Andrew Lasky (00:00)
Everybody welcome back to another amazing episode of the commissions and cashflow show today. I am with my good friend Omar Lopez. Omar, welcome to the show brother.

Omar Lopez (00:15)
Hey, thank you Drew, I appreciate you having me here brother.

Andrew Lasky (00:18)
Omar, you have an incredible story. I don't want to give your story away here, but you had almost a life-threatening injury that completely changed your whole projection on life and the industry that you're in now. Can you share with the audience a little bit about your story?

Omar Lopez (00:38)
Absolutely. Well, first of all, I just want to thank you for having me here, brother. I met Drew at a real estate conference boardroom in Tennessee, Nashville, Tennessee. And yeah, yeah, a few years ago. And after that, you know, we just hit it off. We went out and had some dinner and he's from Miami. I had recently moved to Miami as well. And we had a lot of fun that one night. So we've been able to connect back and forth. So.

Andrew Lasky (00:50)
Two years ago.

Omar Lopez (01:06)
Appreciate you having me here brother, but let's get some value to your listeners. ⁓ Going back to my story of, you mentioned from the time, like from an accident, right? Is that kind of what you asked?

Andrew Lasky (01:18)
Yeah, so yeah, that's a story that you told me that, you know, completely kind of changed your life or it could have been a lot worse. And, you know, you were doing one job that you felt, I guess, was not the right career path for you. And then you got into sales and you've built this very successful company.

Omar Lopez (01:36)
Yeah, absolutely. So I never thought that I was going to be here in sales. So, you know, for anybody out there listening, like, you know, your life can change like that. I never thought I was going to be in real estate. I actually grew up in ⁓ a Mexican household. My dad immigrated from Mexico. Mom immigrated from Mexico, you know, was raised to go to school, get good grades, all that stuff. And one thing about me was that my dad always took me to work.

Ever since I was six years old on Saturdays instead of going out with my friends on Saturdays and all that ⁓ Or playing video games at home. My dad used to take me to work ever since I was six I used to push a lawnmower since I was like six years old I've hear stories from people that I couldn't even reach the lawnmower, but there I was with my dad and I did that for many years growing up and in the summers I used to go work at my uncle's tree trimming company

and they used to pay me cash, I used to be raking and all that stuff. So I knew how to work hard ever since I was a kid. And then boom, ⁓ I went ⁓ to college for horticulture, turfgrass management. That was kind of the thing in my area. I thought that I wanted to have my own landscaping company. And then there was a period where I had about four years where I wasn't doing so good, hanging around with the wrong crowd and everything.

And then that's during the time when I wanted to basically clean up my act and I was a tree trimmer at the time and I had this tree that broke on me. I came crashing down and I fractured my vertebrae. I came down on a brick wall on my butt and my life changed after that. after that, you know, I had this fire in me because

I was at a period where I wanted to change who I was from hanging around with the wrong crowd and then boom, I fell down. think it was like God just saying, boom, there you go, let's go. That's where all those years at, you ⁓ you've been out of alignment, if you will. And from there, I started reading some books and all that. And then there was a period where I kind of started hanging around with those old buddies again for a little bit after I had my back surgery and everything.

And then one time I remember staying up all night and, you know, the next couple of days just being very disappointed with myself and just being unhappy with myself. And that was like my rock bottom. wasn't rock bottom, rock bottom, but maybe compared to other people, but it was my rock bottom. I said, you know what? I got, I'm just tired of being the old person that I was. I'm tired of these old relationships. And I said, you know what?

I want to be an entrepreneur. want to make a lot of money. I remember at the time I was watching YouTube videos and I used to see Tai Lopez or other people that said the more you learn the more you earn. So I remember going to my public library. was like I'm gonna walk out of that library with some books to read and I go over there and I'm just you know my mind is just hungry for knowledge hungry for change and I got these books and I'm reading them and then I stumbled upon one with Robert Kiyosaki. I had already read a little bit of Casual Quadrant

And so I knew who Robert Kiyosaki was, but then I ran into this phone called Why The Rich Are Getting Richer with his accountant Tom Wheelwright. And they kept talking about real estate. They kept talking about real estate. I was like, this is interesting. Let me see this. And I remember, I was like, all right, let me pull the trigger on the first three books of Robert Kiyosaki. I literally remember that time when I bought the three, the package of three, it was like 38 books. And I remember at the time, like being a little nervous, like, oh damn.

