Stay Modern With Murray
Welcome to the Stay Modern with Murray Podcast, your go-to source for the latest trends and insider tips in the homebuilding industry. Each episode, we delve into the dynamic realms of design and construction, providing valuable insights that can elevate your understanding and approach to building and renovating homes.
But we don’t stop there! We go beyond mere construction topics to engage with influential figures such as business owners, CEOs, entrepreneurs, and community leaders. These conversations highlight the experiences and expertise of those who are making significant impacts in their respective fields. Here, you will discover not only innovative ideas and practices within homebuilding but also inspirational stories that showcase leadership and creativity in action.
Whether you're a homeowner, a potential builder, or simply interested in the housing industry, our podcast will offer a wealth of knowledge and inspiration. Join us as we explore the intersection of home construction and the vibrant discussions that can help shape the future of your projects. Tune in to enrich your understanding and spark new ideas in homebuilding, design, and business leadership!
Please tune in to hear from industry experts, non-profits, and local business leaders shaping our world. Visit our website at www.murraycustomhomes.com/podcast for more information and to catch the latest episodes. Subscribe today and stay modern with Murray!
Stay Modern With Murray
Building Success in Real Estate with Matt Murray
Matt Murray, our president, and founder, shares his journey into the realm of real estate. With his recent acquisition of a real estate license, Matt's insights are not just informative—they're transformative to the success of Murry Enterprises. Delving into the depths of his strategic partnership with Team Ferris at REMAX Concepts, we uncover the profound impact of strategic alliances and his diverse expertise in the real estate world.
Matt's unique perspective as a contractor turned realtor adds an extra layer of depth to our chat, illustrating the seamless synergy between construction and selling properties, and how controlling the sales timeline can amplify success.
We wrap up with an exploration of the dynamic team structures and market trends as we step into 2024. Matt's experience in custom home building and development offers vital insights for navigating this competitive real estate market. This episode is a goldmine of knowledge for anyone eager to ride the waves of change and thrive in the real estate industry.
Welcome to the Murray Minute Edition, a series in the state modern with Murray Podcast, where we dive into custom home building, roofing and home inspection topics with one of the members of our team. Sit back and enjoy the ride with your host, matthew Taylor.
Speaker 2:Thank you everybody for joining us on the Murray Minute Edition, a segment of the State Modern with Murray Podcast. Welcome to our first episode of 2024. I am joined here today with our president and founder, Matt Murray. Today we're going to start talking about all things real estate. Thanks for joining us today, Matt. We appreciate you, man.
Speaker 3:Yeah thank you, man. This is big time. I know it's a busy day for you. You got a clothes can coming up, so thanks for fitting me in. It's kind of weird to be a guest on my own podcast like the second time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, dude. Well, the first one we did, man, it skyrocketed. Yeah, we were getting calls, emails, everybody about it. Yeah, you're good at it, dude. Thank you, I appreciate you, man. Well, let's just get right into it. Man, can you share a bit of your background and why you felt it was important to obtain your real estate license?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think the overall goal here is to share that. I got my real estate license, which I think we might have mentioned on a few other ones, but we've never done a real segment about that. So now that I'm kind of full speed ahead, I thought it would be good to get it out there. But no, you know, I was thinking about this. I tried not to script this too much and go through all the answers, the questions and the answers. I wanted it to be live. I'm a little nervous to do that, to be honest with you. But no, I think everybody in the company knows and a lot of people that in the real estate world have known that about 12 years ago my ex-wife was going to get her real estate license and so she studied for a while and she was going to do it and then when she decided not to do it, we had another employee in the company at the time that was going to do it and then that got handed off to somebody else and then, fast forward, it was going to be Megan and then she just got too busy and then finally it was just you know what you know through.
Speaker 3:I think I hit on this before when I was sitting at so many of my son's sporting events, where baseball was one of them this summer, it was just so much time invested at the fields in between games before games, warm enough for games after games, and I was just like God, I want to be doing something other than just checking company emails and the old adage I say that people think it's funny because I have kids and I work so much I got bored. I did On the weekends, I got bored, and so I was just like you know what I'm going to do it, let me do it. And so I just decided to do it myself. But we've always, historically speaking, needed one. You know this dates back to 12 to 15 years ago. We knew, with our involvement in the Custom Homes industry and the Roofing industry and the large part that realtors play in the success of our companies and expanding into other avenues in the real estate industry, we knew we needed to have somebody in our company that was a realtor.
