Ep: 45 – How to Grow and Persevere w/ Paul Germanese | Broker’s Playbook
Simeon Papailias: A good morning to the entire brokerage playbook community. This is Simeon Pompa and I am extremely pleased to bring on today’s guest. Mr. Paul Germany’s Paul, welcome to Brokers Playbook. Well.
Paul Germanese: Thank you for having me. Big, big fan and an absolute honor to be here. I know.
Simeon Papailias: Well, I couldn’t be happier to have you on because you have a lot to share. We’ve spoken a couple of times before this recording in. There’s quite a bit to unpack. And what I want to do this morning is get straight to business and really kind of establish why I believe people should really focus and pay attention to what you’ve done. Because not only have you established a successful practice, you’ve kind of put Windsor on the map. You’re out of Windsor, Ontario. I know, because I run an investment focused real estate practice. I know how much of how many clients of mine have been inquiring and transacting in Windsor, and I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that you may be behind half of those transactions. So so I want to hear all about your story. How did you start out? Where did you start? How did this journey become what it became?
Paul Germanese: You know, when I started out, I came from the restaurant business. I worked in an Italian restaurant for for many years. And a good friend of mine, his father was a was was a broker. And, you know, we’re at his house when one Christmas and we’re having a couple of drinks and, you know, I’m in my early twenties and left there. Next thing I know, I was getting get license different different era of real estate back then. But I got license, I got in, I was working in the restaurant, I was part time and it was oh seven, eight, nine around that era. Again, I’m from Windsor. We got hit the hardest. We got hit really, really hard back then. I mean, we’re we’re we’re an automotive sector down here and and that’s the market that I learned real estate in.
Simeon Papailias: So I just to put it into perspective for our younger brethren and sister, and I think it’s very important to describe that era. I got into business the exact same time you did. This is my 16th year practicing going on 17. So so we’re literally in at the same time. 070809 We’re talking about the financial collapse south of the border. We’re talking about a changing technology, a global technology phenomenon. As the iPhone started coming to be Blackberries dying, like all the old guard was falling apart and there was a lot of volatility, maybe just very similar to what’s happening today with different descriptors. Tell me about what you saw in 0708, because Windsor, as you said, is an automotive city with Detroit being right next to it. And we’re literally a bridge away from plant to plant and people go out of business. Gm is getting bailed out. What was the feeling on the street? What was that? What was that mood like in the market?
Paul Germanese: I’m so people thought I was crazy when I when I got my real estate license back then. But I’m so thankful that that’s the market that I learned in when I was younger. I was in my early mid twenties. I was a buyer’s agent like most agents are. When they start out, I would go show houses and be the first agent in on a Saturday. I was I was showing 60 to 80 houses a week. I was one of the youngest agents in my market, so everybody was just my vibe was attracting my tribe at all. My first time home buyers coming, I’d go show houses. That’d be the first one in copper missing, no kitchens, a coils out of furnaces like it was. It was the Wild West. And I wouldn’t see a single person on all of these showings. Only people understood. Half of them were foreclosures. It was sad. Yes. And we border Detroit. Detroit is a first city ever in America to claim bankruptcy. This is the era of Kwame Kilpatrick. Do some research on that. There’s just absolute mayhem out there. But I learned how to work and I learned how to how to how to operate in that market. In a down market, my mind still operates as if that market’s going to come come back at any time. Right now, we’re going through a little bit of a little bit of a market shift here. My mind automatically knows where to go and how to work when COVID started. Same thing.
Simeon Papailias: And I think that’s more of a life mantra, not so much a business strategy, meaning when you’ve seen the world, when it’s down, you don’t unsee that and you appreciate the up days far more than you would otherwise.
Paul Germanese: You know what? It’s. Yeah.
Simeon Papailias: The name of your team. Just just for the records. I want you to say it right. What is the name of your team?
Paul Germanese: So it’s a W for you. The real estate group. That’s eight W the number four, the letter you, the real estate group. And that that just stands for always working for you. And again, that came up me and the shower just thinking, you know the hot water’s hot and I’m just in my zone in there and you know, I was how do I explain to people like, fuck, like, how do I how do I just be like, I.
Simeon Papailias: What do you stand for?
