Sellin' with CC Underwood

Welcome back to the show. This is Tracy Hayes with real estate, excellent podcast. And as most of you know, my goal the show is to bring the best of the best of everyone who is involved in the real estate industry. And today, I have someone I have admired from afar in regards to her professionalism, marketing, reputation and her in charge attitude she cares greatly about the industry. Leads a top Keller Williams team here in Northeast Florida, and is highly respected by everyone involved in real estate. I welcome the CEO and seeker of awesome at selling with CC team. CC Underwood. CC, welcome to the show. Wow. What an introduction. I love that you actually found my seeker of Awesome.

Tracy Hayes  1:49  

Well, we're gonna dig into that a little bit. I have that actually as a question probably a lot of people ask you on a regular basis. I assume your parents did not name you. See, see, what is Miss Underwood's real name? Oh my gosh. Everyone definitely asked me that. Back in my hooter days, they were like, What does CC stand for? Is it CC and Coke, CC and seven? I got the best jokes about that, so I liked a little bit of a mystery. But it was my first and last name, so it was my initials, growing up, playing sports, everyone just okay, he's been here forever. So the initial C Christine, no, it is a very weird name.

CC Underwood  2:31  

Are we moving on?

CC Underwood  2:34  

I guess someone could look in the legal doc.

Tracy Hayes  2:36  

They really find your driver, find your driver's license somewhere. Okay. Cece, where are you from? To tell us a little about where you grew up, and, you know, where'd you go to? Where'd you go to? You know, you went to University of North Florida, but did you go right from high school, this college? What? Tell us a little bit that. 

CC Underwood  2:51  

Yeah, I was born and raised in Jacksonville, so actually went to UNF because, you know, that's what everyone tells you to do. And after two years of that being busted, I got out of there really, really fast. I worked at Hooters. Worked there since I was 17. I've always really liked working, kind of correlated that, you know, you have a job, you make some money. And I like that a lot. So I just continued on working. Got a different job in massage therapy. I did neuromuscular therapy. Worked on a lot of the Jags players for several years. Wow. So my arm started getting tired and saw an infomercial on TV. I freaking love infomercial.

CC Underwood  3:27  

You know, get into real estate. It's cheap. You make a lot of money. It's fast. I'm like, that's for me.

Tracy Hayes  3:33  

So interesting. So you mentioned Hooters. How long? How long? How many years did you put there? 

CC Underwood  3:41  

So I was 17 to 20 or 21 so at least four years How do you think that as a young person in that atmosphere, waiting tables has helped, helped you grow and just talking to people, just interacting with total strangers a lot of times, obviously, in the real estate world, I will tell you this even now today with my team, I love hiring people that were in the service industry, either waited tables or your bartender. You don't realize the sheer amount of life skills that that gives you, like you said, talking to people, dealing with jerks. I mean, you're truly having to adapt your personality. And always say, when you are waiting tables, you're a bartender, you're a chameleon, so you're learning how to adapt to personalities, and you don't even realize it. Yep, I had a, I have a couple of friends who are in in their own business for many years, actually. I mean, they're, they're, they're, weren't considered Young. Their kids just graduated from high school, but they were looking just a couple of years. They do work for Keller Williams, Atlantic partners and out of the St Augustine bridge. And they had just, they just had, they just have this natural gift of gab and talking with anyone can bring up stories, and they bond immediately with that and how powerful and how quickly, just in little over two years, their business has just grown and and one of the things that we talked earlier, before the show about podcasts is I was listening to a podcast about for.

CC Underwood  4:59  

Real Estate Agents about going out and having, you know, dinner, or after creating a relationship with their clients and their kids get together or whatever, but building that because they're moving into the same community a lot of times, obviously, and building those relationships and how it really grows your business, because that's where your referral business comes from, because just by having that openness and being able to have a conversation with anyone? Well, yeah, I think you know the best sales people, they care, right? They give a shit that doesn't cost anything to care about someone and what happens to their life and what happens to them when they buy a house or sell a house. Just care, right? Right? 

Tracy Hayes  5:36  

It's not how much you know till you know how much like you care, right? If I said that, right, Theodore Roosevelt actually looked up. Thought it was John Max John Maxwell because I was reading his books. But actually he stole that from Theodore

Unknown Speaker  5:45  

Roosevelt, the original rip off and duplicate. So you saw the infomercial. 

Tracy Hayes  5:45  

What was your next move? Did you know somebody in real estate? Did you did you immediately jump over to Keller Williams? What happened there? 

CC Underwood  5:56  

It's crazy. I have no financial background at all. Absolutely not no one in my family. I mean, my mom actually laughed at me when I told her I was going to go get in real estate, because she's like, you don't like, you know, you don't like talking to people. But I mean, again, she just worked at Hooters for four

CC Underwood  6:11  

years. Mom didn't come in too often.

Speaker 1  6:16  

Some things you don't know.

CC Underwood  6:19  

But again, it's, I think it's that initial attraction for everyone, right? It was cheap, it was fast, and you have the potential to make a lot of money. I have a very low patience. I don't like to go through a lot of college. It wasn't a lot of learning. I could get the information fast, and then I was able to do with it what I wanted. So that was obviously really appealing to me.

Tracy Hayes  6:38  

So who was your first advisor? I mean, did you, did you search out advice from anyone or just went, went and showed up to a class and started taking it? 