Speaker 2:So that's kind of par for the course with you, though, man. If you really think back to all these conversations that I've had with you I mean even off, Mike, you know, at the end of the day, it's like you're cut from the cloth. If you're going to ask somebody to do it, you're going to do it too, and that's kind of what this ended up as right.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah, same with home inspections. I don't ever want to ask somebody to do something that I can't do myself or wouldn't do myself. I am starting to realize that that can be an Achilles heel, right. I always just want to go do it myself and I just don't have the time or the capacity to do that, and a lot of times there's a person with a better fit for that certain type of project, such as demo work and ground labor. I shouldn't be out there doing it myself. Now I have a much larger role I need to be playing, but no, it is. I got licensed as a home inspector myself and now as a realtor, and that's part of the reason I joined a team. You know I don't need to be bogged down with doing the paperwork and the listing, agreements and stuff like that. So it was just a great fit to join a team and let them kind of do that stuff while I'm kind of managing the company here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, and I'm sure it's in one of these list of questions, but, like you, I kind of like to keep this fresh and just a conversation piece when are you hanging your real estate license, matt?
Speaker 3:So I hung it with Team Ferris at Remax Concepts, so I'm still learning how to say my new title. Whenever, you know, my phone auto fills in this is Matt Murray with and it says Customums, roofing, inspections. And now it's like I'm trying to teach you how to say you know, remax Concepts, team Ferris, ferris Realty. No, but everybody knows I have been a comrade, a business partner confidant of Susan Ferris is for many years, dating back to the first house I ever built. She sold the first house I've ever built and she's just been there through the years. You know, there's been some ups and downs in the real estate industry and some change and she's always been there.
Speaker 3:Even when we weren't using her to, say, list all of our properties, she was still in the background, being my moral compass, her family's, largely in the medical field, being my advisor in medical field and financials. And I always tell people I have two people that I rely on, which is my banker, marlon Lyon, and Susan Ferris, and typically if I have a real estate transaction, including purchasing this building that we're in, if I get the green light from them, I jump. You know, because they're really protective of me and my money and our company and they're usually the ones saying no, and if I can get a green light from both of them, it's like let's go. So I just thought it was proper, it was a good fit and I wanted to pay homage to her for what she's done for me throughout the years. And Jenna Ferris is actually the team lead with them now and you know Susan's kind of etching into retirement a little bit, so Jenna her daughters is taking over the team lead for that. What does Susan think of?
Speaker 2:that, obviously, I know that's probably been her goal, right, leave the legacy behind and all that. But like that's kind of like you. You know, once you step back, it's going to be almost hard for you to do to be so hands-on and then take that step back. What's it like for her so far?
Speaker 3:You know, I think she's really enjoying it. I think she has. I haven't asked her that question, but if I can gauge it correctly, she has this little slice of retirement where she is handing off the legacy and then she also gets sucked back in and gets put back in the middle of things. And I still like to lean on Susan on bigger transactions. So I'm always calling her, even though Jenna's my team lead. I call Susan a lot and have her help me with ideas and thoughts and stuff. And Jenna goes. She does a lot of the stuff that I wish that I could do, a lot of the forward thinking and going to conventions and researching and doing that stuff. So Susan will have to step in and manage the day to day. But no, I think she loves it. I think the idea for her was once Michael, her husband, retired, to retire and to spend more time with him on the road and stuff. And I think she's getting a little bit of that but also is still having to manage some of the stuff.
Speaker 2:So Delegating man. That's like the hardest thing for me so far that I found in this project management role is like you said at the start. It's so easy just to be like, oh no, I know what I need done, I'm going to go do it, passing the buck a little bit and learning the delegation of your role, man. That's been my biggest learning curve here.
Speaker 3:It is, man. It's so tough, and I had some coaching a business coach and a life coach that helped me many years ago with that Colorated submarine from nonfinan. הא too, umagus, you know me, I don't think I'm above anybody, right, and I'm not. We are large in part, you know, decision by committee here. There's no pecking order. I'm not above anybody.
Speaker 3:If you guys are going to get a lot, go out and demo, and you need help, demo, and I'm right there with you, man.
Speaker 3:But I did have something instilled in me that helped a lot and that was trying to take a one year of what your company made and your leadership in that, and then trying to decide what you're worth per hour and so if everybody in the company can think about that, and then you look at the per hour rate of each position, so to speak. So if I'm worth 150 bucks per hour, I need to know that, and when I'm going to demo a job, rather than having a $20 per hour demo guide do that, I'm at 150 bucks an hour. So is that the best use of my time, right, you know? So I always try to look at it like that. I'm not above anything, but if I can be doing a task that really is like leading the company and doing books and buying lots and the leadership type activities that pay 150 bucks an hour. Should I be out doing something that's 20 bucks an hour instead? So there is a trade off, opportunity, cost, right, and so I try to look at it from that perspective a little bit more.
Speaker 2:And what I used to when you put it like that, that makes the perfect sense right. Where am I best? Exactly when the company Yep. So you've spent some time now with the real estate team. You've spent some time out, you know, purchasing lots and looking at what's up and coming. If you were to have to choose and I don't want to nail you down, but if you had to choose an area of real estate that you've enjoyed so far, like what areas of the types of properties would you say that you want to specialize in? Or if you were to go off on your own and not be with the Murray, what would Matt Murray himself want to specialize in with real estate?
