think of you. Yeah,

Tiffany Riley  48:23  
I have so many people that follow me. Like, I have one guy from New York, never met him, no idea who he is. Comments on all my stories. Like, super encouraging, super sweet. Hey, great job. Hey, this looks great. Nice hair today. Like, just very nice and encouraged. Sounds like me.

Tracy Hayes  48:36  
My comment on yourself.

Tiffany Riley  48:41  
But you just never know. People will tell me, like, girls will say that, like, I've never met you, but I feel like we're friends. I had one girl call me. She was like, hey, I want to get into real estate. Can I call you? And I was like, please, do we just chatted on the phone. She's getting her license November, or she's taking then you

Tracy Hayes  48:55  
told her to listen to the real estate excellence podcast, right?

Tiffany Riley  48:59  
A lot of great information. A lot of top agents go on there. Yeah, go listen in. But yeah, I feel like videos really help people get to know you a little bit, even if they're in California or New York

Tracy Hayes  49:10  
or whatever the place. Well, I don't, don't discount, because you do it very well, and you do a lot of it, of your just, hey, this is what I'm doing, or, Hey, I'm just leaving the gym. I think the authenticity is a word we haven't thrown out there yet, but it's behind the scenes that a lot of top agents talk when they're dealing with social media, be as authentic as possible. And I think that's, you know, part of your attractiveness too, is you're you're being authentic. You know that I'm out here battling the real estate world, and this is what's going on.

Tiffany Riley  49:41  
And I'm also at the gym, and that's why I don't have a separate Instagram for real estate, because I feel like if I have a separate Instagram for real estate, it gets

Tracy Hayes  49:49  
boring after a while, yeah. Like, just sold trying to maintain two channels and

Tiffany Riley  49:53  
that too. But I just do it so that people know that I'm still a human being, like I am, just like, you, I still struggle. I almost did a story. Today about how slow I'm getting at running, but I decided not to. I was like, I'll save it for another but, yeah, just it's relatable, and then it gets people engaged. Like, hey, you're running. I'm running too. Or, hey, you encourage me to run. And then you never know, it may lead into, hey, my dad's looking to buy a house. Can you help them? That's what it comes down to. But it's just you being authentic and you being just who you are, and those the right people will gravitate to you.

Tracy Hayes  50:22  
Right, similar, like minded people will gravitate to each other, typically. All right, we're gonna, I got these questions. These are trending questions in Northeast Florida, real estate just, we'll just make a few comments on on each one. But these, this is what's trending right now. Number one is now a good time to buy a home in Northeast Florida? Or should buyers waste?

Tiffany Riley  50:46  
No, definitely, definitely, the market stats and everything tell you that in the fall, home prices fall, right? It's a trend over the last 20 years or so. It does come when it happens. So right now it is a good time to buy a house, whether it's new construction. Builders are obviously wanting to get their inventory out and sold. So for sure, for that aspect, yes, also for sellers as well, like the market tends to slow down in the winter time. So I would say you have more of a competitive approach of, hey, maybe we can go a little bit below, or we can negotiate certain things. So yes, it is still a good time to buy. Interest rates have come down a little bit. I mean, little bit, and maybe you can chime in on this a little bit more than I can. But again, like we talked about earlier, like maybe you can negotiate the seller buying. If rates scare you, maybe you can say, Hey, Mr. Mrs. Seller, like, you know, as your agent, say, hey, instead of bringing the purchase price down, maybe we can negotiate that interest rate to be bought down, either to one buy down or permanent buy down, whatever the case may be that works best for that specific client.

Tracy Hayes  51:48  
Yeah, no. But bottom line is what I'm seeing, and I'm sure what you're leading into right now, condo inventory is huge. You can get some really great deals on condos right now, you know, maybe it might take you a little time. You're not gonna find one overnight, but if, because maybe there's certain area you want to be in. But condos right now, if the sellers are getting a little more desperate, they're willing to take less because they've moved on in life, or whatever it is, huge deals, yeah, get your closing if you're not asking for your closing costs to be paid, or whatever. You know, having your closing costs be paid, honestly, people, is better than getting the price $10,000 cheaper because you're coming out with, you know, 789, tenthing on the price of the home. Get your closing costs paid. It goes a lot further, because the reality is, you're probably going to refinance, hopefully within the next year, I think we're going to see more, you know, I don't think we're going to go below five, but I think we're going to see some, hopefully get some low five interest rates, or, like I said, do a two one, buy down interest