CC Underwood  6:46  

Actually went to a Watson school, because I, you know, that was the infomercial. That was the thing to do back then. I went to night school. So I think it was like six or eight weeks at night, because I had a job. So I took it at night. Once I graduated, of course, I interviewed with that company. I also interviewed with Caldwell and Keller Williams, and ended up at Keller Williams. Okay, so you actually just went right to Keller Williams after taking the class from from Watson intro. So you're about what, 2425 right now?

Unknown Speaker  7:12  

Now, no, no.

Tracy Hayes  7:15  

29 now, right?

Tracy Hayes  7:18  

2027 Okay, interesting. So let's so those new agents out there, she dives right in. Now, were you working another job at the time, and are you just do a straight headed first? 

CC Underwood  7:30  

I actually started part time. I was part time for two years. Do you recommend that for new agents? Absolutely. I mean, financially, you can't be done with your money. I mean, there's two schools of thought, right, jump right in. Go cold turkey, so that, you know, you have something to lose. Other people just don't have that luxury. So I was actually, I had met a guy. I got married within two years, got pregnant, had two years, two kids, back to back. So, I mean, that part time income was nice. It allowed me to talk to people, right? I was already in the environment. I'm rubbing people on the table. Hey, want to buy a house. Do you find? You know, of course, now you have a team, and I know a little I was going to make this the second half of the thing, but that those new agents coming in, you know, the fact that they may, and let's say, you know, I'm sure there's a lot of agents that immediately come in and mom wants to sell their house, right? There's their first client or something, so kind of makes it easy to go through, but they may go a period of time without actually having a transaction and actually not seeing a check. I mean, do you see a lot of them? Just really, that breaks them down right away. 100% I think it's like 80 or 90% of new licensees end up getting out of the business. I think if you start part time with the intentions of going full time, and you've got the plan and the intentions, it works out, right? You've got a plan to go full time, you have intention to learn your craft, be educated, be a part of that business and grow it. The downside is when you get a license to help people, right? That's those really aren't good intentions. That's really in it. You're in it for yourself to make some money, not really to help someone. And I think some miseducation and uneducated can really harm people in the public in that sense. So when you get that new agent that's never come out, what that's and again, I'm breaking into my second half, but I want to just carry on what we're talking about right now. You sit them down and talk to them about what's it like to be self employed. Oh, yeah, you have that conversation with them, breaking down what their thoughts do? You find a lot of them have a grasp of what's going on, or really need a lot of tutelage. I think all agent right, if you had knowledge of real estate, when I got in, I did not know. I didn't know what an agent was. I didn't know anything about buying a house. I was really dumb to financial and real estate, but a lot of the general public actually has some knowledge. The difference is they have a public view of what a realtor does when they get a license, and soon after they start getting into it, they actually are seeing the realtor side of things they get to see, oh my God, you have to work.

CC Underwood  9:56  

This is hard. Oh my God, I don't know how to get another business. I only have.

CC Underwood  10:00  

Have so many friends and family. What else am I going to do? Like, how do you get so much business? And they're they start asking so many questions. They start realizing they don't know the contracts. No one's around to help them. So it is very difficult being a new agent. Do you remember your first sale? I do want to tell us about it. Yeah, it was actually a massage client.

CC Underwood  10:19  

And I've actually, I've worked with that, working with your warm circle, right? You got your circle of influence?

CC Underwood  10:27  

Yeah. I mean, several years, I've helped them buy a house. It was their parents. They bought it for their daughter. I remember the neighborhood. It was right on old St Augustine. We sold it. They bought a house. They sold that house, bought another one. So I've actually stayed in touch with family. Transaction with them, excellent. Okay, when you first started, and we talked a little bit, what were your what were your initial goals and dreams at that time versus what they are today? Oh, very different. Yeah, you know, at first, because I, I really didn't know. I didn't know what I didn't know. And I was part time. It was I started with Keller Williams because they had the training, right? They're like, we are going to tell you what to do. And I'm one of those people that, if you show me the way, and you show me the plan, I'm going to implement it, I'm going to do it. I might put my spin on it, but I'm going to keep doing if it get fruit from it, you'll just keep doing it. And they had this plan. It was how to get four listings for sales in three months. I remember it's called 443, back then, and that's what I did. I followed plan. I got my four listings, four sales in three months. I followed it exactly. So then I started getting into reading the MRA, The Millionaire Real Estate Agent. Here's the path, here's what you can do. So it was like, Okay, I want to do more and more and more, and that's also core to me. I want more. I want to be better. I want myself to be better. I want to educate. I want to educate. I want to be the most educated professional realtor out there, the best I can be. So it just continued to grow. And after two years, it really I forced myself to go full time and start to grow a team. So that's a two years where you're now between 14 and 15 years in the business. What's your goals today? Goals today is business development. So I do still sell a little bit, maybe one or two homes a month. Last year was a little less with the pandemic, and years prior to that was even less than that, maybe once a month. So obviously we had a lot of changes on our team, but the goal is to grow. We have such great systems now it's taken 14 years, 14 years to get to where I am today. As far as being efficient, the systems, the right people, right? And I'm still having a hire and fire that's still a turning position. Realtors come and go. We've got a great system for training agents. So we have a system for retiring agents. We're just so much more efficient in every single aspect that are truly it has taken us 14 years is Keller Williams. Are they all Keller Williams, or you've inserted your own your own systems on a ground level, it's a little bit of both. When you're in Keller Williams, it's from the very beginning. It's a sharing environment. So I have the ability to pick up the phone and call someone selling 1000 2000 homes a year, and pick their brain. And I'm in all these little micro Facebook groups and Masterminds where we're all just sharing, hey, what do you do for this? What are you doing for investments? What are you doing for employees? How are you growing? What's your next Legion source? I mean, it is just this collaboration that I think has really helped us grow fast when you're listening to this information. And for those that are out there, you know, Cece and I talked about, we were talking a little bit about books and podcasts and so forth. I get energy from that. When I'm listening to other podcasters just talking about real estate industry in general, I get energy from that. Yeah, how do you feel when you're getting, oh, I got a new idea. What does that do for you? It's the best I'd say if I'm ever in a funk, I know it's because I'm not around high level thinking. I'm not around people who are doing more than me, and that is really my happy place. People are like, what do you do when you're stressed? Man, I just go get energy from people and I'm talking to them. I'll just search certain groups, and then I'll message them. Hey, can we hop on a call about this? Or, you know, I've had a business coach for years and years and years. I've always had a business coach. So I'll talk to him about some of that stuff, right? Like, what do you think about this? And we'll just mastermind through it. And he just helps me, what when I get idea crazy, he helps me make it purposeful and put it into action. Okay, well, what's the plan for this? I need a coach for that. I got all the ideas. I got ideas right into my mind. Having nightmares at night about ideas