Speaker 3:You know that's crazy, probably be tackling a lot of questions here, but it all ties into it. What's exciting for me is helping people. I don't think many people know that we don't have a terribly huge portfolio of flipping houses, but we've always been flipping houses throughout the years and so it's always been on our radar something we're doing. And so for 15, 16 years I've always been presented with flip opportunities, investment opportunities, rentals, and I'm always breaking down. You know if you have to buy it for this, what you're after. You know value after remodel value, what are you going to sell it for. You know put in spreadsheets together of costs, operating cost, static overhead, all that stuff.
Speaker 3:So it's always everything we've been doing for 15 years has been real estate involved, and that's fun for me. And helping Maria right now with her buy and sell and just going through the numbers and making sure that people make sense of the numbers and know all that's going to be coming out of the sales price and where they're going to net and gross. That's fun for me. Just because I, as I'm getting more and more involved, I'm maybe starting to realize how much experience I do have and how in the weeds we have been over the years, and so being able to give a slice of that experience to other people has been amazing. So it's fun and I'm excited.
Speaker 2:It's like all roads led to here you know what I mean. Right Does it feel like that for you too. Yeah, it does. That's crazy, yep, all the numbers that you've been digging into just going back to the roofing side with dad, right? Yep, like that, bookkeeping has almost led you into this real estate stuff, man.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so the only reason we really did it like we were talking is just because we were doing so much in-house, and so to be able to keep that piece of the pie in-house you know, buying lots, selling lots, buying houses, selling houses it just made sense to have somebody in-house. You look at a lot of larger builders and a lot of larger companies, not even just in Lincoln but throughout the United States. They all have an in-house realtor. Whether it's a family member, an employee, a friend, they always have somebody in-house. And so we always knew we needed to do that and I thought that's where it was going to go and I thought that was the end of it was just I was going to use my real estate license to just service Murray Custom Homes.
Speaker 3:And you know, after I started going through that process and, you know, just telling the leaders of the company that I was getting my real estate license, just a lot of their avenues opened up. You know, what I kind of really wasn't thinking about during that time was the number of people, the number of clients, that come to us and build with us and then they're asking the salesperson that they're talking to or the project manager we have a house to sell. When should we sell it? Who should we use to sell it? And we were just handing that off and so not having control of that, so to speak, of that timeline when they list it, how much they list it for, because the sell of our house that we're building for them is contingent upon them selling their house, and so we weren't having control over that and so they were either listening it too high or they weren't selling it fast enough, they didn't list it at the right time.
Speaker 3:So now being able to hopefully play a part in that for these clients and having a little bit more say in that process and I think it'll help both of us, right, because now I have a little bit of skin in the game I mean, if I make a bad call and tell them to list their house for too high or not to list it soon enough, I think I'll have some. I'll give them some leniency on the custom home side of the house we're building for them, because I steered them in the wrong direction. But no, it's just, it's definitely just widening our play in the field, right, same with home inspection just continuing to evolve and continue to grow within our field.
Speaker 2:You could almost place it back into the homeowner's lap of like. Why not, right? Because I'm sure you've had a horror story or two of the contingent of being sold on this home. So let's go and play hypothetical. What happens if we're done building Shannon Chestnut's house and yet the other house isn't sold yet? I mean, that can create a disaster, right, it sucks.
Speaker 3:It sucks. It happens all the time. I mean it's happening with the client right now. It happened December 28th with the client. You know, a lot of those moments are lay in bed and pray and trust in God, but when you get into the weeds, no, it does suck.
Speaker 3:And what I have found that does suck about it is, once again, not knowing that they asked us, you know, at the forefront, if we had anybody or anything like that. And we probably did refer them to a couple of people, but they, you know, they went with somebody and we were just completely unattached with that decision. And then it comes down to, hey, we have your house done, you know, you can move in on December 28th. And they're saying, well, shoot, I thought you guys knew that we had a house to sell and it hasn't sold yet, so we can't close on your house, and so it's just, it is, it's a.
Speaker 3:Then it's getting a hold of their realtor trying to figure out what needs to happen. I mean, on this last transaction, we almost considered buying their house to make the deal go through. But it was like a contingent who. The offer on that person's house was contingent and they had an offer on their house. That was contingent, so it was so deep it was, I would have to have went like four clients back and bought their house to make everybody else's go through, and the house just wasn't marketed at the right price and they wouldn't accept the right price. But no, that sucks, and so that's. That is a large, a large part of what I'm really excited about is being involved in that process and and helping with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah and that and that and keeps everything in house here. We're not sending you to real estate agent A or B to make sure that we can complete your house here. I mean, our job is to build your house Right and if you guys love it and it hits all your wants and needs, we don't want to have to worry about real estate agent C selling house A. I mean, let's just get you into your new home, exactly.
