Stefanie Ridolfo, founder of Liv Real Estate Partners at Keller Williams, started her real estate career shortly after delivering twins. To fund her business she sold her home and moved the family in with her parents. Two years later she became a top 1% producer, and ever since has become one of the top brokers in Chicago. In her four years in real estate, Stefanie has built up a successful team and teaches other brokers how to duplicate her success. Learn how she grew so quickly and why going “all in” made all the difference.

Stephanie Ridolfo can be reached at 630.200.2120 and [email protected].

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:15Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for brokers all over the country. That’s our new tagline as we have listeners beyond the Chicagoland market. What we do here, if you’re new is we feature top 1% producers in the Chicagoland area and ask them how they became successful as we are coming up now on our 100th episode, we’ve Gosh been featured on lists that say we’re one of the best real estate podcasts in the in the country. I’m not sure if that’s true, but we certainly do our best and our listeners seem to really find a ton of value in listening to these top heavy hitters in Chicago. Today is no exception. We have Stephanie Rodolfo, coming up in just a few moments. But I also wanted to mention a couple quick things. First, please continue to share this podcast with other brokers that you think could benefit from hearing from top producers, also our Facebook page, we are now starting to add more content. So you can find us on [email protected] forward slash keeping it real pod, we are almost trying to produce one post a day of something very helpful, just like our interviews that brokers could use. For example, today, I found a great thread on Reddit about the importance of doing open houses to find clients. And it’s an awesome thread that someone sent into us. So we wanted to pass that along to everyone as well. So if you’re not already a follower of our Facebook page, please do. Also remember you can find us on Facebook, I just I just mentioned Facebook, but on our website, you can stream every episode we’ve ever produced, which is keeping it real pod.com. So find us on Facebook, find us online, send us your suggestions, we are a sadly we are very behind. So everyone that’s submitted a suggestion. If you haven’t heard back from our production team, we apologize we have, I think we’re over 100 people have been suggested to be on the show. So quite a backlog, but we appreciate it. We appreciate all the fan mail, and all the great suggestions. And if you ever have questions that you’d like me to ask, Are these top producers, please send them in because I’m always looking to increase value for you. You This is for you, not for me. So anyway, thank you for listening as we approach episode 100 Keep listening, keep telling us how to improve and we’ll keep making these episodes. So now on to Stephanie Rudolfo.

Okay, today on the show, we have Stephanie Rodolfo of the of live partners, which is you can find her. I’m sorry,

Nick Rendleman of the Nicholas Ryan Team at Exit Realty believes that his job is to uplift lives through service. We talk about his previous career in ministry and why he believes that the same objectives and skills apply in real estate. His top 1% team evaluates their performance on client reviews and he encourages brokers to ask, “If I were only receiving compensation if the client gave me a glowing review, how would I act today?” This is an interview not to miss!

Nick Rendleman can be reached at 630.631.8600 and [email protected]

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00Today’s keeping it real episode is brought to you by not standard a premium luxury custom menswear experience in Chicago with the highest quality fabric source from the top mills in the world and more than 7000 customizable details each not standard product is as unique as you are booking an appointment with trusted stylist Lauren Lipton at not standard.com That’s kn o Te standard.com forward slash Lauren, L A u r e n, and mentioned in DJ Paris, me to enjoy a complimentary shirt and 15% off your first purchase.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real, the only podcast that features the top 1% of Chicago realtors in the industry. And I’ve just changed the tagline there on the fly. Because we used to say it’s made for Chicago real estate brokers by Chicago real estate brokers, which is true, but we have listeners now from all over. So it’s not specifically just for Chicago realtors, although that’s what we focus on the show today, we have Nick Randleman from exit, who is going to be talking about how he built his business. It’s it was a great conversation coming up in just a few moments. I want to encourage everyone who’s listening as we near our 100th episode, which we’re so honored to be able to say we’ve done as people seem to continue to listen and our view or listenership continues to grow. So thank you for everyone who listens. And also thank you to everyone who is telling a friend anyone you know, who’s a realtor who wants to learn what these top one percenters are doing, how they grew their business, what they’re doing today, what mistakes they’ve made, send them a link to our show. And they can of course, you can find us on iTunes, Google Play Stitcher, and anywhere else podcasts are served, just search for keeping it real podcast. Look for the one with DJ, that’s me. There’s a few others named keeping it real as well, but only one with my name. So you’ll find me pretty easily. And also, you can visit our website, you can stream every episode we’ve ever done, which is keeping it real pod.com. Also, please like us on Facebook, we [email protected] forward slash keeping it real pod. And as we post links to all of our episodes, and also links to all of our guests, their websites, their social media, etc. You can check out to see what they’re doing. But as I reflect back on these 100 or so almost 100 episodes, I want to encourage everyone to go back and listen, if you have time. And you’re so interested to go back and listen all the way from the beginning. Because the advice and information provided here by our guests is really is timeless. Very rarely do we ever talk about current conditions in the market. Of course, we have Kerry McCormick on every month. And she does do that, outside of that every other episode we do is re...