That's 38 bucks right there. Maybe I should just get one. All right, I'm just gonna get three for 38 bucks. And I got them and I read Rich Dad Poor Dad and Rich Dad Poor Dad was talking about designing your own life. That one section, I can't remember it. He said, yeah, it was towards the end. Real estate, passive income, live a life that you wanna design. Live a life by design. And said, you know what? I'm gonna live a life by design. I'm gonna design my life. And so that was it. I said, I'm gonna pick real estate because at the time,

I knew that I had to pick one thing. was like, you know what? I don't want to invent a new gadget. I want to make a lot of money. Real estate tried and tested. It's been here for thousands of years. Land, they're not making any more of it. Houses, I could do this. I could do this. This shouldn't be that hard. So after that, I just got into real estate, started going to real estate meetings, hanging around real estate crowds. And then here we are today.

Andrew Lasky (06:16)
Awesome. And so I know you run a very big ⁓ wholesale operation, but was wholesaling the first thing that you did or did you get into a different side of real estate first?

Omar Lopez (06:28)
So in the beginning, I did try wholesaling for a little bit and I was driving for dollars, cold calling. I was cold calling people that didn't even want to their house. I didn't really know what I was doing. I was just taking action. I was like, all right, you know, I'm just gonna get into real estate. I'm just gonna go to these real estate meetings. I told my mom, I'm gonna call these people, ask them if they want to sell their house. She said, you're just gonna call these people, ask them if they want to sell their house? I'm like, yeah, I'm just gonna call them. And I remember calling million dollar houses.

I didn't know that you had a narrow down list and get people that were in foreclosure. I couldn't really connect the pieces of the puzzle together. And then finally, ⁓ after going to this real estate meetings, I said, ⁓ you got to buy these houses at a discount. I remember thinking to myself, who the hell would sell their house for less than what it's worth? But it just all started clicking and I was like, okay, so this is sales. I gotta be able to negotiate a deal. So I drove for dollars a little bit.

I got kind of close. I messed up my first couple of contracts. I became ⁓ close to getting a couple, but I didn't. Then I had a ⁓ mentor that was flipping mobile homes. So at the time I said, okay, you know what? I think I can do this. There was another guy local that was successful in flipping mobile homes. And so I kind of went down that route for a little bit. I said, you know what? Let me pick this. I'm going to flip up mobile homes and then kind of graduate to something else. And I actually bought and sold many mobile homes. I was like,

the mobile home investor in my town in Palm Springs, California for a while.

Andrew Lasky (08:00)
Was it the mobile homes itself or was it the mobile home park? Like were you buying these big parks and then increasing the net operating income or were you actually buying the mobile home park itself, doing some renovations and then selling it to one person? Like tell us what exactly you were

Omar Lopez (08:15)
Yeah, of course, of course.

So it wasn't the mobile home parts, I wish. It was actually just the mobile homes. Like I would buy these mobile homes and I started buying and selling a lot of them on paper. So creating notes. So I would buy one for like 10K, put like 5K into it, sell it for 40K. So it was like a 5K down payment, you know? So I'd have like 10K in it. And then, ⁓

the rest in monthly payments at 9 % interest payments of like three, 400 bucks a month. So I did a bunch of those next thing you know, cause I had the passive income mentality for a while because I was hanging around a crowd in the, in the real estate meetings where it was a lot of old school investors, old passive income cashflow. And that's kind of what I had learned with Robert Kiyosaki, right? Like cashflow, right? You know, get out of the rat race. So ⁓ that was my mentality at the time. So I don't know, I bought and sold,

⁓ several dozen mobile homes in the area. After a while, I didn't sell all of them on payments. Some of them I just bought and sold for cash or even wholesale. Just make a quick 20, 25K spread just by wholesaling it. So I did that for a while. But then after a while, I started running out of money too. So then what I would do as well is I would go to all these real estate meetings and I started branding myself. I used to go on stage.

And I used to tell these investors like, you know what, my name is Omar Lopez. Or not just the investors, but I was targeting investors. It was just a real estate meeting, right? Like the ones that they have locally. So I would tell the crowd, hey, my name is Omar. You know, I buy and sell mobile homes. I have a couple of notes because you could sell the notes as well. I said, I don't need money yet, but eventually I will need money. So if any one of you guys have money, let me know and I can put it to work. So I just kind of started building up my brand.

