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Masterclass: Cracking the Code to 100 New Managements A Month | Jonathan Bell & Jordan Slinger

• Tom Panos - Real Estate Coach & Trainer

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This is the irrefutable guide to growth & profitably in a real estate business:

  • How to accelerate from 0-3,000 properties in 5 years
  • How to gain 100 new managements per month
  • Which model works best and why?
  • What are your PM profitability ratios?
  • How to incentivise your team


This webinar is ideal for:
- Business Development Managers
- Principals
- Property managers

Speakers:
- Jonathan Bell, one of the leading thought leaders in Property Management
- Jordon Slinger, leading Business Development Manager at Housemark

This training content is sponsored by Housemark: https://housemark.com.au/ and Wingman: https://wingmangroup.com.au/tompanos/

Tom Panos:

Ladies and gentlemen, I am so pumped and excited. After spending my whole life saying make more phone calls, get more listings, I'm about to spend an hour or thereabouts with two amazing people that will not only inspire you but will show you a method that's going to allow you to add 200 to 300 new managements a year to your rent roll. And I am letting you know that, since I've begun a relationship with Wingman and I've got to know John Bell even more better than me going to Manila as an ambassador to Wingman helping with remote professionals, what's becoming very clear is that the current property management system, whilst it's not broken, can be significantly better, significantly better. And let me tell you, if you know this, you can leave your real estate life as an owner of a business with a $10, $15 million asset $10, $15 million asset if you get this right.

Tom Panos:

And today joining me is Jordan Slinger, who is is Jordan Slinger, who is an amazing BDM an amazing BDM, not me just saying it recognised as the Premier Award in Business Development Management in Australia is the REB Award, and he is a recipient of it. I also have with me Jonathan Bell, who is the owner of Wingman, as well as the owner of House Smarts. Tell me, jono, tell me a little bit more, because everyone associates you as the guy that looks after all the offshore talent in sales, but a lot of people don't know that you have an extraordinary real estate business and in fact today I read I read, if I'm correct that your business has been nominated in an incredible award. What award is that? Or is that public?

Jonathan Bell:

yet yeah, wingman got in the far. We came sixth in the Australian Financial Review for fastest growing businesses. But that was Wingman, not Housemarque. And then the Deloitte tech startups as well.

Tom Panos:

Okay, congratulations. Thanks, tom. I want to remind people the Australian Financial Review is not realestatecom, it's not just for real estate people. This is for people in pharmaceuticals, in banking, in media, in every industry, and Wingman is now number five. Well done. But my first question was about the real estate office that you own in Brisbane. That is a specialist property management business. When did you start it?

Jonathan Bell:

9th of March 2019 was our first management, so five years ago.

Tom Panos:

Five years ago Actually, I've seen an image which reminded me of the image of Bezos starting Amazon. That little kitchen. How many managements have you got now?

Jonathan Bell:

2,850.

Tom Panos:

Okay, that's an extraordinary Like team. Sit down, pull your calculator and work out an asset base of that business. Work out an asset base of that business, and that's what we're here today to show you how you can actually get to that level not using a push bike, but using a Concorde Jumbo. Do it in lightning speed. And Jordan Slinger is that person. Because Jordan Slinger is the BDM that Jono said. I want my best person speaking at this. How are you Jordan?

Jordan Slinger:

Good thanks, tom. Thanks for having me on today. Appreciate it An absolute pleasure.

Tom Panos:

An absolute pleasure, jordan. I'm going to ask you a heap of questions because I really want to get down to the bottom of how you actually have had so much success. I mean, we're talking about Jordan. Like you started, you won the award last year BDM Manager of the Year. You started seven months ago with Housemarque and you went from zero to 100 managements in a month. Extraordinary. And I've always said, I've always said the real estate company that takes property management into a sales driven business is going to win the market right, win the market. And I'm pleased to letting you know that Real Estate Gym and Wingman are heading in the space of that space. Because right now I don't think there is a blueprint, there is a plan, there is an encyclopedia, there's a GPS unit that says do this and at the end of the year you'll have 300 new managements. So I'm curious how do you sign 20 new managements a month, jordan?

Jordan Slinger:

Yeah, so thanks for having me today, tom. 20 new managements is industry average is 10. So 20 is not a big number to us. 40 is a big number to us. I think it comes down to activity what we do on a day-to-day basis, also taking away the non-dollar productive activities from what I do. I do not do any admin applications, nothing like that. My job is to build relationships with people that come across investment properties owners, having deeper conversations than the other mediums that are out there.