Welcome to the March edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick from At Properties!

In this episode Carrie first discusses how the city market is doing before launching into advanced strategies when working with buyers in multiple offer situations. She discusses how buyers can write personal letters to sellers and also suggests making a video to introduce themselves! Lastly she provides some buyer “don’t’s” during multiple offers. I provide a marketing tip around skill building to increase your value to customers.

Carrie can be reached at [email protected] or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00Today’s keeping it real episode is brought to you by not standard a premium luxury custom menswear experience in Chicago with the highest quality fabric source from the top mills in the world and more than 7000 customizable details each not standard product is as unique as you are booking an appointment with trusted stylist Lauren Lipton at not standard.com That’s kn o Te standard.com forward slash Lauren, L A u r e n and mentioned in DJ Paris me to enjoy a complimentary shirt and 15% off your first purchase

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcasts made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris and I am your host today on the show. We have as usual Carrie McCormick for her Monday market minute or carry talks about what brokers need to know what is happening with the Chicagoland market. If you’re not familiar with Kerri McCormick she is a top producer. And just to give you an idea of what a top producer she is, by the way, she is a broker at at properties and has been very successful top producer for 20 years. However, she is not only a top 1% producer, she is a top 1/10 of 1% Producer because I did the math earlier today and there are 41,000 brokers in Chicago Carrie is always consistently in the top like 15 or 20 out of 41,000. So we are so honored to have her on the show. She just recovered from a two week illness and is still dedicated to coming and helping our listeners. So welcome. And thank you Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 1:55Well, thank you very much for having me. And, and first off, I also want to thank everyone that listens to your show, because during the month I always get you know, phone calls, I get emails, I get messages, DM messages from the listeners, you know, asking their questions to me directly, sometimes, you know, they’ll call me. And I just want to say that’s one thing I love about our community here in Chicago is giving, giving back to the community. I’ve been doing this for decades, two decades now. And I’ve learned a ton. And I’m happy to help anyone with any questions, give advice, whatever it is, please keep the questions coming. And love to hear from everybody. Awesome.

D.J. Paris 2:40So what are we talking about today?

Carrie McCormick 2:42So I’m just gonna hit on a few things. One, I always like to start with some stats of where the market is, you know, we’re, we’re in our spring market and the new listings in the city of Chicago were down 7.3% For detached which is the single family homes. But they were up 4.

Welcome to the March edition of Coaching Moments with Ryan D’Aprile!

If you listened to last month’s Coaching Moments, you know that Ryan D’April of D’Aprile Properties spent a full hour on lead generation. We had such an overwhelming response from our listeners that this month he spent another full hour answering your questions! Don’t worry if you missed the last episode – you can jump right in with this one. Ryan has coached (and continues to coach) some of the top brokers in Chicago, and his methods are simple and effective. If you’re a broker looking to increase your production by even one deal a month, you NEED to listen to this episode.

Ryan D’Aprile can be reached at 312.492.7900 and [email protected].