Andrew Lasky (09:49)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (10:07)
started getting people's phone numbers and everything. And next thing you know, after selling several of them on notes, if you tie up the cash, if you don't recoup your cash, you're gonna run out of money. So then I started learning how to raise money. And I started, ⁓ exactly, exactly. from there, for me, raising money is not that difficult because I started doing that like a long time ago. So, ⁓

Andrew Lasky (10:21)
It a very valuable skill, by the way.

Omar Lopez (10:36)
I started building up that skill and then after a while I started realizing, said, I'm actually not in real estate. I'm not really a real estate investor because I'm just flipping mobile homes. I'm just flipping private property. ⁓ But at the time we had also, ⁓ I did buy two properties, two rental properties that we did it with the cash out refi on my dad's personal residence. So I was able to convince my dad to do that. I remember he first started seeing me do that.

And he was apprehensive to me. He said, what, how are we going to get another 30 year loan? know, as a Mexican family, all your parents want to do is just pay off the properties. They don't want no debt. They don't really understand there's good debt and bad debt. And that was back in 2019. We did a cash out refi, bought two properties out of state. And it was during that time when I was still mobile home investing. So in a way I was investing in real estate, but with mobile homes, I wasn't. then I said, you know what? I want to be a real estate investor. I don't want to be a mobile home investor.

Andrew Lasky (11:13)
Yup.

Omar Lopez (11:34)
So, you know, at the beginning of the year, and even more now, I'm pretty big on goal setting. You know, I get intentional with, you know, setting my goals, setting plans and everything. I remember sitting down this one time and I said, all right, I'm going to start buying rental properties. So that's what I started doing. I started driving for dollars again and I started targeting homeowners, doing a little bit of wholesaling, but primarily holding on to rental properties. So from there, I had a portfolio of about 12 properties. When I least expected it, I had over a million dollar net worth.

Andrew Lasky (11:57)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (12:04)
I even realize it. was like, shit, you know, I just, you know, got my assets and my liabilities. And I said, huh, okay. So this is what it feels like to be a millionaire. Wasn't that like different?

Andrew Lasky (12:12)
And so how are you acquiring

those properties? Is that from raising capital or was that from just, you know, buying the property, raising the value by doing renovations and then refining or how exactly, you know, were you able to at a young age purchase these 12 properties and then build up that equity so that it was worth over a million dollars?

Omar Lopez (12:33)
Yeah. A lot of it was seller finance. I got pretty good at seller finance. Yeah. I got very good at using my financial calculator and because I would do, I would use my financial calculator to buy and sell these mobile homes when I sold them on payments as well. So then what I would do is I started selling some of my notes from my mobile homes, raising some capital.

Andrew Lasky (12:38)
Okay.

Omar Lopez (12:59)
And then I would buy some of these mobile homes or no, these other rental properties. Oddly enough, was buying, was, ⁓ I was able to buy a lot of properties in a mobile home community where you own the land. So now I started owning real estate, not just the mobile homes. And I would buy some of these on Seller Finance and I would have grabbed the cash from the notes that I would sell on these, on these regular mobile homes and I would put them as down payments.

Andrew Lasky (13:10)
Mm-hmm. Okay.

Omar Lopez (13:26)
On the on the other mobile homes that have the real estate so little by little I kind of started doing that and then we also tapped into my dad's 401k and then little by little I started doing a couple of flips a couple of wholesales So then from there like like I was able to buy more properties and and the portfolio just kind of grew with time It also went up in value because I started buying some of these like around 2020 one

Andrew Lasky (13:52)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (13:53)
And then COVID came and then interest rates went low. So they kind of just increase in value with time.

Andrew Lasky (13:59)
Yeah, okay. Awesome. So now that you, you you built up that portfolio of 12 houses had the equity in it. Then today you run a very big wholesale operation, which is predominantly sales, flipping paper, you know, taking a nice fee, and just keep going sales marketing, sales marketing. So tell us about the operation that you have today in South Florida. What markets are you in?

How big is your team?