Tracy Hayes  14:24  

I saw on your LinkedIn. You had friended Tony Robbins, but is there, is there someone out there, a John Maxwell, Tony Robbins, who do you? Who do you prefer? Who do you follow, or have you, have you gone and sourced their information from? 

CC Underwood  14:38  

Is there any one person, not really. I just, I really love Audible. I love Audible. I love Simon Sinek. If I had to choose one person, I really like Simon Sinek. His books on team and leadership are really great. Of course, John Maxwell is good. Tony Robbins is great. I've never been to any of his things because I don't mean a crowd is not a good thing. I'm going in a corner.

Speaker 1  14:59  

Her that I can't do that. Yeah, fire

Tracy Hayes  15:02  

burning. I was fortunate to go a couple years ago with one of the Atlantic partners. She just wanted to be going at the same time we went to John Maxwell, it was, it must have been 2019 when it because he does one annually in Orlando. Yeah, not quite the packed in. Lisa Tony Robbins, I see on YouTube where they are, seat to seat the seat you at least got a table sit around, yeah, but it's a huge room at the Marriott, and I can't wait till he gets back doing that, because I got so much from that. It changed. It changed me. And I immediately dove in to read more of his books. And obviously I get the next book that comes out. And now I started listening to his podcasts as well, which are really great.

Tracy Hayes  15:45  

How important is because obviously we're talking about personal development. How important that that new agent, or that 27 year old that comes walking in that maybe has actually never even read a book, if they ever read a book, it was in high school. What do you do for your team to get them to grow into that as a part of their business. 

CC Underwood  16:05  

I just pounded in their brain. I beat it into them. We say this all the time. You have to read. This is a legal document. It is a contract, if you don't read and it's actually one of the qualifying questions. I tell the general public, you want to know if a realtor knows their shit. Ask them to read the contract to you upside down, and if they have to turn it around and they have to read it line by line, they likely do not know their craft, and they are not going to be able to represent you. I'm very big on that. You could probably hear my passion about that read you have to read the contract. And people are asking me questions. It's in your contract. The answer is, in your contract. Go read it. Go read it again and again, right? They should know that, like the back of the hand. It's important in case of those, the and I think the credibility is theirs too, yeah, because a lot of times the buyer or seller, I mean, they ask you, it's a general question. It's not something that's top secret. It needs to be researched, and it is right there. And they should know at least what paragraph Oh, that's in paragraph three, and just and be able to pull it out right there. I agree. Managing people. I don't know if you call it managing people on your team. Yeah, what do you? What do you? What's the phrase you use? And you call it leadership? It's we hire self managed people, so I am not going to be your babysitter. I'm not going to micromanage you. I'm here to train support, help you grow. I'm there for you. I am your backbone. I'm not here to do your job. Do you feel you have to occasionally be that cheerleader, that person that gives them a little because, oh yeah, as because your name's on the team, right, and it's your name out there. We cheer each other on. I mean, everyone, I say this all the time. We all have our shit, right? We all have something going on. We all have a life that's going to happen no matter what. And we still have bills. We still have people to care for, so they are both running at the same time. And when things get overwhelming, right now, people are just feeling exhausted. They're exhausted, especially if you were the caretaker that went home and you were the one homeschooling your kid and dealing with all that you were exhausted this past year, and you're still exhausted from everything. So lifting people up, making sure we're having high level conversations. Great energy. I help my team win more, because a lot of times, like right now, agents are getting beat down. They're not winning. So as a leader, that's my job, is to help them win more. So that actually leads that that's great answer, because it leads me directly into the next question that I had and that they're coming to you. This is a tough time for an agent getting beating down. 

Tracy Hayes  18:36  

What motivates CeCe every morning to come in and be that smile on your face and, you know that cheer and positivity? What is it that motivates you every day? 