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00Today’s keeping it real episode is brought to you by not standard a premium luxury custom menswear experience in Chicago with the highest quality fabric source from the top mills in the world and more than 7000 customizable details each not standard product is as unique as you are booking an appointment with trusted stylist Lauren Lipton at not standard.com That’s kn o Te standard.com forward slash Lauren, L A u r e n and mentioned in DJ Paris, me to enjoy a complimentary shirt and 15% off your first purchase.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers also for brokers all over the country because we are starting to get more traction and people from many different states have written into us. So I know it’s not just local, but we are interviewing and talking with local brokers here. We only talked to the top 1% If you’re a new listener, this is coaching moments with Ryan’s APR. And this is a really super fun series that we do. Ryan comes on every single month, and Ryan’s passion is coaching. By the way, if you’re not familiar with Ryan, let me give you a little bit of information. Here, Ryan, April’s a progressive thought leader, he’s focused on providing for his agents and staff in particular, Ryan’s passion is coaching. His strengths are motivational skills, his coaching style and dedication to training. And what I want to mention is Ryan has a visit right? You have 13 offices, is that right? Yes. Yeah, so write us 13 offices, several 100 brokers. And Ryan spends the vast majority of his time traveling from office to office coaching his brokers. So we’re so honored that he spends time every month doing that here for the 1000s of listeners we have so and by the way, Ryan is also on vacation. So this is primetime that he is taking away from his family to do this for you. So on behalf of all the listeners, Ryan, thank you and welcome.

Ryan D’Aprile 2:15It’s my pleasure. Thanks so much. Yes, I’m down here in sunny Miami. It’s in it’s fantastic, by the way, because I think of where we are when I left I think was about 25 degrees, what’s the temperature there now?

D.J. Paris 2:25It is 30.

Welcome to the March episode of Investor Insights With Brie Schmidt!

Use coupon code REAL for a discount on Midwest Real Estate Summit on June 1-2 in Chicago. Click here for details!

Brie Schmidt is one of the most well-respected buy-and-hold investors in Chicago. Each month we’ll be discussing an investment topic brokers should master.

This month we’re talking about house hacking, the principle of buying a multi-unit, living in one unit, and having the other tenants pay the mortgage. Brie talks about loan limits for conventional (20%) and FHA (3.5%) for multi-unit investments. She also shares the Home Possible program (by Freddie Mac) with allows for a 3% down payment based on borrower’s income relative to median income.

Links discussed in episode…

HomePossible Program Details

Conventional and FHA Lending Limits

Use coupon code REAL for a discount on Midwest Real Estate Summit on June 1-2 in Chicago. Click here for details!

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00Today’s keeping it real episode is brought to you by not standard a premium luxury custom menswear experience in Chicago with the highest quality fabric source from the top mills in the world and more than 7000 customizable details each not standard product is as unique as you are booking an appointment with trusted stylist Lauren Lipton at not standard.com That’s kn O T standard.com forward slash Lauren L A u r e n and mentioned in DJ Paris me to enjoy a complimentary shirt and 15% off your first purchase

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. And I really should stop saying that because we have people listening from all over the country, but we do focus predominantly in the Chicagoland market but we welcome listeners from all over today is the newest episode of our monthly series investor insights which we paused briefly last year and we just got too busy and so we are so excited to continue this speeds it’s the number one most requested feature on our show that we sadly just weren’t able to do for a while so we are so excited because we have a brand new host of the series and she if you are involved in the investor community, whether it’s nationwide or here in Chicago, you probably have heard of the name Bree Schmitt, she has all over bigger pockets. I call her the queen of bigger pockets. So if you’re a bigger pockets person, you probably have come across her or you certainly will. After listening to her today. Let me tell you a little bit about Bri Bri acquired her first investment property in 2011. She left the corporate world in 2014 when she became a full time real estate investor. Bree is the managing broker for own firm which is Second City Real Estate, a full service brokerage, working with new investors and also seasoned investors looking to expand their knowledge of the industry and their portfolio. abri utilizes her extensive knowledge of building and managing a portfolio to teach clients and brokers all about aspects of buy and hold investing.

Brother and sister top 1% producers Sophia Klopas and Jason Stratton of the Klopas Stratton Team at Berkshire Hathaway continue to grow their business year over year. In this episode they talk about how their skill sets compliment each other such that clients truly get two-for-one for the best possible consumer experience. They also talk about how knowing their hourly rate and becoming hyper-local doubled their production. Last, they discuss why they never perceive discount firms as competition, and why it’s okay to walk away from clients that aren’t a good fit.