Omar Lopez (14:30)
Yeah, of course. So with time, I went to this one mastermind with a bunch of high level players that were doing wholesaling and a bunch of other stuff. And I noticed how they would do three, four million a year, take home 25, 30%. So I said, man, you know what? That's some different type of money. I want to do that. because the same thing with mobile homes, after buying so many, you also start getting cash for again. You're equity rich.

for your cat for so then ⁓ what was it maybe three years ago at the beginning of 2022. Yeah, three years ago. I went to that mastermind with Chris Rood and I met all those guys and I said, you know what, I'm to do my wholesale operation. And fast forward now, ⁓ our team is not that big. It was a little bit bigger right now. We're starting to hire again. But last year we did one point one million.

Andrew Lasky (15:25)
Okay?

Omar Lopez (15:29)
⁓ we do like an average of around like a hundred thousand a month. ⁓ right now it's 10 of us. ⁓ we've got some virtual team members and some in-house team members. So, ⁓ that's pretty much how it is. We run PPC. We started implementing direct mail in South Florida. Primarily it's always been PPC for like the last two years. so we just run ads on Google. We manage our own accounts. ⁓ you know, we just run ads.

Andrew Lasky (15:58)
For those that are looking to get into wholesaling, marketing's a very, very big part of it. What made you want to do PPC? Because typically, Google is expensive.

Omar Lopez (16:08)
Yeah, so that's a good point. So two years ago when the market started correcting, when it started correcting in June or July of 2022, ⁓ during that time, it took about six, seven, eight months for it to really correct and to start seeing what was going on. ⁓ We were always doing cold calling at that time and it was always working during that time. The market was pretty hot. So

we were able to put a lot of properties under contract and sell them pretty quick because there was a lot of speculation from investors. And once ⁓ the market started correcting, ⁓ we were having a hard time putting properties under contract. So, you know, the buyers were backing out and the sellers were still stuck on like the high prices that everybody was getting. The investors were focused on the future. They're like,

Andrew Lasky (16:43)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (17:07)
You know what? We're gonna tank. So at that time we had to pivot into Novations. So we started pivoting into Novations and I pivoted into PPC because I was getting tired of cold calling. Cold calling wasn't hitting the same way that it was. And I remember my buddy Nick Perry, was, he had like a long time that he had been on PPC. So what we started doing is we started casting a wider net with PPC in different states because PPC, when you cast a wider net,

When you're not local, it's actually cheaper. So when you're local, just in South Florida or just in your major metro, your leads are gonna be three, four hundred percent. Yeah.

Andrew Lasky (17:47)
for expensive. Wow, that's interesting.

So Google penalizes you for for working in your home turf, essentially.

Omar Lopez (17:55)
Well, it's you have more competition, right? So you have more competition and you're making it work more to be able to have your ad pop up above the rest. Like in South Florida, there's just like way more competition. It's more saturated. And ⁓ yeah, you're staying focused, more local. But when you cast a wider net, you just kind of cast it and it's like, just give me, give me, you are able to compete against multiple markets, right?

Andrew Lasky (18:08)
Way more.

Omar Lopez (18:22)
So you're not going to be saturated. So if you're casting a wide net in the whole state of Florida, somebody in Jacksonville, their budget might run out. So then boom, yours pops up, right? yeah.

Andrew Lasky (18:35)
Yeah.

And are you guys focused? ⁓ All of Florida? Are you in multiple states? Like how big is your reach?

Omar Lopez (18:45)
Yeah, yeah, we are. We're in six states, primarily six states. Sometimes we get some leads like we started off with 25 states and then we narrowed it down to like 12 states, then narrowed it down to like the six states in the South. So we're in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Indiana, ⁓ Texas and North Carolina. Those are are our bread and butter. We just started doing some direct mail that have been given us some pretty big spreads down here in South Florida.

It's way more expensive than our PPC, but I do want to tap into this local market. And ⁓ I'm kind of split testing it to see how it's going to perform because I'm kind of on the fence whether I should go more local, you know, get more cash buyers lists and all that stuff, or still ⁓ stay more spread out across multiple states and, ⁓ you know, going down that route. So I felt like I was going to mention something right there. Yeah, six states primarily, like

Recently, we actually got a deal in New York. We're not even running deals in New York. But somehow, your Google Ads, they'll spread to different states. And we actually made $40K on that deal. Yeah.

Andrew Lasky (19:54)
⁓ that's awesome. So yeah, let's

talk about that now. So for somebody that is considering getting into wholesaling, you mentioned 40,000. Is that like a typical wholesale fee?