CC Underwood  18:46  

I mean, it's them and like, literally, they are my driving force. I tell people, once you're on my team, you're in my world, like you're under my protection, I'll cut someone for you. Like, that's how I feel about my people. So every day I wake up and it is, what's another lead source that I can do? What's another business? You know, development, what's another partnership that I can have? How am I going to again? How am I going to help my people win? How am I going to help support them? So if they're in front of a customer, they have a problem, My people will have a solution for it. They will have a solution which means they're going to convert more, they're going to win more, they're going to get more people under contract. How do you, you know, the, obviously, the market conditions now just kind of all of a sudden they came upon us. I don't know, maybe in the last 90 days, from the standpoint of, there's little to no inventory. People are getting 20 plus offers on a home. Some people making offers sight unseen,

Tracy Hayes  20:00  

Not knowing what's going to happen next. How do you keep them focused and moving forward? 

CC Underwood  20:05  

Well, one it's to not worry about that. Again. Like you said, I've been in since 2007 I've been through several different market shifts. And while we say, you know, no one has a crystal ball, there are signs. And one thing that I preach to my team is listen to your buyers. The buyers know when the market changes before anyone else. The buyers will tell you when the market changes. Their language will change. Here's the words that they're going to say to you, and you're going to hear it consistently over and over. And because we're on a team, you're going to hear it more and faster than someone else. So you're really going to be on the front lines of that. But regardless of what happens, you just have to be the innovator. You have to be the person that takes charge when covid hit after about 30 days, like I was done. I had had it. It was, you know, these things, they took our events away. This is not an option. I'm like, doing nothing is not an option. You have to be able to adapt to whatever happens. So as long as you're you have that adaptive personality, you're willing to innovate and make changes quickly, you're going to be fine no matter what the shift is. That's a great answer. I think that's one of the biggest challenges. 

Tracy Hayes  21:03  

It's the biggest challenge on our side, from the lending side. You know, the thing came out a few weeks ago about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac cutting back on investment in second homes. Immediate panic, and really, nothing's happened. Yeah, so yeah. And then interest rates go up. Interest rates go down. We got customers go, oh, we want to, you know, because they're building and six, eight months away, and they want to lock in a rate and it, you know, just roll with it. And actually, those who rolled with it, the interest rates actually just trickled down, back down just a little bit. So we went up and came back down a step. So, and just being patient, and I think understanding our business. Yeah, you're going to roll it in. 

CC Underwood  21:43  

You have to have that rainy day fund that's got to be in your initial conversation, as we were talking earlier, when you're talking about what is a realtor? Yeah, you better have that rainy day fund, because you may hit that bottom. 

Tracy Hayes  21:54  

Or there was many times when I first started for the first 1214, years, 12 years of my business. I was in a call center taking calls all the time. So it's like swinging the bat, swinging the bat, swinging the bat, hitting them, hit it, and all sudden you can't hit a ball no matter what you say to somebody, they're not doing and you're seeing other people do it. You're like, what am I doing? And you got to be prepared that you may have a bad month or two and or the market may change, but it'll come back around. So. So this juncture, I wanted to switch over we're talking about, we want to dig into selling with CC team and CEO of Seeker of awesome. Where'd you come up with that?

CC Underwood  22:30  

 Really, I'm not even sure where it came from. It was, I have an aversion to titles. I have an aversion to letters behind people's names. The whole trail that no one, no one in the public knows what that means. Just so your attorney, that's just for us, that's for our own personal egos, so we can tell our community how many courses we've taken. Not that there's not knowledge that comes from that. Not knocking taking the course, but oh my gosh, the letters and the title. So that's just me really poking fun at myself, going, I just, I'm looking at all things awesome, awesome people. That is my title. 

Tracy Hayes  23:05  

You know, it screams positive attitude to me when I saw that, and I've seen it before. And then when I went on your LinkedIn, you had that on there, and instead of having all those little acronyms that nobody knows what that means, I immediately said, That's someone who's positive, that's someone who's, you know, hey, I'm I'm out there, and someone, you know, you know, we attract like people. And when you're positive, you're going to attract other positive, like people. My team almost would say, almost annoyingly positive.

CC Underwood  23:33  

I'm that person they're having a bad day. I'm like, pull your pants off. Like,

Tracy Hayes  23:38  

so, 27 years old. You started a couple years in. You went full time. How did you start going? You know what? I want to start my own team. And how did the selling of CC team actually get started? 

CC Underwood  23:49  

It was the growth. One thing that I definitely believe in is you don't force growth, you know, let the leads, let the business grow. You certainly. You have to read ahead. You have to know where you're going. You have to be that person who's ready for it, and they can plan for it. But truly it was the business. I was having too much business for myself. The model said you need to get an assistant, and next you get a buyer's agent. So that's what I did. I followed the model, and I gave all the buyers away to the buyer's agent so I could focus on listings. And I continued to take more and more listings as the short sales grew, I became the short sale queen. I learned how to do short sales. I was good at it. So that was rolling for a few years, and following the process that Keller Williams had set out and again, just being adaptable, because it was very surreal to watch top agents at the time get out and come to me for advice when I'd only been in the business a couple years, right? Because I was willing to learn about short sales. 

Tracy Hayes  24:42  

So you went to listings because you just preferred that, or just because you had to make a choice. Do you prefer buyers or or listings?

CC Underwood  24:51  

 I do prefer listings. I think the model it's buyers take up a lot of drive time. So for me to focus on growth, if I'm in the car, it's really hard to do that.