This episode is brought you to by Knot Standard custom men’s clothing consultant Lauren Lipton. Mention D.J. Paris to get a custom shirt free with your first order!

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by not standard a premium luxury custom menswear experience in Chicago with the highest quality fabric source from the top mills in the world and more than 7000 customizable details each not standard product is as unique as you are booking appointment with trusted stylist Lauren Lipton at not standard.com. That’s kn O T standard.com forward slash Lauren and mentioned me DJ Paris to enjoy a complimentary shirt with your first purchase.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real, the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers also brokers who listen from all over the country. So I should probably update that. But we interview the top 1% of Realtors in Chicago, there’s 40,000, we only talk to the top 400 And ask them how they built their business and what advice they have for other brokers who may be listening. And they share their strategies, their secrets, and what has made them successful. So we gosh, we’re coming up on 100 episodes, and we keep getting more listeners. So we’re super grateful because we have as we spend no money on marketing, but I would like everyone who is listening, if they want to help us if we’re helping you. Here’s a couple of ways you can help us number one telephone if you know any other brokers in the industry that would love to hear what top producers are doing so that they could replicate that success. Tell them right anyone in your office, you know, give them a link to our show. The more listeners, the more people we can help second, go to our Facebook page. So it’s facebook.com forward slash keeping it real pod why because we post links to all of our episodes, exclusive content, and just a great way to stay in touch to find out what we’ve got going on. And then third, if you are an I an iOS and Apple user, subscribe to us on iTunes, do a search for keeping it real podcast. If you’re an Android person, you can go to Google Play and do the same or just use whatever podcast app podcast app you have. And search for keeping it real podcast, you’ll find us subscribe so you never miss an episode. And then one last thing, this is kind of cool. You know how you have an Alexa at home? Probably everybody does. And it just sits there and you don’t use it. I use it to turn my lights on and off. And that’s literally all I use it for. Well, you can actually now use it to play our podcast. So there’s one step involved, which means go into your Alexa app on your phone or your mobile device and go to the skills and do a search for keeping it real podcast you’ll see we have a skill you have to activate that skill takes two s...

Welcome to the February edition of Coaching Moments with Ryan D’Aprile!

In this episode Ryan spends a full hour on lead generation – the most important component of a broker’s business. Ryan spends time on the difference between lead gen and marketing, and gives the exact strategies his teaches his brokers on how to add more contacts to one’s database and how to stay in touch over time. Also, Ryan reveals that in every broker’s contact list, there are a minimum of 32-64 transactions per year (and how to capture those deals)!

Ryan D’Aprile can be reached at 312.492.7900 and [email protected].

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers except I’m going to change that and say it is made by Chicago real estate brokers, but it’s for brokers all over the country. We do have listeners everywhere. So I’m going to teach myself not to say should just for Chicago brokers. Anyway, today is our monthly episode with Ryan Day, April. And this is called coaching moments. And Ryan is with us if you don’t know Ryan, you should, because not only is he the owner and operator and head coach of the April properties, they have 13 offices all throughout Chicago and the suburbs. He has hundreds of Realtors, lots of top 1% producers, and Ryan spends pretty much all of his time coaching and developing the careers of his realtor. So we’re so honored to have him on the show. He’s a legend in the Chicago market. And we’re really honored to have him today. So Ryan, welcome once again.

Ryan D’Aprile 1:10Thanks, CJ, it’s good to be here. Oh,

D.J. Paris 1:12let’s plug your let’s plug your company’s website. It’s deep, real deep, real properties.com. That’s it? All right, great. And if you’re a realtor out there and you want to study or interested in maybe joining Ryan’s team, go to do properties.com. And you can contact them and you can find an office near you and and schedule a phone call or consultation. Or if also if you’re a buyer seller or renter investor that’s interested in working with with one of Ryan’s brokers, you can do that there as well. So anyway, I’ll turn it over to Ryan.