Speaker 3:And, and you look at the growth pattern of a lot of larger companies throughout the United States Linnar, a couple of the big ones come to mind, but they it was. It was interesting to me how they they went about growing their company into the multi-billion dollar giants that they are, and and it was growing within their field. Um, you know, at some point it's hard to you know, at some point it's hard to you to bite off more of the pie, so to speak, than what you already have. Say we have 25% of the whether it's 10%, 20%, 25% not trying to sound like we have that much, but I haven't ever ran the numbers but say we have 25% of the pie of any given trade here in Lincoln. Say it's roofing, of the residential roofing market. We have 25%. We've busted our butt. We have a full-time marketing team to get us to that point, to get to 28% or 30%. That's a large investment.
Speaker 3:The amount of money that we pay for keywords for roofing Lincoln, nebraska, is substantial.
Speaker 3:It's highly competitive and to bite off another sliver of pie would be extremely difficult. And so it comes down to okay, how do we go down that path of trying to bite off more of the pie to fight with the apple roofings for more keywords in the white castles, or could we look at growing within our industry, and so that's kind of where I have been in my business mindset for many years as to why we have offices in Houston and Omaha and Grand Island and Houston, and that's where I'm at and that's kind of why we started the Home Inspection Division and that's why now I'm a realtor is you hit it perfectly with a one-stop shop, and so that's what these other companies have done is when you walk in the door and you want to do a custom home, they're your one-stop shop, they are all things custom homes. They are your appraisal company, they are your title company, they are everything. And so it's going to be fun and interesting to see where we go in the next five or 10 years.
Speaker 2:We met with Chamber of Commerce last week and shout out to Shannon over there at their office. She was a huge help. But she told me hit three target audiences. Find your three targets right and then try to hone in on those three instead of being so broad, and try to take over everything and not take over I said that wrong. Try to have a monopoly on everything. Hit three and really craft on those three. That's yeah, man, I learned from you throughout these Murray minutes than probably anything else throughout the day. Man, just kind of picking your brain on the future and how you got here. So let's flip the script. Melissa Taylor, my wife comes into Matt Murray. Why not selling her so much? Because I know we're not into this to be competitive. We just want another avenue for our clients. But why would she choose you?
Speaker 3:You know that's a good question because one thing that does ping me about. So I'm in a lot of realtor groups right now and this isn't local. I'm in a lot of nationwide and worldwide realtor groups. I found it interesting as we are evolving. When I say we, now that I'm a realtor, I'm using that as we. But the realtor world is changing. I think most of the public probably know about a huge class action lawsuit that was brought against the real estate commission and a whole bunch of brokerage firms and just about the verbiage and how commissions are charged and stuff like that. So it's been very unique for me to kind of be involved in it now. But to be in the back seat and to you had to have a broker's sorry, a real estate license to get on a lot of these real estate forums that I'm on and to see these people talk about this and to see how it's going to change the real estate world is very unique and I'm excited to see where it goes. It kind of scary, to be honest with you, but I try to stay on top of what's going on. But we have a wonderful team around us and that is why I signed with who I did so. A is. You know we have a wonderful team. We have a transaction coordinator. We have a piece of the pie that fits every different aspect. I'm not going to try to be involved in every transaction. That's why I did join the team I have.
Speaker 3:You know, I have my full-time job here running Murray, but you know I don't think there's too many realtors in town that have the experience that I have. You know I, custom home building is a lot of. You know, being part of the developer world and buying lots and selling lots. And if you, you know when we buy a lot we don't just you know blindly, you know, take a pen and place it on a map and decide that's where it goes. It's in the weeds of deciding what's happening in that neighborhood, what's coming are their schools is located near a fire station.
Speaker 3:You know what's the resale value, who's in the neighborhood, who are the other builders, what's it going to sell for, what's the long-term projection, five-year tenure it's a lot. It is a lot and I've been doing that for 15 years now, and so I think there's just a lot of different ways that I look at real estate, maybe just from being involved in the custom home world and buying and selling like we do. That not a lot of other realtors have, but I think when I was going back to what pangs me is a lot of realtors will get their real estate license and then they'll post on their Facebook page or whatever that they're the best realtor in town. The most knowledgeable, is like you literally have one month of real estate experience, which I know. I'm green on the transaction side, but I'm definitely not green on the process and the knowledge.
Speaker 2:It's just like coaching man. I've said it since I started about eight years ago I don't want to be the smartest one in this room. By no means necessary do I want to have all that. I want to surround myself with the people that know what they're doing. I know what I'm doing, but I want to surround myself with the people that have been doing it for 10 years. I can't come into this tomorrow and say, all right, Matt, hire me. You want 10 years of experience, but how am I going to get that unless I surround myself with people like you guys in the team? I want to talk about trends, man. What should people be aware of that's coming, or the way everything goes in waves? There's trends coming in 2024, I'm sure it might be interest rates or whatever. What should people be aware of looking at the year coming?