Tom Panos:

All right, Team. I'm going to put a challenge out to everyone that's watching this. Susan, I don't know if you're there in the background. I don't know if you're there in the background.

Tom Panos:

I don't know if you're there in the background. Yes, you know what I really feel? Is it too late for us to? Actually, we are on Facebook, aren't we? Yes, okay, jono, jordan, I'm going to ask a favor. You're going to offer a one-on-one 30-minute coaching session to one person on this. They will do one-on-one, so this is the prize You'll have a one-on-one coaching session with both Jordan and John, who's going to speak to you about your issues, which is different to doing it in front of a lot of people.

Tom Panos:

To actually enter to win, as we're streaming these, I want you to either take photos, share it on social media, tag me, tag what do you reckon? Tag Wingman Jono, or yeah, wingman, yeah, Tag Wingman. And put down a learning that you're getting out of today, and we will pick a winner at the end of today and announce it. Those of you that are watching on Facebook right now all you've got to do is press the share button, or you can actually do the same thing. You can take a photo, put it on Instagram, share it. Tag Tom Panos, tag Wingman. Tag Tom Panos, tag Wingman. Tom Panos, tag wingman. Tag Tom Panos, tag wingman. So you believe, jordan, that 10 a month is like standard? You should be doing it.

Jordan Slinger:

I'm signing 10 a week at the moment.

Tom Panos:

Okay, I'm just. How many days do you work? Six days, okay. What does the typical day look like for you?

Jordan Slinger:

Yeah, so I don't a usual BDM will come in. I don't come into the office until after midday, so I'm out meeting people, meeting referral partners, meeting owners. Basically building relationships is what I do. So I come in and then I go through proposals using my offshore, and I don't usually work off a computer, I usually work on my phone.

Tom Panos:

It sounds like to me you are a leader of a team that's in delegation mode and you're delegating activities and monitoring those activities. Is that? What you're saying by you, yeah.

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, I think, Tom't think that's possible. Yeah, I think, Tom, like that's probably a big thing. That Jordan's done really well is that most BDMs get stuck doing an entry report, going to the houses, doing a lot of the leasing, doing a lot of the back-end activities which consumes them.

Jonathan Bell:

So most BDMs are doing 10 managements a month and they say they're overly busy, and we've tried to adopt the EBU model, like you do in sales, where you've got the top salesperson or the top BDM who's Jordan, and we built a team around him so he can focus on what he's best at, which is getting the best rents, signing the managements and getting the best results for the clients and having raving fans and then delegating everything else. And I think that's where a lot of BDMs get unstuck because there's so much compliance and admin involved in that leasing process, they get stuck doing that on a daily basis.

Tom Panos:

I really listen, I really love. The first thing I'm hearing is your team is prospecting business, not just processing business. Big difference, right, big big difference. So your typical day looks like first half. You're out. I mean out of curiosity. Someone's watching this now. Who do you delegate to?

Jordan Slinger:

Offshore. All my team workers, all my team on the coast are offshore. It's only myself on the ground here. Everything else is done offshore. You do not need a massive team, you do not need an office. Everything can be done using offshore, if you do it right.

Tom Panos:

So when we're talking about offshore, are you actually using the wingman team, Right? Oh beautiful, Okay. Now it's all the jigsaw puzzles coming together and I want to ask so on a Saturday, what do you do on a Saturday?

Jordan Slinger:

So I'm doing the same thing going out and meeting people, going to open homes, dropping bottles of wine to sales agents, going to financial advisors.

Tom Panos:

You know what I actually think, don't get me wrong. I think you must be really, really good, but I reckon part of the reason why this is happening is you're just there. I don't think people do that in that industry. I think what we are talking about is groundbreaking. But in sales it's like this is what we do, and you know what that says to me no competitors. What a free run that you've got there. You've got we do. And you know what that says to me no competitors, what a free run that you've got there. You've got a free run. And you know what else I like about your business.

Tom Panos:

Yes, in property management you get another strike at it. You might even miss out, but in real estate you miss out. They're gone. They've sold in Byron and they've moved to Wollongong. I don't know why you would do that, but anyway. But the point is they're gone. That client's gone. There you get another crack at those. So I want to ask, jono I'm going to get you to chime in as we're going through here, because at the end of the day, you run that business how many property managements do you reckon a property manager can manage?