Paul Germanese: I have your best interest in mind. It’s all about you. How can I get this across? I want to scream it the top of the mountain and just started with always working for you. I’m always working for you to the point where I’d be out and I buy somebody a drink or something like, Oh, yeah, always working for you. Hey. And it just. It just transcended over everything, everything in my life. And, and that’s just what we’re known for.
Simeon Papailias: So I think I’m trying to link and be able for, for our audience to resonate. When you go through a tough market or a tough time, it doesn’t matter what it is. If you’re guiding, principle is always working for you, which means you’re a man of service. You didn’t say I’m the number one agent for me because I’m the number one agent. Nobody gives a crap if your number one or number two people want to know, they’re going to be taken care of. If you can display that, because the other thing is you’re like, oh, no, a down market, down market, up market. We’re brokers, we’re the ham in the sandwich. We’re not on the one side or the other. Whether it’s prices come down, prices go up. People need to transact real estate, and we’re there to represent them fairly. We’re there to represent their interests first, beyond anything else. So if if every if every broker could just understand that if the market goes down, that doesn’t mean your business goes down, but that means the value of that transaction may have shifted, the frequency of your transactions may have shifted, but you’re still there to do the same job you were doing yesterday. Always working for you is your mantra. And this is why, even if you see a shift in the market, it just reminds you of how important it is to be of that service.
Paul Germanese: Shifts, shifts create opportunity as well, right? There’s there’s two sides of every transaction. There’s a buyer side and there’s a seller side. I mean, these interest rates going up, you know, I mean, the the, the profits are tight as it begins with that’s going to shift some investors out or to a different market. But it’s also going to create what we need most down here in Windsor. And again, I always want to be a Windsor focused here. Everybody forgets about us down here, man. Everybody forgets because Ontario stops at Windsor. We’ve got we’ve got I think we’ve got the state is that is will serve with that No worries. All right Everybody forgets about us down here. But the stat is I think we’ve got two or three extra weeks of summer down here because our weather is so nice is in the eighties on the weekend was fantastic. But yeah, I mean, it creates opportunity. Every shift in the market creates opportunity. The investors exit and guess who gets to re-enter the market? The buyers that we lost, which was that first time single income home buyer. They may they may have an opportunity back at the market. So I always.
Simeon Papailias: Look at what kind of what kind of trends are you seeing? Just not to to derail the mindset conversation that I want to have, but just quickly touch on, have you seen a shift in prices already?
Paul Germanese: We’ve seen a shift so I can feel a shift in the market immediately because I’m primarily a listing agent. So I can feel my my showings. I mean, the amount of people we had down here from the GTA in February and March or January, February, March, my phone would get 70 calls a day on, on, on listings just from GTA agents. Very frustrating market to work in. I miss them though, because they brought a lot of offers. They brought a lot of people down here. They’ve exited our market for the time being because I think opportunity is being presented in their own market again, I’m seeing so my number of showings is down. We have 2030 offers on every show, on every listing. My my offers are down as well. I’m at that 3 to 7 range now. My values have stayed the same though, so the images are excellent. Yes, the inventory is starting to stack up. Windsor has got a multi billion dollar battery plant that was just announced three weeks ago. You got an Amazon.
Simeon Papailias: I watched I watched the Doug Ford announcement live. That was massive. It’s massive for Ontario.
Paul Germanese: That’s right here in our backyard. We’ve got Amazon that just announced last week that they’re building a warehouse here. We’ve got a brand new international bridge crossing that’s being constructed, constructed currently to match the one that we already have. The two towers are already up. That’s going to be the biggest economic impact for us because logistics and trucking and that whole industry, we have the biggest international crossing in North America and Windsor-detroit now we’re building another bridge strictly for that. The logistics and the money saving on these companies can be massive, and the spin off on that is going to be huge. And we’ve got a mega hospital coming as well. So the future is bright here in Windsor. Don’t forget about us. We’re doing a lot of business down here. We’re doing a crazy amount, a crazy amount of business. We’ve had a 40% gain in our market since last year.
Simeon Papailias: That’s that’s absolutely incredible. It’s actually one of the hottest markets in Ontario. Absolutely. Which brings me back to to mindset and journey. You’re a 15 year vet today. You weren’t you were 14 year vet last year. Let’s go back ten years, year five in real estate. You’re obviously a very intense man for both your tone, your manner and the way your outlook on getting business. So that’s something I see right at the forefront, which I respect dearly. Tell me a little bit about successes mounting. You’re getting results year five. At which point did you have were you forced to get into a team environment where you had to be a leader? Were you a born leader? How do you see yourself when you look in the mirror? At which point in the journey did you have that shift and how did you execute on it?