Omar Lopez (20:06)
So our average deal size is about $18,000. So it's not very typical for us. Kind of averages out. Industry average for wholesaling is like 15 to 20K. If you're doing 25K, you're doing pretty well. There's a couple other people that I've noticed that'll have rips of like 30K. And of course that's way better. But I would say that on average, right around 15 to 25K is...

pretty normal in the industry.

Andrew Lasky (20:36)
Gotcha. Okay.

And you mentioned before that, you know, you're pulling lists. So for the audience, what does that mean? Is that like specific, you know, targets like you've mentioned fore-closure? Is this like a low equity or high equity list? Or what what do you mean by lists?

Omar Lopez (20:53)
Yeah, so with PPC Google Ads, ⁓ you probably know this, but you don't pull this for PPC. You just run ads and you're basically targeting whoever ⁓ does a keyword search of like, my house, sell my house today, cash buyer today. So those aren't lists, but if you're going to be sending direct mail or if you're going to be cold calling or texting, then yes, that's where you pull lists on websites like PropStream.

property radar, a couple other ones, badge, think. And those are lists that you ideally do want to target of people in certain areas that have higher equity, you know, are older than 55, maybe tired landlords, you know, those are people that probably own a rental property and like live like in a different state or something. They've been on it for a long time and foreclosures, tax delinquents and stuff like that. So.

We use a mail house right now called REA Prince. And right now we're mailing an invisible list and ⁓ a shipwreck list. The invisible list, they, ⁓ it's like in their company, it's a list of the ones that I just mentioned right now. It's all combined, the high equity, the senior citizens, the tire landlords and all that stuff. And that's the one that's actually been working out pretty well for us. And then we mailed to a different one that they called the shipwreck, which is basically

Andrew Lasky (22:06)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (22:18)
a collection of foreclosures, tax delinquents, ⁓ intra-family probate type of situations, stuff like that. those are the lists that I'm referring to.

Andrew Lasky (22:28)
Okay, awesome. And so then once they reach out to you and they say, hey, I'm raising my hand, I'm interested in selling my house, what does the sales process look like when they contact you?

Omar Lopez (22:38)
Yeah, so we have what we call a six step sales process. So for direct mail or PPC, it's pretty much the same. They reach out to us, we call them and ⁓ say, hey, Drew, how's it going? This is Omar with Fast Home Cash Offers. I noticed you submitted a form. Yeah, it's me. OK, great. Well, listen, right off the beginning, you want to set the expectation. Hey, so this call right here is just so that we can learn about each other and first determine if we might even be the right fit for each other.

Now you might find that we're not a fit for you or we might find that you're not a fit for us, right? So if we think that we are a good fit, then we'll submit it to our underwriters for an offer. But if we're not a fit, then we're not going to submit an offer and we'll just point you in a different direction. Will that work? Yes. Okay, great. Boom, right there. We take them through ⁓ like a pain funnel. You know, we use like the spin selling model. First uncover the situation. Hey, tell me about the situation. Get into the problem, the why, the motivation, the impact questions.

Andrew Lasky (23:30)
Okay.

Omar Lopez (23:38)
You know, how is this pain impacting you or the implication? What happens if you don't do anything and then the end is a need payoff the spin selling I got it from a book called ⁓ Spin selling and the end is is like a solution like they call it need payoff, but it's more like a solution All right. Well, what's the best solution? So from there? We're it's a funnel right? We're kind of qualifying them ⁓ and then we get into the roadblocks. All right,

Andrew Lasky (23:55)
Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (24:05)
Why a cash offer? What made you reach out to a cash offer? What is it about a cash offer that caught your interest? Have you thought about listening on the market with a realtor? How are the conversations going with other investors? ⁓ Why not just keep it as a rental? ⁓ Give it to your family member or whatever the situation is. From there, ⁓ what kind of questions do you have for us? Any overarching, anything that's important? At this point, if they're serious, they're slowly going to go down the funnel, right?

Andrew Lasky (24:33)
So you

mentioned something that I want to make sure that we don't skip over. So you mentioned how you asked them about, why don't you give it to a family member? Why don't you just list it with a realtor? A lot of salespeople will be very, very afraid to ask questions where you're giving them another option. But this is a part of your sales process where you are giving them those options. And clearly it's working for you because I know the type of revenue that you do.