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, I think industry standard is about 100 to 120 per property manager. In our business at Housemarque, our property managers manage double that. They're managing a minimum of 250. But again we've got the same model. It's like how do we In property management it's a little bit of a lemons market where everyone's doing it exactly the same way and there's so much competition in sales and I feel like in the sales industry it's run really professionally.

Jonathan Bell:

The open homes are amazing, the support teams are amazing, the elite agents are amazing, but in PM it probably doesn't have that same limelight. So what we did is all of our senior property managers we tried to attract the best senior property managers and we actually elevated them and we treat them like our top salespeople. So they all get a wingman offshore EA in the Philippines. All they do is landlord communication. Their sole job is to build relationships with their current landlords and try and build good enough relationships where they refer friends and family. So we've got one of our property managers bringing in 10 managements a month purely from relationships of their own portfolio. They don't have to do any out of office, so they don't do any entry reports, any routines, any exits.

Jonathan Bell:

So we're treating our senior property managers like um, elite sales people, and we create an ebu model around them, similar to what slinger get jordan gets on the sunshine coast, which then means they're managing more properties. We can pay them more. So our model is the more managements you manage, the more you get paid. So we're incentivizing our property managers to manage more properties and be growth-orientated rather than you know, want to actually lose the managements because there's less work. So we're creating much more of a growth mindset and a sales side of the business and customer service, rather than just here's your 120 properties. Manage them well, and I'm not going to talk to you for the next three months.

Tom Panos:

Now listen makes absolutely sense. What you're doing is, mate, people have been doing this since they've been building Henry Ford was building cars many, many years ago. Like there are divisions of labour, this person does this, this person does this. I mean, mate, handymen don't get paid money that well, because they're not specialists. Specialists get paid well, and that's both in trades and that's both in medicine. So what you do is you've got people sticking to their lanes. I'm curious with you. I was about to use the same name. He calls you what's? He call you?

Tom Panos:

slinger slinger I've only I've met you once on a slinger.

Jonathan Bell:

I just want to ask you, do you?

Tom Panos:

have. Do you do like in real estate sales? We have the listing presentation. The listing presentation is the story. The listing presentation is the story. The listing presentation is the pitch. It's basically a narrative that you've got to give versus two or three other agents who have got the same sort of narrative. Do you have like a stock standard presentation?

Jordan Slinger:

I do. Now all the BDMs are going in and saying we charge this, we have low vacancy, we have heaps of tenants. I'm giving more of a story. Me and my partner have just moved from Brisbane to the Sunshine Coast to give exceptional service and bringing that story to landlords instead of jamming down the same information that every other real estate is jamming down their throats, it's getting a lot more of a positive reaction back. I think that you've got to know who you are and what you're trying to do, and for me, I'm trying to provide a service that is not provided on the Sunshine Coast.

Tom Panos:

Okay, okay. So if you're the same as the next person, your typical landlord's going to say agent, agent, agent, you're the same, you're the same, you're the same. They need a differentiator. That differentiator ends up becoming fee. I mean, it's in the simplest terms is you're all shit, you're real estate people. Who's the cheapest of the shittest? That's how the average brain works, right? So one of the things that you're saying is don't be the same. Look at separation, look at USPs, look at how can I stand out? Because you need to stand out to win out. So I'm curious Give me one or two separation points that you think differences that you've got versus competitors.

Jordan Slinger:

Well, I just give them my story. I just be as genuine as possible and say me and my partner have just moved here and I've left a big business to be here and I've put a lot of effort to be here and there is no one else that will give the effort, the amount of attention to detail as me and I'm not going in saying all these other things that other BDMs are saying I'm giving them the story and people want to be on the winning team.

Tom Panos:

And I can see why that works because, I mean, I can just picture it. You're sitting there in front of an owner and probably somewhere along the lines of Mr Client, mr Landlord, mrs Landlord, I want to let you know I've come over, I've left everything behind to come here and you need to know I've got to prove myself each and every day. Giving me the opportunity to me is a privilege, not an entitlement like some of the other agents. Right, I can just picture why that?