Paul Germanese: You know, I was forced forced the organically this had to happen because I was at a stage in life. You know, my oldest daughter is nine. I’ve got a nine year old, a seven year old and a four year old. And as the children started coming, my career started to to elevate. And I just wanted to get get home to them. And I didn’t want to become a slave to the business. Like I didn’t want to continue to be a slave to the business, which I was. I was 100% a slave. I loved when a lot of new agents entering the market right now. And I just love when they say, Oh, I get to make my own schedule.
Simeon Papailias: Isn’t it?
Paul Germanese: So that’s the beauty of it. But if you’re successful, your time is gone. This is a time game. Real estate. Real estate is a time game. That’s what all we want. And it’s a game of leverage, right? I’ve realized I didn’t want to be a leader, but I realized as I hired people. My process got better, my service got better, and I was able to free up some time as well. I love hiring people. I’m not scared to hire anybody. So back then it was I was in a parking lot and the first agent that that joined me was was Agent Chris Toledo. And I just pulled over one day and I was like, Listen, I’m drowning here. I’m in jail. I need help. Do you know who I am? Do you want to do you want to be a cellmate with me? Which is what it was at that time. And we and we did it. He’s still with me. He’s. He’s his own age now. He’s. He’s definitely learned the hard way. And sure, if I would do that to another person. But that’s what it took. So definitely not a born leader. I mean, I find leading sometimes not a struggle, but I like my I like my downtime, I like my alone time. And but it is what is you can see behind me there’s there’s ten of us here now. And no matter what’s going on in my life, I got to I got to open the doors and lead this team to.
Simeon Papailias: And how are you finding you personally? How do you find or where do you draw the energy to lead today? The energy to lead tomorrow? As one of the questions that I very often get is where does it end? Where does it start? Like a lot of us and I’m talking about now going back to very senior people, it does get to be a law in some days are tougher than others, just like some days are much easier than others. Where do you draw your your perseverance from? Where do you get the energy to say, I’m going to rock out again today and I’m going to kill tomorrow? Where do you draw that from?
Paul Germanese: It’s it’s it’s that fire. I’m 15, 16 years end and congrats to you on entry and and all of that. I mean, I feel like I’m day one Like that’s I don’t know. I think you got to have that fire inside you and it’s not for everybody. I’ve had agents where it’s just like, where’s where’s that fire? Do you have it or you don’t? My my fire inside me again. Everybody I sit down with is the job description is you must be passionate, you must stay inspired. That’s the job description. Whatever that looks like for you. Go, go figure that out. And I’ll be here to support that. But it boils down to the person and that fire. I’m 16 years and I’m fucking day one right now. I look at your setup and talking to you like, this is what I’m this is where I’m this is where I want to go. This is what I’m striving to do, right? I’m a realtor’s realtor, man. I look at other people in my market, in other markets, I look at Listen, Chairman, the chairman this is a roll of page vibe here right now. You know what I mean? You know what it takes to get there. And look at you guys. Oh, you’re fucking numbers. It’s unbelievable. I’d love to get there. I’m sitting down here. Winds are cranking out to 50 to 80 deals. And I’m looking at you guys. I’m like, wow, But it’s the media part two that I just strive to be. So that’s that inspires me. That that’s that’s.
Simeon Papailias: Passion.
Paul Germanese: I see your passion that that fires me up. But if you don’t have that fire, sorry, you’re fucked.
Simeon Papailias: Yes. So, so I’m going to just to comment to that because I agree wholeheartedly is I don’t so I’ve been asked the same question and you were not able to give me a clean answer, one that somebody can take you to their practice. And unfortunately, I don’t have the words either because I’ve tried. So you describe it as fire. I describe it as hardwired in your DNA. We’re seeing the same thing. We’re not able, though, to give somebody maybe a point to be inspired by or direction on how to do it. Not that we owe anybody a therapy session, but what I want to do on this podcast is be able to find the words as to maybe some of the back drivers as to what what causes that fire, what is it in our lives? Because I see the world we’re extremely similar, which I don’t typically always like. Like when I say we’re similar, like it’s almost a carbon copy. I come from the restaurant industry. I grew up in service. I’m an extremely intense and pumped individual. I don’t need to have coffee to wake up like I’m already freaking out. When I when I open my eyes, I’m freaking out. So we have extreme similarities in that. And I do want I’m focusing a lot on that 5 to 8 year agent right now and their journeys because I find just like myself, perhaps just like yourself, that’s where the biggest change happens. People don’t realize that it takes five years to build a business no matter what or give a shit who you are. There’s I’ve seen nobody be consistent or know their job well. In less than five years I did a couple hundred thousand my first year, but that doesn’t mean I knew what I was doing. I was just intense freaking out, trying to find transactions by hook or by crook. I did it, but that was not the man who I am today. After thousands of transactions or five years. Hundreds of transactions. You’re a different person.