Tiffany Riley  52:53  
options. And that's what's so important, to hire a good agent that knows what they're doing. Because if it's your first time buying a house, you don't know what to ask for, and if your agent hasn't sold many homes, they don't know what to ask know what to ask for either. So they're just going to go in and say, Yeah, I think we should offer this

Tracy Hayes  53:06  
and, Oh, didn't tell me they didn't have that much cash. Or, yeah, 100% usually every don't. I think one of the tips that you're leading to there is don't assume just because your buyers have a lot of money that they want to use the money. Really savvy buyers right now is like, I was talking to one yesterday. He was going to pull his money as retirement stuff. I'm like, hold on a second. You're going to get a six, high 5% interest rate likely here by the time we close in December. But what's your what's that stuff doing in the market right now? Why would you you know you're already making a sizable down payment. Why would you pay cash for the house? Take a quarter million dollar loan, keep that quarter million dollars in the

Tiffany Riley  53:46  
market. Cash is deducted on your taxes too, if you finance a little bit of it. Yes, exactly, exactly.

Tracy Hayes  53:52  
What's your outlook on home prices? And it was kind of leading off this last question, what's your outlook on home prices in Jacksonville, St Augustine, heading into 26 Well,

Tiffany Riley  54:01  
I know that we're below the median average for the US as a whole, but like I mentioned earlier, I think that they're trending to come down even a little bit more. I the last closing that I had last month, we negotiated the price down by $250,000 and I honestly went in confident, but I was like, I don't know they're gonna say yes to this. And sure enough, $250,000 off the purchase price, and we still got $34,000 in concessions for my

Tracy Hayes  54:26  
buyer. People underestimate there's a lot of people have bought their home in 2020, maybe 2019 they paid, let's just say, throw a number out there, 400,000 and now it's worth six, 700,000 is what they could get in the green and you don't know what's happened in their life and why they moved, and they might be just willing to, hey, yeah, the equity, because the growth, yeah, could I the value of the home if I wanted to sell it? But you know what I got to get out of here? I just want to cut loose. Or maybe they're in a divorce and they're like, we just want to release this property. Get rid of it as fast as possible. You never know until you ask exactly everyone

Tiffany Riley  55:05  
and like offend people, right? That's not what I'm saying. You just never know, like you said, their circumstances or what's leading them to sell that house? Yep. So don't be afraid to ask

Tracy Hayes  55:14  
100% How do you help relocating families, especially military, navigate buying a home from out of state. This is

Tiffany Riley  55:22  
my favorite thing. So I was a military spouse, so I actually, we lived in Alaska. We bought a house on scene. You're learning so much about, I know I am really. We bought a house sight on scene in like Crestview area, which is like near Panama City Beach and Pensacola area. So what I, my agent, didn't do this, but what I what I do is I do, obviously, a zoom call. I understand, like we do a buyer consultation via zoom I figure out what you're looking for, what's important to you, what school if you have kids, what schools they want to be in nearby, and all that good stuff. And then what I do is I do a video tour of every house so you want to look at before you come here, because a lot of the times I'm helping, like the person from Maryland, she's not military, but she's relocating here. But I also have a good network of military referral partners or military families that are moving here because I am military certified. So we do a lot of video tours for them, and then if they're able to fly down and look at the top five, then we do that. We narrow it down. If not, then they buy the house sight on scene, but I video everything like I go underneath the sink and I turn the water on just to make sure there's no leaks, because the last thing that I want is for them to put a down payment, down pay five, $600 for an inspection, and then we find out that there's a leak under the sink, something that I could have caught by just simply turning on the faucet and looking down. Something so simple, right? So I try to save my clients money by doing that, I video the neighborhood as well. Like, here's a neighborhood. I also send, like, a relocation guide. I'm like, here's the top five areas and the reasons why, what's nearby. So I do a lot for my relocation people, yeah,

Tracy Hayes  56:52  
well, it saves you. That's something you can, you know, do in the evening or whatever. It saves a lot of time when they get here, because a lot of times, I imagine, as most people, they don't have a huge amount of time, and if you're able to cut out a lot of stuff that might have just worn them down too, you could, they, could you start showing all these properties, and eventually they get worn down. And they may, they might make a choice. They confuse the information of two different properties, and it's like, let's just go with that one. And then also they find out what they moved in, like, whole say, this is not really what we what we thought, yeah, we thought it would be. So you eliminate a lot of trash, I guess,