Jonathan Bell:

that would have cut through, right, and I think, tom as well, like what I've noticed is in sales, when you go in for a listing presentation, the owner's thinking, okay, I don't love this person potentially, but I'm happy to deal with them for the next 30 days because I'm going to get the best possible sale price In rentals. They're actually meeting you and they're saying can I work with this person for the next 10 years? So it's like they're not actually only looking at are they going to get me the best result, they're actually going. Can I deal with this individual? And I think that's very much our approach. When we hire BDMs and we get people like Slinger. You want your BDM to be really likable. They actually need to have very little ego and they need to be very much like going in and saying what are you looking for? What do you want out of this relationship?

Jonathan Bell:

Jordan, for example, when I first started the business, my number one pitch was you get me. I'm not going anywhere. You have me for the rest of your investment journey. You can call me anytime, whereas if you go with a big agency this is when I started If you go with a big agency, you're going to speak to the BDM and then the BDM is going to hand you off to the PM. The PM is probably going to leave the business and you'll get another PM, and then you're going to have someone managing your property who's never even met you or seen your property, whereas if you're dealing with me, you get me at all times and I think when you're starting your rent roller you're looking to grow.

Jonathan Bell:

That is the most compelling argument. And then over time it changes. Now we can say hey, we lease 100 properties a month. We're getting thousands of tenants per month come and ask us for properties. We've got people specialized in their roles, so you're getting someone who's You're getting 10 people for the price of one, and we're not. There's no key man risk, so if someone leaves, it doesn't actually impact your property. So that's a much more compelling argument than someone saying we've got low vacancy rates and we have less than 10% staff turnover. Landlords don't care about that. They want to understand what impact it's going to have on them and their investment property.

Tom Panos:

Man. I just I want to ask you, jono, like to me, the most common question. So I have 50 one-on-ones a week. Some of those one-on-ones are with principals. I don't speak about property management in most of my one-on-ones, but when I'm dealing with a principal I often have things where they say I just don't know how to incentivize my PM department right. I mean, I know we've got a short period of time here, but is there any comments that you guys can add to that?

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, I think like so typically in a real estate office. I'm sure a lot of principals on here would agree. You've got the BDM. They get paid to bring in management, and then you've got your property manager, who's on a salary. So the BDM goes out, gets the listing, gives it to the property manager and the property manager is like I don't want it, I don't get paid anymore to manage this property. All you're doing is giving me more work for the same amount. There's this, like most BDMs Jordan would probably agree. Most BDMs and PM divisions actually hate each other.

Jonathan Bell:

So in our business we believe that growth fixes all problems and every single part of our business is focused on growth. And that's not just growth of new managements, but that's growth of our team. That's growth of remuneration for our team, that's growth of better service. So everything we do is we attract property managers who want to grow and want to earn more money. So we actually have an incentive program at 250 properties, you earn this, At 300 properties, you earn this and 350 properties, you earn this and it means that they're actually property managers.

Jonathan Bell:

Go, if I manage an extra 100 properties, then I'm going to get paid this and this is what it's going to do for my family, so it actually gives them a growth path. Not many property management businesses actually give their property managers incentives to manage more properties and I think that having your property managers see a 12-month plan and see what their life could look like based off how many managements they manage has created for us, has created a growth culture, and property managers are actually coming to us saying can I manage more properties now, which?

Jonathan Bell:

is unheard of in the industry.

Tom Panos:

And that's the way life should be. It should be performance based, right, and not only that. I like that because you know, sometimes, remuneration schemes. You know sometimes remuneration schemes, like I had one yesterday, guys, where the sales agent was upset with their associate because they're not doing the work, and then I said, oh, what's your remuneration? And he turned around and he goes oh, he gets, you know, 2.5% of everything I write. And I said, man, have you got any other jobs? I said I'd love to come and sit there and hang out there on TikTok, sit in the office and pick up two and a half, because you're basically saying is I'll get two and a half percent based on what you write, right? So what we're talking about is reward the behaviours that we want, reward the people on the stuff that they're doing. Now can I ask you, slinger, you know, were you a salesperson before.

Jordan Slinger:

No.

Tom Panos:

So I'm trying to work out. Is there a specific person that you know people should be looking? Were you in property management?