Paul Germanese: 100%. I remember doing 100 deals on my own without DocuSign. I’ve got to go get a counteroffer here. So technology is definitely allowed us to.
Simeon Papailias: I’ve talked about this before. I remember the days me and Jaz were in separate ends of the city and the GTA is a big place. Like literally we’re an hour apart. It’s 1130. I was at a Red Lobster at that at Young and Finch. He was somewhere in the West End. We both did a deal that night. I was like, Where are you at? It’s 1145. The client just left, just finished having a drink and we’re just exhausted, like, just drained. And he had wanted multiples, and I think it was the transaction. It was actually one of his best friends place that he bought. And he had to fight and fight and fight and telling his boy like, you just got to come up and like just all the things. And you remember at one point then like I’m talking 7 a.m., we meet at the gym and 8:00 would be at the office and here you go, it’s midnight. And we still haven’t seen outside like outside of the business. So when you were talking about being a slave to the business and all those things, that really resonates with me because I’ve had sandwiches for years.
Paul Germanese: You remember that moment, though? Like when I remember driving in my gold neon that my grandmother gave me and I’m going and doing deals. I think I listed a problem and then I got an accepted offer. And then. And then, then, then something else happened and I was just driving and I was like, Holy shit, I’m doing it. I feel like I feel like I’m doing this. It’s happening. Holy shit, it’s happening. I feel I’m not. I’m not I’m not faking it anymore. Like this is. I’m actually serving people and I’ve got a pipeline here and all that stuff. So it’s always about, it’s always about that, that journey. I’ll never stop and I’ll never be satisfied. It’s just the way that I’m built. I’ll never be satisfied. Like I can have massive projects on the on on the horizon and we get them done and I’ll be happy for a fucking hour. And then then I’m on to the next. You can have a great X, maybe I can have a great month. And then it’s just like, okay, but my eyes are already on already on next month. And there’s so much noise out there too, with, with other realtors right now and social media, my algorithms like feeding me all the real estate and they set a record price here. Record price, Of course, it’s a record price. It’s a record market. So you won’t get any of that BS from us. But I’m just fired up, man. This is the best business in the world.
Simeon Papailias: Let’s go back to some advice. I want to know. When you hire somebody on your on brokers playbook today, we have an incredible audience of knowledge, thirsty brokers, very respectful brokers who want to take and I’ve begged them to take all they can because it’s going to be their duty to give back once they implement some of the strategies. Tell me about your service mindset. Tell me, why is it important? That you tell your client. Because I tell my clients I don’t give a shit what they think of me. All sorted. So happy to see you. Same in acting. Because of all the media, we’ve kind of changes the dynamic. I remind them who the client is and who owes what duty to who. Absolutely in person. Every time I looked at them in the eyes. Don’t you ever speak to me if I have time for you or else go find somebody else. If you don’t think I have time for you, you don’t know me.
Paul Germanese: The worst thing. The worst thing someone can say to you, you probably agree with this. Or if they. If they started text with Sorry to bother you in my voice.
Simeon Papailias: You can’t even look at it.
Paul Germanese: When I sit down with everybody, I say, Listen, this is always working for you. You’re my boss. The quicker you can understand that I work for you, the better. This will go, so treat you the same.
Simeon Papailias: So we felt like obviously you do the same, but like, it’s the first thing I get out of the way is reset the balance of the scales, which has to be all in their favor. Not a balanced relationship. There’s no balance here. I’m looking to earn 30, 40, 50,000 in the next few days, weeks or months. Who the hell do you think you are?
Paul Germanese: Yeah. Yeah.