CC Underwood  25:00  

So people, they get it mixed up with teams like, Oh, I'm an agent. I'm giving you half, half of my commission, or whatever the percentage is. It's like, no, as a leader, I'm generating business, and I'm giving you business like we are learning, we are growing this together. It is a true partnership. Without you, there's no me. Without agents taking out buyers, I wouldn't be able to focus on listings. And now today, without my agents. They actually work with both buyers and sellers. I wouldn't be able to do what I do without them. So to me, like they, they are the core of the team, like they are selling with CC, going back, I probably wouldn't have named myself. So how

Tracy Hayes  25:32  

do you do because obviously, you know they, you're you're out there in the advertisements. I know you've had billboards. I've seen you in other advertisers, client calls in and they think they're getting you and but how do you transition them to say, hey, you need to take one of my teammates? 

CC Underwood  25:50  

Oh, well, I mean, it's never a take. And I think first and foremost, whenever you're growing a team, you never want to make someone feel like they're being passed off. And in reality, if you had the best people, you would have no problem having that conversation. I see people building a team. They actually get in fear based and they truly think that people want them. It's like, no, they want your service. They want your systems. They want your education. They want the experience that you gave them. So if you did a great job of training someone, you would have absolutely no problem stepping aside and saying, You know what, I'm not the best person for this. I've trained this person, and if you trust me, that I would put you in the very best hands. This is the person who's going to take care of you. 

Tracy Hayes  26:25  

So your advertisements, you have your picture on there, well, you don't hide that. You're a team. Somebody calls in and Sally, whoever's on your team is the one that responded to, do you see a discourse with the clients, like, Oh, I thought I thought I was getting CC. Or do you actually interact with, or at least have an initial conversation with some of those clients and then hand them off? 

CC Underwood  26:47  

It depends on how they they come in, right? If they're calling into our lead line, they'll never talk to me. If, for some reason, they do get my cell phone number and they talk to me, then there is going to be an introduction on the initial conversation service. Comes down to expectations. So if you set the right expectations from the very first phone call, Hey, I'm so excited to be, you know, talking with you today, I'm going to have my listing partner. She's going to come with me on the appointment. She's actually going to be your point of contact from here on out. Same thing with a buyer referral. We get a ton of agent referrals. I tend to talk to the agent and say, Hey, but if you want to connect that customer with this agent that's going to be their point of contact. It's all about expectations. 

Tracy Hayes  27:25  

So how big is the team now? 

Tracy Hayes  27:26  

is the team now?

CC Underwood  27:27  

Right now, we have seven agents that does include me. We have two transaction coordinators, full time marketing and a full time director of operations, and a full time Isa. She's really our business development, answers, phones, sets appointments for our agents. So all of your you don't have a, I don't know if I heard you correctly, a buyer's agent inside. All your agents do both. Yes, okay, so whatever, whatever it takes them, because you want them to learn the business completely, I would assume, from both ends, before they graduate. Well, they do have a process. So typically, if you're a new agent, you're going to start with buyers, and then we have a you must go through a listing boot camp. This we call it. It's a four week listing boot camp. You graduate from that, then you can go out and be set listing appointments by the team. But if you're a brand new agent, and your best friend says, hey, I want you to sell my house, you get that listing. That's your person, right? Right? 

Tracy Hayes  28:20  

The greatest reward that you have in leading the team. You tell us some stories of some agents that I'm sure have had followed you and did whatever you told them to do and had great success. Do we have any agents on that list?

CC Underwood  28:35  

 Oh, my God, we have so many, like Julie, that's the best part. And I, I get to see it from a completely different perspective. You know, agents that come they're going through divorces, they have family bills, you know, they've got a card that they want to upgrade, and almost all the time, you know, once they start making money, they're getting a new car almost every single time. I've seen so many of our agents get new cars. I've seen them pay off debt. I've seen them go through, you know, marriages and divorces. I've seen them make money so that their husbands could stop working and they can be home, or sometimes causes divorce. I mean, all sudden the wife starts making more money the husband. Some husbands have egos over that. I have no problem with that. They all have. I mean, they all have this great purpose, you know, for their money. And so it's not just about income for them. It's like, okay, you're a single mom, you're going to be able to be able to provide. You're not going to have worries, you're not going to have debt, you can do what you want. And we're going to help teach our agents, you know, how to build wealth. It's not how much you make, it's also where do you put it, you know, making sure you're not spending all of your money. Make sure you're living below your means, so that you can do nice things and you can travel. And we want our agents to take vacations. So you have to have that nice counterbalance to keep you sane. Because, I mean, well, they all enter the business thinking of the lifestyle, right? I mean, they have this vision of lifestyle. They're watching millionaire New York or millionaire listing New York or LA or whatever, and they're seeing this lifestyle, of course, totally different price point,