Jordan Slinger:

I was a property manager for about three months and then moved to a BDM role. I've always been in sales businesses and I've always gone to sales training. People want to do business with people they like. So, if I have any advice for a principal, hire someone because they like that person. Go out to lunch with them, see what they're actually like as a human being. Are they going to get along with the marketplace and then go from there, instead of hiring someone that's not going to suit what you're trying to do as a business?

Tom Panos:

Okay, as we're going along, we are getting some questions coming in. I'm just going to see if we can answer some of these. What type of work can you outsource to the offshore? In a PM business, most needs to be done in-house, like routines, exit maintenance, which is the bulk of the work. How do you outsource this? I'm a business owner with a rent roll of 100 properties with a PM. I'm also a sales agent and very tight on time. I've got to tell you I'm stressed, even reading, I'm stressed, reading that. I'm stressed, anna, I'm stressed Anna. A hundred properties and you're doing sales and you've got this PM there just doesn't stack up. There's a better way, anna. There's a better way. But, jonoer officers, right, thousands of properties that are populated with remote professionals from Wingman doing PM work.

Tom Panos:

Explain.

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, so basically like anything. So all lease documents, all entry documents, like anything you can do that you don't have to be at the property at, will actually be done probably better from the Philippines team, like they're more dedicated, they've got better attention to detail Organizing maintenance, following up quotes, organizing your routine inspection run, organizing smoke alarms, general tenancy agreements, agency agreements, arranging bond. So 80% of property management is actually admin. We found 80% of the actual role is actually done is actually administration work. 20% is dollar, productive or relationship driven. So for you, anna, my personal opinion would be get someone to do 80% of that work. Employ someone who will do entries, exits and routines and manage the properties for you and you focus on selling and bringing in business. So you'd have for your team, you should have someone offshore doing all the back-end work, your onshore person's managing the relationships, doing entries, exits and routines, which is needing to be done onshore, and then all you would be doing is bringing in new business and selling.

Tom Panos:

Love that. So, anna, you've got to get off that hundred. You got to get off in cricket. A hundred is a great score in property management. It's a bad score, anna. You got to get over that number because the numbers just don't don't stack up there.

Tom Panos:

Um, and I'm, you know, one of the things that has fascinated me with uh offshore team and it sort of it really hit home when I was in Manila when I realized that people in the Philippines speak to other people in the Philippines who are Filipino. They don't speak. They speak to each other in English. They don't speak. They speak to each other in english. So it's not a case of, oh, what's their english going to be like? That's what they speak. That's what they speak. Um, jono, can I ask you what would the first step like? So you're someone right now you're watching this. You're a principal, maybe, or you're a BDM. You're a principal of BDM. What's step one? So, firstly, can you have your current? Like? Some people don't even have a BDM working in the business. A lot of people don't. Like some people don't even have a BDM working in the business. A lot of people don't. What's your view on the PM manager also doing BDM?

Jonathan Bell:

Two different skill sets. If a PM can do BDM, I call them a unicorn and typically if they're a unicorn they own their own business. So you need they're two different skill sets. Property managers need to be extremely detailed. They need to dive into problems. They need to enjoy focusing on solutions. Bdms need to focus on growth and building relationships. It's really hard to find someone who's got both those skill sets. They're opposites. They're actually opposite personalities. So my personal opinion is that it's hard to get someone to go from a PM to a BDM. But if you can do it, then go for it. I think the better strategy.

Jonathan Bell:

If I owned a business that had sales people, my strategy would be find an associate. Say I want you to be a BDM for 2 years. I want you to build relationships with owners. I want you to bring owners in because you're ultimately building their pipeline for when they go to sell and when they move into sales they will then have a pipeline of sellers. Be a BDM for two years, help them grow as a BDM and you're attracting someone who has sales skills, who has the desire to go out and prospect, and then help them on that journey. Hopefully they want to stay as a BDM. But if they don't, they then build a pipeline of three to 600 managements who then become future sellers in their business. I think a lot of associates start in sales. I don't understand why they don't start as BDMs.

Tom Panos:

Yeah, I actually think 1 million percent, because I actually think it would be so much easier to crack it in BDM than what it would be in sales as a sales agent, because, purely because of the numbers, the amount of competitors that you've got there is a question that I was going to ask, but it's actually been asked by someone else rent roll organically from scratch.