Simeon Papailias: So tell me, how does one take that in so business? Let’s say I’m in business. Seven years, Paul. What can you give me that I could implement today from a service perspective? What do I do to my next client? What do I say?
Paul Germanese: So first of all, I think it starts with the the people that you surround yourself with, right? If we’re talking if you’re a single agent, I think the first thing I should do is you hire somebody to help you service those clients. Again, if you’re opening up a restaurant, you’re not going to be the dishwasher, the hostess, the chef and the waiter and and the concierge of that business. But yet in real estate, we decide to do that all the time. One of them, a coach I had in the past, told me that. And it just really, really resonated me. Maybe because I’m from the restaurant business, but you want to truly serve people. It’s going to take it’s going to take a team at some point. And that 5 to 7 year agent, if you haven’t hired yet, you’re you’re you’re going to have 100%. I couldn’t imagine how how better service I was able to give people with help because again you get to that point where you become a slave to the business. And my appointments were, you know, I got 20 minutes here, I got 20 minutes here before I got to go present this offer, before I got to go do that. That’s terrible service. But I but I realized what was happening because I lost one client because I was doing that. And that was one way too many for me. And I hired the next day. So if you truly want to be of service to somebody, obviously your your intentions and your mindset and has to always, always be above the client. I call myself your favorite bartender. I’m going to over serve you. Right. I’m going to I’m going to go there time and time again. I’m going to go the extra mile because and again, not just cliches, but I love them. There’s no traffic when you go that extra mile, but hiring people and leveraging the $20 an hour job stuff was the biggest game changer. I think any.
Simeon Papailias: I’m going to go super practical. What are the duties you gave your first hire? What came off your plate instantly?
Paul Germanese: So it was booking all the showings, loading all my listing paperwork. Fintrac Like, I mean, I think.
Simeon Papailias: That all non revenue related activity, absolutely all non revenue related activity.
Paul Germanese: So absolutely.
Simeon Papailias: I think because I do want to get to close and I think we’ve shared a tremendous amount of energy. If anything, there’s no way you’re going to hear the story and not be become and there’s no way that I’m going to tell every single person listening if they want a piece of you to reach out to you, to all your socials, because we’re going to be sharing them all. And that’s the culture of brokers. Playbook is collaboration. Meaning as a host, it is your duty, Paul. It is your actual duty to if somebody reaches out to you to help them, not that you wouldn’t anyways, but as I said, if you’re a five year or two year, one year brand new agent you’re here to take, there’s nothing you can give me, boy. Yeah, but you’re here to take but remember to give back when you got it because there is no other way to elevate each other, to inspire each other, but to give back.
Paul Germanese: And the ones, the successful ones always. And why is that? That that the successful ones are always open books and always willing to give back because they know that the small amount of small percentage of people that actually implement what they’re saying will find great success and there’ll be a benefit to the real estate industry. Again, I’m a Realtors realtor. I love awesome real estate. I love awesome real estate agents. I love awesome real estate teams. But I really hate shitty ones to write, so it’s so good to give back. And if people actually implement what you’re going to tell them, you know, it just creates a better, better for the industry, which is changing right now, which is there’s a lot of agents out there. We need really good agents.
Simeon Papailias: Well, I’ll repeat that because it was a lot of fun. So both Paul and I love great real estate, love great real estate agents. But I can tell you without a doubt that we both hate.
Paul Germanese: Shady.
Simeon Papailias: Ones. So if there’s one thing you take away today, don’t be a shitty broker because we ain’t going to like you. Be a great broker and join the ranks of the elite in real estate. You’re going to have a truckload more fun by sticking to your guns of integrity and service to your client. Paul, I want to thank you so much for your time with me this morning. I couldn’t appreciate it more. My men.
Paul Germanese: Absolutely. It’s always, always fun and great to see you. And don’t forget about wins or down here, the four one stops at Windsor. Baby.
Simeon Papailias: Not only Will I’m not forget about Windsor. I’m going to definitely try to line up an in-person meet soon. And there’s no doubt that I’ll have you back over the next little while here. Paul, thanks again. I appreciate you help to our amazing audience. Thank you for tuning in. We hope that both Paul and I brought you value in. Your time is ultra valuable and thank you for choosing to spend some time with us for any and all questions. Reach out to any of our socials at the website brokers playbook dot com and get in touch with anything you need. Until next time, we’ll see you soon.