Tiffany Riley  57:32  
double the work. I guess some people would say, because I'm going out there before, and then once they fly down, then we go look at it again, right? But I feel like it's taken that overwhelming process away from them, because all they all have to do is open up their phone or their email and it's right there. The property address is on there. It's labeled for them, so it's easier for them to say, Oh, this is that house. Yes, I like this. No, I didn't like that about it. And that's it. Versus them coming down here and looking at 20 properties and getting super overwhelmed. I want to make it easy for them. Moving alone is stressful.

Tracy Hayes  58:01  
I know it could be something as simple of how far it's from school or how far it's from work, right away eliminates it, and you're not wasting their time driving out there when they're get here. You're eliminating those things. And let's us focus on these five, because now, as a sales process, you've taken 20 homes, narrowed it down to three or four or five, and we're going to go see those, and they're gonna make a decision, right? And because that's what they

Tiffany Riley  58:22  
really need, and I don't want them to come down here and say, Hey, we looked at 20 houses. We hate all of them. Then I just wasted their time, their money, and I wasted my time and money. So I try to go there before, just to kind of narrow them down. And then once

Tracy Hayes  58:34  
they're here, I think that, I think this question here is very popular, especially obviously buying existing home, what upgrades or improvements are actually worth doing before listing a home in Jackson,

Tiffany Riley  58:48  
rooms, kitchen and flooring would be my top three. Obviously, the roof is important as well. Like, if we was talking about cosmetic stuff, bathroom, kitchen and flooring, the roof is super important as well. If not, then just say, if you can't pay it right away, or can't, you know, replace the roof, then maybe just say, hey, we'll sell you this house, but we will replace the roof before closing

Tracy Hayes  59:08  
or escrow it in, or whatever, anything that those things can be taken care of, or the hot water heater, obviously, for insurance, because that's all another subject. But the, you know, my wife's an agent. I was talking to her. We were actually talking about this particular subject, because we were talking about our neighborhood, because there's a lot of homes in there that was built 20 years ago, the neighborhood started 20 years ago, and there's some homes in there that haven't been updated, and selling homes in there. And obviously there's there's people have gone in and they've redid a kitchen, and all of a sudden the person who buys it comes in and redoes the kitchen again, and you just don't know what it is and who that buyer may be. But then you gotta strategically set up the pricing accordingly. And again, go back to why you need a great real estate agent that can go in there and say, we could. Sell this house, as the kitchen is, but we'll sell it here as an incentive or whatever, negotiate type of thing, because you just don't know what the buyer has in mind. Some of these buyers have the money, and they're going to come in like, we're going to gut this place. We just love the neighborhood when we love the structure to house, but we want whatever, new kitchens, new bath, and they're going to gut it, no matter what you did to it. That's right, but it may be the simple attractiveness of that new bathroom that you did that sells it

Tiffany Riley  1:00:26  
faster, exactly. And you have, when you remodel things, you have to make sure that you stay neutral. You can't just put in a black sink, because not everyone's going to want a black, black sink and a pink toilet, right? You know what I mean. So go neutral, pick lighter colors, go to an open house, or a model house, rather, and see what's trending, see what builders are doing, maybe try to mimic that. Yeah, yeah.

Tracy Hayes  1:00:48  
What should buyers be looking for or watching out for when touring homes in this market,

Tiffany Riley  1:00:53  
I would say obviously important things are the age of the roof, the water heater, the age back for insurance purposes. Like I said, simple thing as opening up a faucet for the bathroom the kitchen, and just checking out for any leaks, because that goes to tell you if there's any active leaks or not. The neighborhood. Maybe do your research on that. We can't tell you legally whether it's a good or bad neighborhood. So do your research on the neighborhood, on the area. Drive to it at nighttime and see if you like it. See what you see around there, if it's noisy, if the neighbors are partiers or not. So I would say a few of those things. Yeah, yeah.