Speaker 1  30:14  

If they wanted to reach out and say, Cece, can you consult me? Would you Are you open to sitting down and from the standpoint of recruiting that raw of an agent, or you look for more experienced agents and to pluck off and bring into your team, it's really both. I mean, we're really looking for a certain personality type for our team. So for us, we go through a pretty extensive interview process. We have our culture. It is very important to me. I'm not willing to sacrifice it for one person, someone, if you're a top producer, but your ego is bigger, and, you know, hits people in the face before you enter the door. You're not a good fit for us. We are a team. It's not about one person, and any one person will never break this team. I don't care how much you do, so it's really important that we all work together, and the person that enters our world understands that it's a partnership. There's going to be some things that you get out of the benefit of us, and there's gonna be some things we benefit from you, but together we're gonna go farther. This is why I admire this woman, because of her her confidence. And when I one time I saw you speak at NEFBA, I forget what it was about this couple years ago, and I was like, she knows her stuff. She knows she knows her stuff, and she's gonna tell you like it is, and you just gotta, I mean, you gotta get to go with it. You have the success, and you're not afraid, you're not bragging about it. You don't break every time I see you're wearing jeans and a T shirt like you are. Now, CeCe has her image. That's, that's her image, and she is who she is. And you're and but you're going, you have the drive and just the confidence that you you the persona that you put out there, I will tell you where this came from, right? There's strengths and weaknesses about wherever you go. And so the great thing about Keller Williams is we have access to everything, right? The downside of that is, you see so many people on stage and you're going, Oh my God, look what they have. They did this system, they spent this money, and I spent a couple of years wasting 1000s and 1000s of dollars on the system that they use because I want to be like them. And for years it was miserable. I was miserable. The people on my team were miserable. I hired the wrong people because they weren't like me. I was not attracting or bringing on people who were like me, and who would really accept me for who I am, because I'm in there in a freaking suit. Can you imagine me in a blazer, in a skirt, you know, trying to be this professional image out there? And I get to the point where it was like, we're done, and I went to the team and I said, we're going to cut it off. We're going to cut the lead crack, we're going to cut all this, we're going to get rid of the people that aren't like us, and we're just going to be who we are, and from that moment on, was really we just continue to grow. And the people that were wanted to stay we stay attracted a like kind, yeah, this is me. I don't need to wear a suit. I don't have to cross my arms and be a pretty pose, you know? I can do whatever I want and still run a successful team, right? No, I know it's funny,

Tracy Hayes  33:00  

 I had a boss a few years ago, and he said, I don't care, you know, if you want to wear flip flops, as long as you're getting deals, I don't care and that. And that's really Florida, if you want the image, the Tommy Bahama image. And I sort of, you know, I sort of like that. I mean, I'm not wearing my Columbia shirt today, but I do have shorts on. And most people think of banker, where I see guys always wearing jackets. I'm like, Dude, I'm a big guy. I'm gonna wear I'll be sweating. That's I need to be me. Oh, big boy. Yeah,

Tracy Hayes  33:34  

I gotta be first. I gotta be comfortable. Because if I'm uncomfortable, then I, you know, I can get I, you know, I'm a Gemini, so I can flip from one to the other. I'm a Heckle, and

Speaker 1  33:44  

I get it. It's so much better. You're more confident whenever you're yourself, because then you're only going to attract the people who you know, who like you want to be around you. I was

Tracy Hayes  33:53  

listening to a podcast of the many I've listened to in the last few months. But one was just, was talking about, if you you've got to be you, and it's that person's runs into you, you know, client runs into you, and you're out to dinner on a Friday night or at the grocery store or whatever, just in the in your zone, and they run into you that you're still you, that they're still looking at the person they just just wanted to try, that you're not this persona they have. I put the three piece suit on, but then when I go home, I got cut offs on in a, you know, tank top,

Unknown Speaker  34:23  

whatever, you know, yeah, short competition,

Tracy Hayes  34:27  

or we got, we got into some good stuff. Current market conditions. Never last. We touched on this a little bit earlier.

Tracy Hayes  34:35  

What do you see developing right now? 

CC Underwood  34:39  

Actually, I was just listening to an expert on a podcast. Just before you came into the came over today, and they were talking, you know, the Fed's going to keep the rates low until we see the the economy go on fire really, basically, they want to see inflation before they start raising so rates, rates remaining low. Let's assume that part. But where's the breaking? What do you feel is.

Tracy Hayes  34:59  

Going on right now? I have my vision. But what do you think is going on right now in Florida, and why we're under such a demand and we can't even build houses fast enough? 

CC Underwood  35:08  

And so a year ago, our good sellers market writes about three months supply, and we're sitting probably like 1.2 1.3 months supply. Perspective, you've got markets like Arizona that are a two week supply. They love to be in a market like ours. They would love to have our inventory. So I think it's good to keep that perspective. I mean, Florida has so many good things going for in terms of jobs and construction, it's there. I think again, you have to be creative. You have to learn how to win. You have to learn how to find deals and you it's going to be a little different, right? With Zillow becoming a brokerage with open door. Their goal is market share. It's not necessarily, hey, I'm going to get you a good deal. We see their homes going back on the market, sitting sometimes you've got investors. Maybe they're going to liquidate. You've got the American homes for rent, all those guys that bought back in 070809

CC Underwood  35:54  

who knows what they're going to do with their inventory? That'd be great if they would sell some of that. You've got the foreclosures and forbearance that might come into play in 2022 so I think just forecasting and again, you're gonna as a business and as a realtor, you've got to look at where your buckets are, and if your partnerships that you had before are disintegrating, if your lead sources are disintegrating, right? Because you were an expired for sale by owner lead generator, and that funnel has decreased. You have to look for different ones. You I've always been a big proponent. When open door first came to Jacksonville, we partnered with them. Everyone else bashed them. We partnered with them, and we found a way to do business with them. We were able to capitalize on something that everyone just thought was terrible. And as a business, Mantra is where people flee. I will go. It has always served me well. And whenever I see people like just chatting it up, notes right now, listening to show you.