But why do you include that in the sales process? Why do you ask those questions?

Omar Lopez (25:08)
Absolutely, so I actually didn't believe in asking those types of questions up until maybe like a year and a half ago when I started learning more sales from like other team members. I actually had this one old team member that ⁓ he was our top closer and he actually taught me a lot about sales. He knew a lot and when we hired him, he put me up on game as well. So the reason that we asked that is because for two reasons. The first one is you want

to let them know that you're not really thirsty for them. It's like, hey, have you thought about that? Like, you that might be a good option. So at the same time, in their mind, they might be, you're right, the traditional salesperson might say, no, I don't wanna ask them that because, you know, if I say that, they might think, that's a good idea. Thank you, I don't wanna work with you, right? But in a way, it's like, hey, I really don't care if you go down that route or not, you know, because, you know, we have a ton of people that reach out to us, you know.

We run PPC, we get cheap leads, so it's like if we don't work anything out with you, I'm gonna work it out with somebody else. And at the same time, so it develops some trust, and then at the same time, if they are thinking about somebody else, you wanna identify that and get through that. Because you don't wanna deliver the offer, get through the sales process, and come to find out, and they say, listen, I'm actually just gonna listen on the market with a realtor, thank you. No, you wanna be able identify that, get through that roadblock, because if it's a roadblock,

Andrew Lasky (26:10)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Omar Lopez (26:34)
See that the things that were scared of asking in the sales process in my experience really come back and bite you in the ass later You know so by uncovering it bringing it up to the table ultimately What I've also learned is that sales is not just about Qualifying the lead it's also about disqualifying the lead so if they have these other options these other roadblocks Bring them to the surface right now. Let's get through them I always use the analogy of like having like an object right here, but the roadblock

All right, like it's gonna hit you. If it doesn't hit you right now, it might hit you later. Let's get through it. Okay, what is it about that? And so ultimately you wanna be able to influence them and if they have that option and if that's really a better option and if they're gonna go for that option, then that person's probably not gonna be a fit for you. But if you're good at selling, if you're good at influencing them, you might be able to scorch the ears and say, listen, do you really wanna do that? Like, you know, we might be the better option. So that's why we ask it.

Andrew Lasky (27:32)
Yeah, now look, wholesaling is now a very, very popular type of investing in real estate. I don't know if it's because of social media with TikTok and Instagram, I feel like you go on to one of those platforms and you have like 18 year olds that are now very successful in wholesaling real estate. So there's a lot of people that are out there doing it. Let's say you now have qualified somebody, you know that, hey, this is your target person.

Your customer, how are you differentiating yourself against all the other wholesalers out there?

Omar Lopez (28:08)
Yeah, so that's a great question. And the way that we do it here is we provide the utmost professional experience. know, so we take them through the sales process. We treat everybody with courtesy. Our mission, which is written on our wall, is to provide the best streamlined experience when selling and buying a home. That's our mission. Every team member that gets hired, everybody in here knows that our mission is to provide the best streamlined experience when selling and buying a home. And so with us,

We're just professional. We listen to them. ⁓ We don't go straight to the offer. We listen to their pain, their needs. We figure out a very good solution for them. Then we go through the conditions. We come back. We give them the offer. See, the sales philosophy that we have as well with us is we like to stay calm and detached. So our competition, they don't really have a sales process. ⁓

Andrew Lasky (29:02)
Mmm.

Omar Lopez (29:08)
they if they jumped on a course that they recently learned, you know, maybe the course just gave them like a one or two page script and ⁓ they might be winging it. You know, they might get straight to the point. They might disrespect the lead. They might want to get straight into the price. They want to deliver an offer with us. We actually hold out on our offers. We don't deliver offers like unless the person deserves it because you know, we like to increase our status. You know, ⁓ we have a higher status when we talk to our homeowners. So, you know, we say, listen, like

⁓ Yeah, we might not be a good fit and you know, that's why we don't deliver offers on everybody We only deliver offers because we have a specific budget that we're allowed to work with every single week our underwriters So they only deliver offers to like people who are like ready so ⁓ if we feel that they're not gonna qualify then we try not to deliver that offer because by us Letting them know that we're gonna deliver an offer or that we have an offer for them It kind of makes us like thirsty and it makes us ⁓ seem like ⁓

We lose leverage because they're expecting that. So we hold our cards. So with us, it's a combination of everything, right? We like to maintain our status, stay calm and detached. But our competition, I mean, we've been told before that like, gosh, know, thank you guys. You the last guys that I spoke with, man, they were like, they were just like used car salesmen or worse than used car salesmen. They were scary. So our competition is unprofessional. They're below average. So that's how we stand out.