Tracy Hayes  1:01:27  
How long does it typically take to buy or sell a home in Northeast Florida? What are you seeing with your with your stuff? What do you are you? Because I know some stuff are selling over first weekend, I know, but other stuff are sitting, Oh,

Tiffany Riley  1:01:39  
yeah. It all depends on your pricing, your marketing, the condition of the home. I had a I have a seller. This is like my fifth transaction with her. She was a for sale by owner. Anyway, long story short, Earth her mom's house that we're selling. And we've been on the market for a year. Different things have happened. Lady Bird situations. Anyway, a lot of things have happened. But overall, I've had this listing for a year. She didn't want to listen, and she was like, Just do it. Just do it. Just do and I was like, I don't want to take this listing, but again, it's my fifth transaction with her. I was like, Okay, well, do it your way. If it doesn't work out, we'll drop the price. Sure enough, she kind of listened. It took a while, but she listened. And so I would say, if you don't price it correctly, especially in today's market, that the buyers have more of an advantage. Your house is going to be sitting for a while. Sitting for a while, and then after your house sits for so long, people start to wonder, like you're getting desperate to tell them, it's low ball you or, Hey, what's wrong with this house? It's been on the market for 100 days. And then to buy a house with, I mean, average 3045, days to buy a house.

Tracy Hayes  1:02:38  
Yeah, I was listening to there, and it was triggering the the and it's out there statistically, you know, yeah, if you're not pricing the home correctly up front, all the, all the things, the expectations are, and then you start lowering the price, and then people are like, Oh, well, they're already lowering, let's, let's, how far will they go and it just costs you more money versus just listing it correctly? And if you list it correctly, you might actually, if you hack the right home in the right neighborhood, you might actually get more than that anyway, right and get what you want, but you got to, you got to put the right advertisement out there first the right price. How long was this? How much do buyers actually need for a down payment in our market today. This is was a trending question, so obviously it throws it out there, which really falls into my my neighborhood, in this and but I want Karen to chime in, what percentage to tweak off this? Are you working with? With buyers with little to no money down?

Tiffany Riley  1:03:40  
A lot of my military buyers little to no money down. Yeah, the VA loans are great options for them. Hometown Heroes wants you know that has some funding into it. It's a great option for them. I know that you have a lot of down payment assistance programs that people could utilize. So can you chime in on that?

Tracy Hayes  1:03:57  
Yeah, yeah. Well, obviously, I'm not a big I'm not a big fan of the Hometown Heroes for a VA buyer, just simply because of especially if they're not putting any money down. Not every VA buyer doesn't put money down, but the ones we're talking about here low down payment because it is a second mortgage. It sits there. There's no interest paid on it. You don't have to make a payment. But the reality is, with interest rates dropping, you're going to want to refinance if you're in the home for any period of time, likely coming up, and if you do, you got to pay that off. They don't what the word in our industry subordinate that second mortgage. In other words, they the second mortgage stays as a second mortgage, because if I refinance the first mortgage, the second now is the oldest one that would actually move in the first lien position unless they agree to subordinate, in other words, stay in second lien position. So in this market right now, with rates typically trending in a downward direction, I would not recommend that. I would rather negotiate the seller to pay the. Cost, because we can put a veteran with a VA loan in a house with little to no money out of their pocket.

Tiffany Riley  1:05:06  
That's what I'm able to do. Normally, I negotiate for the seller to pay either a rate buy down for them, depending on what they want to do as a buyer. What makes more sense for them financially? A lot of them walk away with money back at the closing table. Yeah,

Tracy Hayes  1:05:19  
they get there, they'll get their earnest money back, whatever, 100% that, like I said little to only we have a great product here that I that I love. We call it planets down payment assistance, but it's basically tagged behind FHA loan. And the great thing about it is there's no strings attached. If you're approved for the FHA loan, even a manual underwriting FHA loan, you could have a 580 credit score if that, if we get you approved on the FHA loan, it will give you you have a choice of three and a half or up to 5% so three and a half will make that down payment for FHA, you can get up to five so that extra percent and a half can be used towards closing cost or whatever. But the interest rates are more competitive. It also allows versus Florida housing, and although we still do that, FHA will go to 56.9 on a debt ratio. If you're doing Florida housing, you can't be over 50% so FHA may approve you, but Florida housing isn't going to give you because you got to be at 50% as long as you're approved for the FHA loan. So there's no credit score restrictions. Now the challenge little bit, it's not a second mortgage. It just sits there. It's a second mortgage you are making a little bit of payment on for 10 years, but you are looking basically taking, like a $10,000 loan for 10 years. Whatever you know, whatever it mean. This is