CC Underwood  36:51  

Can we talk? Yeah, so what are you doing? You know, like we talked mentioned, this has been about about 90 days also, and everyone started to feel this amazing amount of offers on us. So what have you done last 90 days that maybe you weren't doing the previous six months a year or ever, that your team is doing differently today? We always, I said, our team, we have a strategy. It's very important. My reputation is extremely important. The way that we are presented to other realtors. Your realtor relationships are so important. It is a small town here in Jacksonville, and so you piss people off, they will not forget. And so it's always important that we're educating people on the other side, but our offer strategies, that's the one thing that we do all the time, is talk about how to get your offer accepted. And we have a process, and we have a system, and there's a certain way that you present offers on our team, like it gets checked. If you're a new agent, it gets checked every single time. I want to know that your package looks right. It is clearly typed out. It's in one PDF. You've got an email going. You've communicated to the other side. You are having real conversations with your buyers about escalatory clauses, about cash over above appraised value, just what that strategy looks like. And we actually had a buyer call in crying, crying on the phone, in desperation. We get that a lot now that they were losing out on homes, and they said, You know what, I'm done. And this is not a knock on new agents. This is a get yourself educated, get a mentor, get a coach, get someone around you if you're new, type of a thing, but they were in tears, just so people have the impact of and you're uneducated, and that lack of experience, it shows in a market like this. It truly does. And they had lost out on three or four homes. Somehow, called our team, got to our team, I think they Googled us, and we were able they found a house. They're like, we have to get this house. What are you doing? And this is the time where experience comes through, where you can be real. And literally, that conversation was, How much money do you have? That is an okay conversation to have with a buyer who is crying, saying, What do I need to do? They're literally asking for your professional advice. What do I need to do? It is your professional obligation. You need to tell them. Tell them what they need to do. Great. How much money do you have? Here's our strategy. We're going to put X number of dollars towards an appraisal. And we're going to put like he had 40,000 so we had 20,000 to go towards an appraisal gap. We also pay $20,000 of the seller's closing cost. So whenever you are talking about strategies, we call that person. We let the seller pick their freaking closing date. Like, whenever you want to close, you can close. They ended up doing lease back a post occupancy. And so we literally pulled out all the stops for this person like you. Tell us what you're willing to do. We will put that package together for you. They listen to us. They got the house. I mean, those are the things you just have to be willing to do that. You have to have harder, real conversations with people, and sometimes financially, it will be harder for you. Right? Not everyone has 10,000 $40,000

CC Underwood  39:50  

but again, it goes back to the strategy. You're going direct, you're mailing postcards, you're knocking on people's doors, you're talking to investors. You just have to do more. It's.

Speaker 1  40:00  

About opening doors. This is when the value of an agent really shines.

Tracy Hayes  40:04  

Just listening. If my jaw could hit the floor, it would have, because I've been in this business as long as CC has, maybe I might have her by a few months, but I've dealt with agents and listening, and I pride myself in out, getting out to the Board of Realtors and doing my classes, one of the ones the Community Development District, one, because I have my knowledge there. And tomorrow I'm actually doing one, an intro to real estate finance. But one thing I've noticed is a lot of stuff that you just talked about, getting going to some of these socials and getting to know the other agents on the other end, having, obviously getting on a team when someone has a very positive representation, very positive reputation in the area, and what you just said was, oh my, I mean, if you're thinking about getting in a you need to, I hope your phone rings Well, as soon as this broadcast go out live, but goes out there, they're calling You because of the tutelage that you could give them and really advance their career just that much further along because you've done it already. You

CC Underwood  41:08  

About opening doors. This is when the value of an agent really shines.

Tracy Hayes  40:04  

 Just listening. If my jaw could hit the floor, it would have, because I've been in this business as long as CC has, maybe I might have her by a few months, but I've dealt with agents and listening, and I pride myself in out, getting out to the Board of Realtors and doing my classes, one of the ones the Community Development District, one, because I have my knowledge there. And tomorrow I'm actually doing one, an intro to real estate finance. But one thing I've noticed is a lot of stuff that you just talked about, getting going to some of these socials and getting to know the other agents on the other end, having, obviously getting on a team when someone has a very positive representation, very positive reputation in the area, and what you just said was, oh my, I mean, if you're thinking about getting in a you need to, I hope your phone rings Well, as soon as this broadcast go out live, but goes out there, they're calling You because of the tutelage that you could give them and really advance their career just that much further along because you've done it already. You spent the 1000s of dollars. You've fallen on your face, you've gotten up and how you you were, you were there for them. And but the agents I see, as some of them say, Well, you know, and I understand, I'm not going to make any money meeting other real estate agents. Yeah, not today. You're not, maybe not. But something's going to come down the road and they're going to say, Oh, this is, oh, I remember meeting, meeting him, and I talked about, I think he's very intelligent, or she's very intelligent, whatever that reputation that you have, and you got the agent on the other side says, especially right now, in this market where you've got 20 offers, oh, we got an offer from cc's, we need to put that on the top. Let's talk, let's talk about them first.