Speaker 3:Let me rewind for one second. I was thinking about this the other day because I'm going through my first by process right now. It's fun, but as I was part of it, I was like wondering why I wasn't more nervous, because it was the first time I'd done it and I was writing an offer for my client buying a house. And then I was dealing with the realtor and they were trying to change stuff and we were countering and it was what I do every day. I stand between person A and person C and I'm person B and I have a little bit of skin in the game, but I'm, at the end of the day, we're just the middlemen, right, as a custom home builder, we're trying to pair the best subcontractors with the client's interests. And when we're talking to the clients, we're kind of talking on behalf of our subs, because our subs have questions and they say you can do this, you can't do that, and then we're trying to tell our clients that nicely, and then we're trying to take the information that our clients give us and we're trying to relay that to our subs. Here's what the client wants, here's what they don't want. And at the end of the day, you're just a middleman, and the success of our company, every company that I run is how good of a middleman can we be? Same with you. You're just doing the exact same thing that I just said and, as the owner of the company, that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 3:I'm just trying to hire the best people that are the best for my clients and our clients, and, at the end of the day, it's every day I find myself that's what I do. I have open-door policy, but that's what I'm doing. I'm taking something that the PM has a problem with and taking it to the homeowner, taking something that a subset and issues that we have with the snowstorm, for example. I'm trying to explain it to the homeowners of what the concrete guys are saying they can and can't do. Well, you can do this, you can't do that, we'd recommend this, we'd recommend that, but that's all I was doing.
Speaker 3:I was in between my client, who had the date that they wanted to close and their purchase price, and you have the seller over here and their realtor, and so it was just another sliver of what I do with on an everyday basis, and it was definitely not a new experience for me, and it made me realize. I didn't know if I'd be excited about buying and selling for other people because, like I was stating for, the idea was I was just going to do the custom home stuff, so I really wouldn't be working for a client. But it was fun. It was fun advocating for somebody and fun just making.
Speaker 3:I realized that there was a lot of times throughout that process that if you didn't know what you were doing, it could have fell through. And that's a kudos to a lot of the realtors that have had success in Lincoln, nebraska, because they're how do you say it? People person. They are people people, no, but you get what I'm saying they. Real estate is so much about how to fix problems, cure problems and keep people headed in the same direction, not let them get off track, and that's what we do here.
Speaker 2:Well, you kind of got your juices turned in again, probably like fired up again.
Speaker 3:It was fun because I'm kind of removed from that. You know, in the Murray I've removed myself for that. So it was fun, it was very interesting and exciting and yeah, and you know, I treated it as though we were dealing on a multimillion-dollar trains action and it was fun. But no, back to the trends. Repeat that question for me?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So if somebody's coming into you, you've been doing this for, like you said, 15 years. You've seen the ups, you've seen the downs. What can somebody look forward to? Good or bad, that's coming into 2024, as far as what the trends look like and I know you're guessing, so everybody listening, this is a guess, right what are we looking to For trends? Trends in 2024.
Speaker 3:Well, I think we'll continue the trend of acreages. Everybody's wanting to urban sprawl, get outside of town. We're going to continue the trend of backyard oasis. Everybody wants a pool, everybody wants to spend an arm and a leg on their backyard, which I totally get at me too. But it's just crazy how it went from two or three years ago People would completely run out of money and whatever pennies they had left they'd spend on their backyard, and then now it's like the first thing we talk about, the first allowance we put on their budget sheet is either their pool or retaining walls or you know what I'm saying their ponds. So I think that's going to continue to be a trend.
Speaker 3:I still don't see us getting away from the open floor concept.
Speaker 3:About a year over the last two years we've seen in larger markets kind of get away from that a little bit.
Speaker 3:We're a little bit here in Lincoln where we're closing off. One of the trends that I've been seeing, especially with my wife being the designer, is I was against it at first but I'm kind of coming around to it is when you walk in on these open floor concepts, you walk in the front door and you walk right into the heart of the house. You can see the kitchen, you can see the living room, you can see down the hallways. And I think people are realizing they don't like that If you have somebody step in your front door that you don't know, do you want them seeing basically your entire house? And so they're kind of creating some festivals a little bit sectioned off from the main portion of the house. But I still think we're going to stay with the open floor concept for the foreseeable future, just with families and kids. I think people have entertained the idea but just can't wrap their heads around why or how they would like that.
Speaker 2:The big windows too. I mean, yeah, man, now I'm seeing what you're saying. Like you walk into the front door and you're looking into my privacy. Yeah, everything, yeah, dude, you throw some theater windows on there and now you're seeing it from the outside.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, and also you know it gets back to you have to have your house kind of completely clean and your dish is done, just for somebody to knock on your door and step in your front door, they're seeing your living room, your kitchen, your dishes, your cooking space, and so, like I said, I was against it at first, just because of the amount of square footage and the extra walls it took to kind of create a little vestibule. But I'm kind of coming around to the idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this has to be so crazy for you I'm pausing the notes that we have Like looking back, man just walking in every day. This has to be surreal for you. I can't like wrap my mind around what your thought process is right now, because it was just roofing, and then it was custom homes, and then it was restoration, and now it's real estate, and I know you have goals for 2025 and beyond. So it's like every day you walk in here. Let's go back to when you walked into my office, for example. You knew I was frustrated this morning because I'm dealing with something and all you did was pop your head in. You all right, and we talked, and now it's the handle, the situation's handled. This has to be surreal for you. The whole real estate thing helping other real estate agents not wanting to compete with them, but just be another avenue what's every day like for Matt Murray, the person dude?