Tiffany Riley  1:06:34  
why, like you said, every transaction is different. Every person's different. This is why they should call you Yeah, so that they can find out what the best option is. Yeah, 100%

Tracy Hayes  1:06:41  
that way you talk. I think one of think one of the questions here, what should a buyer be doing before reaching out to a real estate agent? You know, either calling a real estate agent or calling a lender for calling the lender first is not bad, because we can make sure we got you aligned, so I can then go to you and say, Hey, this buyer, they've only had this much cash. So we're going to do this. You need to negotiate some buyers, you know, closing costs, concessions and then so you're making the offer correctly. Because I in 20 years of doing this, there's a lot of agents that don't realize their client doesn't have enough money, or just has enough money, and you're like, Whoo, I'm going to empty out your bank account to put you in this house. You're going to move in. You don't have enough to buy your your friends and pizza that night? Yeah, yeah, because that does happen. So I this is a really good question. I wanted for you is, what neighborhoods or communities are you most excited about for 2026 for families investors and first time home buyers?

Tiffany Riley  1:07:39  
So there is a new community being built out by the park group, which are the same builders that build nakati and E town. It's going to be sitting right around e town area, and it's called Evergreen so they're starting to develop that area back there. There's going to be, I don't even know how many hundreds of 1000s of homes back there, but they're going to have a pickleball courts. It's going to be close to the the recharge center in any town. It's going to connect, but it's not part of E town itself. So I'm excited to see that. I'm excited

Tracy Hayes  1:08:09  
what kind of price point are we talking about there.

Tiffany Riley  1:08:10  
Think in the 400 400 and up after like, the million. Obviously, you know that they're building out that surf Park in E town as well is going to be close proximity to that, which will be really fun. I'm excited for them to finish out seven pines. I really like seven pines. I think it's a beautiful neighborhood. Silver Leaf, as you know, it's continuing to grow, which is a really nice neighborhood, great school districts around the area. So those are some that I'm really excited about. To see how they continue to develop.

Tracy Hayes  1:08:39  
How do you because we all have, obviously, those are your favorites, right? You love going because there's a lot of positive things. Obviously, imagine you could talk about it. You're attracted to it. We just got done talking about social media and attracting people who are like minded. So some of a lot of things that you like, they likely like, right? You know type of thing. But as as an agent, do you find yourself? Sometimes you have to go Hold a second. I like that, but I can't. They may like it, but I can't be too forceful or salesy to push what I like, even though I think they would like it, right? You know what I'm saying? How do you how do you tread that line?

Tiffany Riley  1:09:20  
I am not salesy whatsoever, and that's where my interview or skills come into place, where I just listen. I'm like, Okay, tell me what's most important to you. And like yesterday, I met a buyer, and he was like, Okay, well, I like community we looked at a condo and we looked at it at a single family home, same price. One had its own private pool. Obviously, the home had its own private pool. The condo had more of like a community pool. He wants community so I'm not going to push for that single family home, even though I think it's a better option because it's more square footage for the same price and no HOA fees, right? Versus a condo. But I listened to what they want to

Tracy Hayes  1:09:54  
pay for a landscaper and stuff. I'm

Tiffany Riley  1:09:59  
like, Okay, well. What's what's important to you? Well, I want to be able to walk to Publix, okay, well, then I'm going to figure out what neighborhoods are around Tamaya, one of them, right? So you can kind of maybe leave to my long walk, but you can get to Publix, or maybe what neighborhoods fit the criteria that you're looking for, if you like to go on walks, right? I'm not going to put you on curtain, because where you're going to walk around your neighborhood, yeah? But that gets kind of boring, right? So you have to really listen in to what your buyer's needs are, their wants and their needs, and try to match that. So yeah, I might love e town, but you don't. You hate the traffic, you hate this, you hate that. So I'm going to try to figure out what you're looking for, and try to think outside the box. Talk to other realtors, talk to other lenders, figure out, hey, you know, I only know these neighborhoods, but what do you recommend? This is what they're looking for. And that's why we collaborate, and we all come together as agents, and we talk to each other, and we figure out, hey, you know, I have this buyer looking for this. And you're like, oh, I have a listing that has exactly that criteria that you're looking for.