Andrew Lasky (30:36)
Yep. So your whole sales process is actually listening to what their problem is, diagnosing it, going through the other options that they might have, telling them that, those options, well, actually you're not telling them, they're telling you that those options don't work for them. And then right when they are looking for your service and that they actually need it, you're there to then say, okay,

I'm ready to give you the offer if you are ready to move forward. Essentially, is that

Omar Lopez (31:11)
Yeah, pretty much. We also implement a commitment step where if we think that the person is going to be a good fit, we try to make sure that we apply some scarcity. And that's where we use that one pitch right there. Like, listen, we have a specific amount of funds. On the next call, when I deliver you the offer, can you tell us just a simple no or a simple yes if it doesn't or if it does work? And what I mean by that is because of our budget,

If you say no, is absolutely fine, feel free to tell us no, by the way. Other salespeople, they don't implement that, right? Other salespeople, they push for the yes. Like, no, you better tell me yes, right? And obviously we want a yes, but we just kind of tell them, hey, feel free to tell me no. Like that's completely fine. ⁓ So from there, we apply that scarcity so that we can avoid anything about it. Anything about it on the actual offer. So we apply this scenario that we have a specific budget amount of funds.

that we can spend. So if you say yes, we're going to grab those funds and we're going to put them into a different holding account for your property. But if you say no, we know where we stand. We're going to grab those funds and use them for a different property. What we want to avoid is having people who sometimes say, hey, you know what? Let me think about it. Let me mull it over for a couple of days. Let me chew on it. In our experience, that typically means no. And I think some homeowners are afraid to tell us no.

Andrew Lasky (32:19)
Got you.

Yes. let's talk about those prospects for a second. So those prospects that aren't yet ready to commit, but they're still like your ideal clients that you know that you can make a lot of profit from. How are you either re-engaging them or how are you following up with them? Because I feel like a lot of salespeople, they have trouble following up. And that word follow up or that phrase, it's like

It's the, you know, the word that you don't want to say when it comes to sales. So how are you staying like on top of mind so that when these home, these sellers, when they're ready to actually sell their home, that you're at top of their mind?

Omar Lopez (33:18)
Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, that's a good question, you know. I know this might sound a little contrarian, but you sometimes like if the person is not actually ready to commit to an offer, then sometimes we won't even deliver an offer, you know? Like, because it's like, well, at first what we try to do is we try to figure out and see what's the objection that they have or they're not ready to commit, you know? So like, if we can overcome that,

then that's ideal, if they're really calling to get like a free quote or like a free estimate, they're not very ready to commit, then sometimes we won't even deliver the offer because like, you know, we say, hey, listen, if we deliver the offer, like it doesn't really even make sense. Like they're not gonna commit to us, right? So in that case, we might give them like a very low range, like, yeah, you know, I mean, this isn't a final offer by any means, but you know, it might be like in the low 200s or something, you know? So, but at least we're not.

⁓ giving them the experience of like that final offer. But to answer your question, ⁓ if for whatever reason we do need a follow-up, they're just not quite ready, you know, mean, our CRM, you know, really helps us out with that. ⁓ You know, we have a good CRM, set up a good follow-up day, we put them on a nurture sequence, ⁓ you know, follow-up, whatever the timeline is, you know, depending on the urgency of the lead, ⁓ kind of call back, leave a...

a text message or a voicemail and some of those nurture sequences, really help us do the work so that we don't have to think, you know, ⁓ who do I have to call today? So I think the CRM really helps us out for sure. Yeah.

Andrew Lasky (34:55)
Awesome. Awesome. So Omar,

thank you so much for the insights. We are going to get to the final part of our show, which is called the final four. These are the same four questions that we ask every single guest that comes on the show. So question number one, what is your favorite sales book or sales movie?

Omar Lopez (35:17)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So let's see. My favorite sales book for me has been You Can't Teach a Kid to Ride a Bicycle at a Seminar by David Sandler. Yeah.