Speaker 3:You know what's crazy when you say it's been 15, 16, 17 years. It is true that every day's different and I love that right. I think I'm in a different mindset, in a different world today than what I was in last year, and I love that. I thrive off of that. But I'm headed more towards getting out of the weeds and that's what I want. I want to be able to give back to my employees, not only financially but my being. I want to be here for you. I want to be able to do more of what I did this morning walk around and take the temperature of the room and take a temperature of the office and decide what we need to do and sit in with people.
Speaker 3:Because, historically speaking and kind of still, my day pretty much operates probably a lot like yours does. It wakes up to a fire and then I'm putting fires out all day and I never get a breathe and I don't get time to be a boss, right, because I'm still in the weeds. It's just answering emails and putting out fires all day. But I'm getting more towards a slice of my day being top level, high level, rather than in the weeds, and that's what the goal is for 2024 is to kind of completely get me out of the weeds, shift Kevin into more of a senior PM role that I'm kind of assumed right now and then help Tom with expanding roofing, help Tori with expanding the inspections, decide where I'm going to go with my real estate license and all that stuff. But that's what I thrive in. I thrive in creating companies and growing companies.
Speaker 3:Starting the inspections had me fired up and then it just went right along with my real estate license and that has me fired up. But I want to get into the. When I'm headed into the office, what excites me is helping you guys. How can I make your day easier, how can I answer questions, how can I better your day and what sucks and why I think I did get a little burned out over the last three or four years and why I'm a little frustrated is I thought I'd get to that, to the place quicker of getting out of that, and I'm not. I mean, still it's when I'm headed into the office I'm on the phone putting out fires. When I walk in the office, I'm in my office, closed door, putting out fires and answering emails and stuff, and it's not what I want to be doing.
Speaker 2:So I think you're, but, like you said that the last time we had you in here for the Murray Minuteman, you're getting the personnel right, like, and you don't want to. I think you mentioned it on air and if not, I'm sorry, but it's you don't want to reactively hire, right, you want to proactively hire, and so I think that's you know, and I can see how that would be frustrating. That takes time and you're going through interview process is now I hear it every day, so it's like you're going to get there, okay, so let's, let's back up and let's get back to our sheet before I hold you up much longer. So let's take my, my family, for example. Right, I'm just going to throw out random numbers.
Speaker 2:Let's say, back in 2020, we got down at a 2.3%, right, and now I'm guessing from reading through some emails we're looking around the 6% getting back down for this year. How can myself, being a second home buyer or whatever, how can I navigate this competitive market? But, like, if I come into you and I'm like Matt dude, I don't know what to do, like, how can a new buyer navigate this competitive market and what resources do we have? What resources do you have?
Speaker 3:Well, that's a far reaching question. I'm still trying to answer that question myself of how I adequately help people because, historically speaking, like I said, I am very cautious. I don't I don't pull the trigger on any deal unless I've had it signed off on by multiple people and the numbers look tremendous. I'm low risk and so trying to navigate how I'm going to help clients and allow them to pull the trigger when I might not agree with it or whatnot. But I'm surrounded by the best, I think in Lincoln the bankers, multiple bankers, multiple title companies, multiple financial advisors. So I definitely leaned on a lot of people in my past and will continue to lean on them for my clients.
Speaker 3:I don't I don't always think that I have the best answers, but I know there's somebody in town that will. So there's multiple different avenues and different questions that come with whether you should do it, where you should do it, how much to sell yours for and all that stuff, and so I'm excited to be able to get into the weeds. So that's kind of what I'm having troubles with is, when a client comes to me, are they just wanting me to blindly write the offer for them? And they've already done the legwork and they're at peace with their decision. Or are they wanting to lean on me for my expertise and I'm a nerd, I'm a math guy, I'm a numbers guy, I'm a spreadsheet guy Are they wanting to lean on me for that and let me get into the weeds with them and decide if it's a good decision and what price they should offer and what the numbers look like and what they're going to need to sell their house for?
Speaker 3:So you know, I'm kind of still new to this, I'll admit it, but I'm excited to help people. I'm excited to help people. I'm excited for people to come to me and say help us, help us make a decision on what we should do, where we should go, what we should buy. You know, I've been doing that for my employees actually for 10 years, maybe for Tom Kevin, where they should build a house, when they should build a house, all that stuff. So it's going to be fun to see where this goes. I'm excited to extend from my network of intelligent beings here in Lincoln to my clients.
Speaker 2:For anybody that's listening. When is the ideal time for somebody that's on the market to come to you? When would you like to see them through your doors?