Tracy Hayes  1:10:52  
Do you know you just gave, like, about five to 10 different reels right there? I like to go for a walk. Where would you buy in Northeast Florida? Yeah, right. I want to walk. I want to walk. I want to be able to walk the Publix. Here are neighborhoods that you can walk to Publix from. Those are, actually, I mean, you think about it, people are, you know, yeah, because obviously, obviously, he asked you, I guarantee there's the or obviously, you know, the, although I'm not a big fan, this is a pet peeve of mine, is the golf carts. I, you know, I know golf carts, nakati, they leather, but man, it is. People don't realize it's, it's so dangerous, and I'm seeing so many things out there, not to be negative, but, but, but that that neighborhood allows that, right? So if you want to drive a golf cart to Publix, here are a handful of neighborhoods in Northeast Florida you can do that in boom, boom, boom. So I think you know

Tiffany Riley  1:11:49  
what I learned, Zillow is now tied to chat GPT. So a lot of people what they're doing as they're leaving Google and they're going to Gemini or chat GPT, and they're saying, I want to House Four, bedroom, three, bath, 3000 square feet, close to Starbucks, yes, and it'll Tracy PT, which is now tied to Zillow. We'll send you a list of homes that are close to that. Yes. So it's so nice. I love AI. Yeah, yeah.

Tracy Hayes  1:12:10  
Actually, that luncheon that you didn't go to back in March, I think it was something, you had something, yes, something, get something. I'm calling you out. I'm calling you out. But Lyman is actually creating that so that can go on directly on your site. Oh, that's right, that they, I, he, and he actually, I mean, he's using AI natural language so he can put that directly on your site. So you can say, hey, you go, sir, people naturally. But he wants it built like, like you're saying, someone says, I want to, I want to be within 20 minutes of work. Here's the addresses I want to be, you know, I want to be able to pass a Starbucks on the way there. I mean, all that, all that stuff, you can spill it in there. And actually, I did something the other night. I have a football game out in in Lake City on Friday night one of the high school playoff games to officiate. And there's, there's like, 10 of us and the crew, the seven officials and the clock operator. So we're all, we're like, Well, where can we all meet up? In carpool out there, right? I actually put in everyone's address in it, and then actually, and I said, Okay, we're going to go to, we're going to Lake City for the football game. Where should we meet up? And it mapped out everyone's address and then told exactly, oh, you should meet at this right here, because it's got plenty of parking and but that can be brought right into real estate and what we're talking about so we did talk about down payment. I think we covered the 10 questions that I've got here. Is there anything else you'd like to add?

Tiffany Riley  1:13:43  
Karen, no, thank you so much for having me. I'm super honored to be here, excited to be

Tracy Hayes  1:13:47  
here. Thank you. Thank you. I think the I got, yeah, there's some tidbits about you today that I that I learned I didn't even realize. I didn't realize you were born in Colombia and then lived in Alaska. That was, yeah, that's quite a shock of geography there.

Tiffany Riley  1:14:06  
Just so I'm allergic to the cold, and I never knew that until I went to Alaska, allergic to the cold. Oh, yeah, I didn't even know that was a thing. I met a client who was also allergic to the cold. So I know it's a thing now, but I get, like, Hayes on my legs. It gets below a certain temperature. Yeah, it hasn't happened in Florida, but in Alaska would happen quite often. Wow, I'm itchy. What's going on? And it was just my legs. And as soon as I got warm, they would go away. Never heard that before. And I met a client, military, a client as well, who the same thing happened to him. And I was like, Okay, so I'm not the only one.

Tracy Hayes  1:14:34  
Well, Karen's contact information or Instagram is everything's gonna be in the show notes, obviously, and everything I put out there. So tune in, whether it's whether you're following on Instagram or you're you're watching the YouTube obviously, this is streaming live right now. The podcast will go out live on Monday, but all in the show notes, you'll have all her contact information. So if you enjoyed the show here and have questions with her, please reach out. Out and please leave a review. I need some more reviews. I don't know. I think, I think Apple doesn't make it Apple podcast doesn't make it friendly to leave a review. You have to actually go through a training to figure out how to leave a review on Apple. Yeah, it is that you, you would think, with all the technology they I know, every time I go on a zoom call or something, the first thing or Google meet, or whatever, first thing that pops up as soon as soon as you close out the call is, how was the call? You know, you think they should make every time you listen, yeah, as soon as you pause or click out of a podcast, just pop up and say, leave a review. They get more listening. Yeah, yes, or Spotify, or all the others out there. But I really appreciate you coming on today. Thank you, great show. Thanks for having me.