CC Underwood  41:47  

 We do hear that a lot. Yeah, people will say, we want to work with your team. We know your team is solid. We know you've qualified your buyers. So your reputation does, it really does precede you. It means everything, and just because you've met a new realtor today, again, like we're trying to help them. What do you need? Let us help educate you on the contract, on different ways to write it. We've actually had Realtors come back and say, Wow, you're the way that you've written this contract has given me so many ideas on I'm going to use this in the future. Like that's what we want to do. Is better community. And it does work. You never know where a new agent is going to be in three years or five years, they could be that top producer. You need to give back to your own community, right? And you need, you need to get you to get your deal accepted by them,

Tracy Hayes  42:47  

Now, obviously you have a team. My next question is, independent or team? Is a team for everybody? 

CC Underwood  42:53  

It's not

Tracy Hayes  42:55  

what type of person you think is more of an independent that really probably would buckle with a team, clash with the team ego. 

CC Underwood  43:01  

If you have you really, if your branding and what you want, if you have to have you in the absence of income, then you're not a fit for the team, because a lot of times, people miss the boat. You can make a lot more income, because, again, we're better together. We've got everything you need. Your income will go faster, farther, but sometimes, if you got to do it yourself, that's it. I like, I like the ego or the check. And

Tracy Hayes  43:30  

there is no doubt, because on this side, from the lending side, we deal with it too. We, you know, sometimes people, you know, I always remember trying to remember the phrase we used to use in the call center, but I mean the talk, talk, talk. 

CC Underwood  43:43  

And because you want someone to think of you're the sometimes it's time to just shut up, put your ego, decide they're signing the contract, shake their hand, go get them a cup of coffee, whatever. It's not about you exactly. It'll beat you at the end of the month when you get your check, or in your case, you guys get paid. You know the next hour we're closing right now. 

Tracy Hayes  44:02  

You obviously went with Keller Williams. But do you see a benefit in the in the mom and pop or boutique real estate thing? If you were a new agent coming in today, how would you weigh the difference between joining, you know, doing the Keller Williams Way, or there's some successful agents that have broken off and started their own thing. How do you evaluate that there are.

CC Underwood  44:20  

 I mean, in the state of Florida, you only have to have a license two years to open up a brokerage. You never once have to sell a home. I think that is a fail in our industry. And again, I understand it's a business, and there's money involved. So if you're a new agent, if someone's saying, Hey, you can hang your license with me. You can keep 100% of your commission. Value your craft, value your craft. Ask them how they're going to train you, and how often they're going to be available for you, because that 100% if it's in exchange for absolutely no value, means nothing. Have you seen in your career? And I assume the answer is yes to this, but

Tracy Hayes  44:59  

Does it matter? Have you seen a distinct difference between the independent or the team, or is it in the in the person,

CC Underwood  45:05  

 there's a very, very small percentage of agents that will escalate their first year, on average, I see it takes five years for them to have a sustainable income. I mean, that's just to get to 50,000 you know, or more average, I would say five years on our team, it takes one do you feel sometimes I just need a little some people just need to get up and get a little kick in the butt, get them on the track. 

CC Underwood  45:27  

I just think they're distracted. I think as a new agent, you're you're too worried about your logo and your website and your social media, and you're worried about the wrong things that actually don't get you business. And I was too my first year because I didn't know. So I feel like the benefits of someone take all that away from you so that you can only focus on business. And for some agents, that's the perfect distraction. They don't want to go get business. They want to feel busy, but not productive, right, right? 

Tracy Hayes  45:51  

I know exactly we're talking about total different change of subject. CeCe is going out on the town. Does she go to the jumbo shrimp game, or she go to the Jaguars. Oh, Shrimp, shrimp. You know, it's funny. When I wrote that down, I was like, I bet you she goes. She's a jumbo shrimp girl.

CC Underwood  46:09  

I love I'm a sports girl, not for statistical reasons. Don't ask me anyone's name. I just love the sports. I love sports in general, right? What is on CC's travel bucket list, my house, you're just a homebody. I'm a homebody.

Tracy Hayes  46:29  

When CeCe is not talking real estate, what does she like to do?

CC Underwood  46:33  

 I'm at the soccer field.

CC Underwood  46:35  

I'm a soccer field with the kids. Yep. Okay. Are you driving a minivan today? Ah, no. We

Unknown Speaker  46:41  

don't need to fit in any more than what we have.

Tracy Hayes  46:45  

Well, CC was great. Having you on the show today. Tell us it's gonna be in the show notes as you as well. Whether it's a new agent or experienced agent, maybe hurts us. So you know what? I need to pick CC's brain, maybe, maybe even apply to and talk to you about being on your team. How do they

Speaker 1  47:01  

contact you? Facebook's always really good also, I mean, text is probably the easiest way. Hey, I'd like to grab some lunch with you. It's 904-401-8481.

CC Underwood  47:11  

Okay, no Instagram. I'm on this. I'm literally everywhere. I'm on Instagram. Tiktok. Facebook is probably the fastest way to get to me, but you are. 

Tracy Hayes  47:19  

We talked earlier, she is on clubhouse too, so she'll follow her on there as well. Cece, I love enjoyed having you on the show today. Thank you so much. All right, everyone. Have a great

Speaker 2  47:34  

day. This may be it for today's episode of Real Estate excellence, but we both know your pursuit of excellence doesn't stop here to connect with the best of the best and really take your skills to the next level. Join our community by visiting Tracy Hayes podcast.com where you'll meet more like minded individuals looking to expand their inner circle and their personal experience that's available at Tracy Hayes podcast.com you

Speaker 3  48:07  

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