Speaker 3:Earlier than they probably suspect, right. So it really just depends on people's situations. But and this is forecasting you know a lot of people think spring market. But when you get to spring market it's probably going to be back to a hot market and that's multiple offers, that's houses going quick, and so if you're wanting to buy and you're wanting to be in by spring, now is probably the time you need to do it, right? But if you're wanting to sell, the answer is different. You know it depends on where you're at what price point. You know, if you're still in the twos to threes, you can sell now.
Speaker 3:I mean, the one that we bought last week was on the market for two days and we think we're probably going to be able to sell her house in under seven days. So it just really depends. I mean, if you're in the fives to sevens, the answer is different. If you're in the above a million luxury home, we're soon going to be in that boat ourselves, personally trying to sell our house. We've been up for two years this May, so we're navigating those waters too, but just really having to sit down and go through all those answers and questions and everything, but the sooner the better. Yes, that is yes. Yeah, there's. I've been confronted with a couple of people that need to sell by March in order to make a deal that they have pending go through, and I'm like we should have been talking about this months ago, right, like we need to go, we need to jump and so, yes, the sooner the better.
Speaker 2:Let's talk challenges before I get you out of here on to your next meeting man, what challenge? What the biggest challenge that you've seen in the short time that you've been a real estate agent so far? What's the biggest challenge or challenges that you foresee coming?
Speaker 3:You know that's that's. That's tricky. That's a good question. A lot of what we're dealing with and, like I said, when I say we, it's the real estate industry. I know I'm new, but I've been following it for pretty intensively for a while now.
Speaker 3:The changes that are coming are are on on the on the surface, major right. How the real estate industry and the real estate commissions are going to deal with this change remains to be seen. They appealed the decision and they're you know, every local branch is kind of dealing with it a little differently. In a nutshell, what they're trying to say is, as a seller, you can't charge the buyer's commission. You can't charge the seller or the house, the buyer's commission, right? So when we sell a house, we say we're going to charge X percent, whether it's 5%, 6%, and that percentage includes the commission for the buyer's agent, right? And what they're saying is that that's no longer allowed. That's that's deceiving, I guess is the proper word.
Speaker 3:Anyways, this is a way too involved to get into. I'm probably misspeaking, but it's a huge thing that they it was a class action lawsuit with a lot of people, a lot of major players, billion dollars lawsuit Keller Williams, remax was part of it. The real estate commission was part of it, and, and they lost the judgment just went through like a month or two ago, and they're appealing the decision, but it's it's. It's supposed to, like I said, on the surface change the game, but the way I see it going is it's just a a, a verbiage change in the contract, right, like just letting them know. Now, though, that this lawsuit went through. We can't do it this way. We have to do it this other way, and so I'm I'm kind of really hoping that's the way that it goes, and and it doesn't put a whole bunch of people out of business and put buyers, agents, out of business and so on and so forth.
Speaker 3:But it it it's a little tricky.
Speaker 3:I have never thought about wanting to capture leads or anything like that in the real estate industry, like I said before, and to to hit on it again, as it was just playing on using my real estate license for for us, for for Murray, and so I'm not really for sure how it goes.
Speaker 3:I really just want to figure out a way for me to be the best representation for the people that I can and I now realize that with the number of people that you know, analyzing our past clients over the last two or three years, realizing how many of our clients come to us with a house to sell and they don't have representation, realizing the position that I'm going to be in to sell those, I want to really starting to, I guess, get a little nervous and anxious about making sure that I am the best for them. Because, like you said, I think it's a great fit. It's a one-stop shop. They come to us, they're trusting us to build their house and they're trusting us with the timeline and when we're going to finish it. You know why not use us and let that play into the timeline and financials and everything. So it's a great one-stop shop, but how do I ensure that I'm doing them the best service possible and my team is doing them the best possible, and so that's kind of what I'm anxious about coming up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I saw on a Facebook post somebody. It was on one of the Lincoln Market areas and they were talking about hey, we're looking to build. Who should we go with the comments? That stood out right away was Murray.
Speaker 3:I saw that too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, dude, it was wild and you start digging into it. They treat us like people, not like a number. You know why? Not, murray? And my answer is always because you get to work with us. If I'm going to build a house, if I'm going to sell or buy, I want to be treated like I'm a person, not just a number or client, you know that's crazy, I don't know why.
Speaker 3:I think that I saw that last night at like six o'clock and I was up middle of the night thinking about that. I was so like I had mixed emotions when I saw that, just because in custom homes so much shit can go wrong, you're completely custom building a house and expectations can be different. All these things that I've talked about in the past can be different, and getting to the end of an eight month, seven month, 10 month build and still remaining on good talking terms with that person is extremely hard. I mean, you're spending their money and it's like you're marrying somebody for eight months that you don't know and usually by the end of the build it's kind of like get the f out. You know you've been involved in our life for this long and ready to be done with you, regardless of how good you are and how good we did. Sometimes that's just how it ends. But to see that was so amazing and I just I thought about how you get yourself to that place of still being a positive referral after you go through one of the most stressful events that you know.