Andrew Lasky (35:33)
Okay,

I actually I have to read that one. I've never read that one before, but I have heard multiple people say that that's a good book. Awesome. Question number two, what's one sales strategy or tactic that you implemented that completely changed the game for you?

Omar Lopez (35:39)
Yeah, that's a good one.

Yeah, I would say for us has been

Just being able to pull away. Pull away and be afraid. Don't be afraid to tell the person to have them say no to your offer. Because a no is better than like, and I need to think about it. Because if it's an absolute no, then from there you could start uncovering the objections. I remember that one guy that was with me that taught me a lot about sales. I remember the first couple days when he first came in.

and I was doing a couple of sales calls and then I had delivered the offer and the guy's like, no, you know what? ⁓ It's all right, I'll get back to you or can I have a day to think about it? I remember my buddy in the background, he was like, ⁓ tell him like, hey, it just sounds like it's not gonna work for you. That's okay, feel free to tell me no, right? And so I implemented that and the guy's like, no, no, no, it's not that it's not gonna work, it's just that X, Y, whatever that objection is. So it's like,

It's okay to pull away, like, listen, it just sounds like it's not gonna work. So if anybody's listening to this and if they're negotiating, if you're in sales or something and you deliver your pitch and the person says no or they wanna think about it, just pull away and just say, hey listen, I completely understand, that's not a problem, it just sounds like it's not gonna work for you. And sometimes people are afraid to, if it's direct no, then they might tell you that it's a direct no and it's just not gonna work.

But sometimes people might be afraid to just say the no so they'll tell you what their true objection is. They'll be like, no, no, no, no. It's not that it's a no. It's just X, Y, Z, whatever it is, right? So that was one of my biggest strategies, being able to pull away and welcoming the no because that's where we kind of uncover the objection where before, you're trying to negotiate strictly on price. well, I mean, what is it? Or like, tell me more, you know? So that's kind of been my strategy.

Andrew Lasky (37:50)
That's awesome. love it. Question number three, what is your most favorite purchase that you've ever made with a large commission check?

Omar Lopez (38:01)
Gosh, I was trying to think about that one earlier. You kind of had me there. I can't say that I've specifically have splurged on a large commission check, but I mean, I remember when we sold one of our properties that we had.

in California, we made $160,000 on it. And from there, I would say that that's what kind of gave me the boost and that capital to really start and be where we're at today, like in Miami. It was at that time when we moved to Miami, came over here, set up shop and everything. So I wouldn't say it was a splurge, but I think it was just like a way for me to just kind of build the momentum to where we're at and being able to splurge on everything that we have today.

Andrew Lasky (38:56)
Awesome. I love it. And then question number four, if you had to start all over again, you know, knowing what you know now, what's the first thing that you would do to get it all back?

Omar Lopez (39:08)
knowing what I know now, I would have really started studying like a lot of sales books sooner because there was a very long period where I thought I knew how to sell, but I didn't really know how to sell. I was more pushy than anything. You know, see sales is kind of like an art. You know, you have to be like Picasso, like wielding the brush, you know, just it's like, it's not like one specific strategy. It's not one specific technique. And I really wish that I would have started.

learning more books like can't you get it right back at a seminar? Start with no by Jim Cam Chris Voss never spent the difference and really stop to understand these books because I remember that I had listened to never spent the difference on on audiobooks and stuff like that But it wasn't until recently a couple months ago that I took my time. I highlighted it I took notes and everything that I really started understanding these strategies and so after really taking sales serious

and really being able to learn all this stuff is when I kind of realized, I didn't really know how to sell. I thought I knew how to sell, but I didn't really know how to sell. Like, man, what a rookie before. So if anything, like I would encourage myself to really just go back and get very intentional with the education on all these sales books for sure, and these sales contents.

Andrew Lasky (40:30)
That's awesome. ⁓ Omar, thank you so much for being on the show, brother. If people want to learn more about you, where can they find you?

Omar Lopez (40:38)
Yeah, I'm not sure if that's visible or not, but that's at the Omar Lopez right there. They can follow me on Instagram. And that's my main social media account right there.

Andrew Lasky (40:49)
Awesome Omar again. Thank you so much. Look forward to seeing you again soon my friend and I'll talk to you soon Thank you

Omar Lopez (40:55)
Absolutely brother, thank you.