Ryan D’Aprile 1:43All right. Thanks, DJ. Well, thanks for having me appreciate I’m really looking forward to our our monthly meetings. And these are coaching moments that we’re doing. So let’s talk about what we want to cover today. And last month, we covered a morning routine, right? So what I’m going to do today is go over what I review with our agents and what we call our coaching one session. And so I have coaching session one at coaching session two and then we have workshops. And in summary what coaching session one is about it’s it’s kind of it’s like the game of real estate and life in general that we’re going to reveal and so workshop is we’re we’re sleeves are rolled up and we’re doing work. This is more instructive. And just showing everybody like let’s relate it to a board game Monopoly it could real estate board game. And so what we’re gonna do is we’re not going to play the gam...

Welcome to the February edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie discusses how the market slowed last year, but that in 2019 we’re starting to see some increases in activity. With rates being down, Carrie is noticing her buyers are poised to purchase and provides a tip on how to prep them now with a sample contract. I also talk about contacting past clients to discuss the possibility of a refinance.

Carrie can be reached at [email protected] or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:15Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcasts made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. This is our monthly series called them the Monday market minute with Carrie McCormick. If you are a new listener and haven’t listened to one of our Monday market minutes before Carrie is a top producer without properties for over 20 years has been a top producer. Last year she finished in the top 15 of all realtors in Chicago and that’s out of 40,000 Realtors. So we are so honored, she comes on once a month and tells our listeners what they need to know about what is happening in the Chicago real estate market. And also, before I bring carry on, everyone should follow Carrie on Instagram, just do a search for Carrie McCormack real estate. That’s the thing, you can also find her on Facebook as well Carrie McCormick real estate, and welcome to the show. Carrie,

Carrie McCormick 1:06thank you, thank you Happy 2019

D.J. Paris 1:10Happy 2019.

Carrie McCormick 1:12So just to get started, the one thing that people have been focused on is interest rates. And with the Fed holding off on further interest rate increases, we see that this year is starting off very good. So we’ve seen a lot of activity in the market. All of us that have been in the market for a while we know that q2 was kind of flat. So last year of 2018. Really after, I’m gonna say like July, the rest of the year was just flat. And the reason going back and looking at that, you know, interest rates were increasing, taxes were increasing, there’s a lot of talk about increasing taxes. And you know, the second bill came out and people were worried about that. And actually, the wage growth wasn’t as favorable either. And it just created this affordability issue. And people I think were just hesitant about buying. People were out looking, but they weren’t actually pulling the trigger and buying. So I do still think that housing affordability is going to be an important storyline this year. But we are definitely seeing buyers starting to get out into the market. And they’re getting motivated to buy, which is great. So also, one thing to look at is last year in 2018. Because of the interest rates and taxes, a lot of people have just decided to rent. Right? So now we’re seeing an uptick in the rental rates just because of the whole supply and demand factor. So rental rates are starting to tick up this year, which now those renters are saying like, why would I rent or pay more in rent, now let’s go by, right, because interest rates are going down. So again, looking just at the economics of the market, we’re gonna see a shift this year. But we’re going to be tied to those lease months,...

Michael Hall finished 2018 as Baird and Warner’s second highest producing broker in Chicago and also placed in the top 50 of brokers in Chicago (this is out of 40k brokers!). As a top agent for twenty-four years, Michael talks about how open houses started his career, how listing presentations are like dating, why he encourages brokers to spend 50% of their time searching for new clients, and why he knows that you can grow your business in any type of market with the right attitude.

Michael Hall can be reached at 773.398.4359 and [email protected].

Prior to becoming a top Chicago real estate broker with Compass, Josh Lipton had careers in private equity and as an attorney. When he made the switch to real estate, he earned CAR’s coveted Rookie Of The Year award, naming him the highest producing first-year broker in Chicago. Two years later he became (and remains) in the top 1% of ALL brokers in Chicago. In this episode Josh talks about why he visited college campus in his first year which resulted in 70+ rentals, how he uses Facebook lists to stay connected to clients, why he orders a pre-inspection for his sellers, and a dozen other strategies that brokers can implement today to increase production!

Josh Lipton can be reached at [email protected] and 312.504.5409