Speaker 3:They say that it can be other than divorce and marriage, but I think that you hit the nail on the head. It's just we freaking care. You know we care so fucking much, almost to a detriment, and our clients not any of our clients are just a number. You know we might be building multiple homes but everyone gets so much attention and care and if we do mess up, you know shit happens. You know it sucks, because you know we don't own the subcontractors, we don't own their companies, we don't own their employees and so naturally we don't have control over how they handle themselves and what they do. And everybody's human and something's going to happen. And it's how you navigate that. And we care, we care, we want to make it right and hopefully that resonates with our clients when we're done and I know that they're probably like you know, get the hell out of here. I'm done with you, I want to get back to my marriage, but hopefully they have that level of respect that we cared and we took their project serious and they weren't just another number.
Speaker 2:Bro, you hit it on the head, like you care, to a fault, right, like it's, it's. It's something that I've that I talk to my wife about constantly. I'm like I, why? Why? Why am I like this? You know, like, why is it? Why is it bothering me at midnight? Or if I hear an emo go off at 4 30 in the morning, like why do I jump? Like why and it's not just this, it's coaching, it's being a family, it's my, my kids Like I, is it some? Kevin's perfect example? Right, our lead PM. He's a perfect example. Like. It doesn't get to him to the point where you can physically see it, but he's constantly just going right. So it's like you know, it's a happy medium, yes, but at the end of the day, I wouldn't change who I am for anything because it's it's got me here you know, yeah, that's.
Speaker 3:You know it's crazy, I'm probably running over, but it's why you know we didn't need to hire when we hired you and it's why we're practically hiring another person like like us. You know, culture fit, and it's a biggest thing, I think. Throughout COVID and our growing, we hired a couple of people that weren't, you know, great culture fits, great experience wise, but not culture fits, and I've realized that I need to hire a culture fit basis. It's because I find people like you and I have to take people like you and and try to have you, because you're like me and Kevin was like me where you care to a fault and you can't shut it off, and it ran me ragged.
Speaker 3:And I appreciate, though, because now I just have to teach you guys how to like turn it down a little bit. You have to set boundaries, and you can't be jumping at your phone at 430 in the morning. You know you got to be there with your family and you got to get your sleep, but it's hard to teach that if you don't have it. I'd rather you have too much of it, and then I can kind of turn it down a little bit and learn you how to compartmentalize than the other way, and so, yes, I'm glad I'm hiring the right people Going back to your wrestling days.
Speaker 2:right, I can't bring that dog out of you. I can tame him, but I can't like bring that out. Absolutely Final thoughts. Man, I know we've had to have missed something, anything.
Speaker 3:No, I'm just excited. I'm excited to. You know, the more I realize it it's kind of taken a life of its own. And you know, what I said six months ago or two months ago on air might be different than today because, you know, truly honestly, I just was planning on getting my real estate license to just do the transactions that Murray Customs Homes has and not really act as a realtor, so to speak. But maybe I'm starting to find out that that might be hard, like with Maria calling me and asking me to buy her a house. Now I'm a buyer's agent. I got to go do an inspection, I got to go, you know. Now she wants me to list her house, so we're going to list her house, and so I'm realizing that it might be tougher than what I thought to just operate in that one capacity. But it's also really exciting, especially with our inspections, our home inspections, because that is large and part driven by realtors in town, and that's another reason I wanted to get it is, I respect a lot of realtors in town.
Speaker 3:They are the driving force of a lot of businesses, whether they know it or not. They are, whether you're doing a couple of transactions a year, multiple transactions a year, your rentals and the words out of your mouth mean a lot. They meet and talk to a lot of people. Their reach is far, and so I've always known that and so maybe starting to realize that I'm going to acclimate into the real estate community a little bit more than what I originally thought, and I'm excited about that, excited to go to the events and get to know them and, I guess, become part of them. I've been following it a lot and I'm hopeful that it ends that lawsuit, ends in a good way and doesn't affect too much of the real estate world. But it's going to be fun. It's going to be fun.
Speaker 2:I think the real estate world, lincoln and the surrounding areas are a better place now that Murray and Matt Murray real estate agent are involved in, and I think only thing that happens from here is everybody goes up, everybody gets elevated because you're a people, person, man. Thank you, I'm Matt Murray. Everybody thanks for tuning in to this latest episode of the Murray Minute Edition. I appreciate everybody listening. I look forward to keeping you updated, matt. I look forward to getting you back on the pod for the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned for our next episode. We'll be live at Glacier Till. Thanks everybody.
Speaker 1:Thank you for joining us on this episode of Stay Bothered with Murray, the Murray Minute Edition. If you have topics you would like us to discuss, please email us at info at MurrayCustomHomescom or message us at MurrayCustomHomescom.