Jonathan Bell:

Where do you find data for potential owners? There's probably a few strategies that you can use Depends if you're in a sales office. If I was in a sales office, I would call through every single owner in the database or I would build really strong relationships with the sales agents. Like most sales agents own a few investment properties themselves. Most sales agents friends and family. They're very well connected. There's obviously a few softwares out there that you can get contact details for that has really good data as well, and then also mortgage brokers and financial planners typically have really good databases as well. So I think it's a combination of building really good relationships with your network that have access to clients with properties, and then the second part of that is leveraging your current sales team or database or software that I'm sure we all know about.

Tom Panos:

Listen, I just can't get over the amount of people. I mean, the next opportunity is right underneath your eyes. People don't realise that the tradesperson that you call to go change that washer the electrician that goes to fix up that problem has four investment properties that you're not managing. That owner that you currently have that you're managing has another three properties that are sitting with another person that you just never have asked. There are organisations in your area that have got a thousand staff in a building. In that building they have people that own investment properties. Right, you've got a captive audience to come up with a corporate special, the AMP special for all employees of AMP. You get this deal from Housemart. There are so many opportunities. What do you think Leah has asked? What do you think the maximum amount of property is? A property manager should manage from end to end.

Jonathan Bell:

We don't have an end to end model, so it's hard to answer that question. I personally don't think you should have an end to end and it depends on the property manager. That's like saying how many sales should a salesperson sell every year.

Tom Panos:

It probably depends on the person and their motivation level, their skill set okay, one question that's come up is how does the ebu model, the super team model, the pot model, if you like it, operate in property management with licensing requirements?

Jonathan Bell:

so all of the all of the so to hold a real estate license. There's all the Australians are doing with a license the things that you need. So negotiation, showing the houses, organizing all the things that you need a real estate license to do. Your offshore team's doing all the administration that you don't need a license to do Calling a tradie and organizing an invoice or organizing a maintenance request you don't need a real estate license to do. Calling a tradie and organizing an invoice or organizing a maintenance request you don't need a real estate license to do. And ultimately, the sign-off comes from the person with the real estate license in Australia.

Tom Panos:

And team. I've got to tell you, you've got to get the narrative out of your head. Oh no, I'm not like that. I need that person to be next to me. This whole thing doesn't work. Listen, one guy said to me yesterday he goes, but realistically, like you know you couldn't. You know, like you couldn't do it without you know Susan, and Susan's not in the Philippines. Well, to be quite honest with you, I reckon I've seen Susan probably as much as I've seen Princess in the last few months. Yes, susan is in the next suburb, but I would literally, I mean, I don't see Susan sometimes for eight months.

Tom Panos:

Right, this whole thing about, oh, they've got to be there, they've got to be there. She's been working with me for 12 years and she could have basically been in Makati the whole time. It's as simple as that, you know. And the few times, the few times when she's decided to come to the studio to do work with me, I send her back. I send her back because all we do is chit chat, right, all we do is socialize. That's what happens in corporate world, by the way. Let's be honest, everyone, let's be honest. They go in there, they walk fast through the corridors, go to the cafe, sit down chit-chat. If it wasn't the case, the world would have slowed, the world would have stopped during Zoom, but it didn't did it right, kept on going. In fact, it got more productive.

Tom Panos:

So I just and I just want to ask there's a couple of more questions that I feel guilty by not asking, because if they've been good enough to ask and we should be good enough to answer them, how do you tackle when you need to drop a property manager's pay due taking on less properties due to a hire? I don't think you drop a property manager's pay, right? I don't think that's a property manager's pay, right? I don't think that's the issue to the anonymous person. All it is is you're basically saying is everyone's got access to this deal, to be accessed to this deal? This is what you've got to do. It's no different to a sales commission. Up to a million, you're on X percent. At one million to two million, you're on, you know, at another 10 percent. I don't think you're punishing, you're incentivizing better performance. Is that right, john?

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, absolutely Absolutely. There's a good question here from Carol to Jordan. What are the main points that you think a BDM should focus on? Ie, you mentioned open homes. What else? What are the top three things, Slinger, that you reckon a BDM should do?

Jordan Slinger:

I think meeting external referral partners, if it's inside, if you have a sales team in your business, you should be taking those sales agents out for lunch, breakfast dinners once a week. You know you should be building that relationship. So when they come across an investor, you know that that person will reach out to you and say, hey, this person's ready to go. That's number one. So activity quality of conversation, like why did you buy the investment property instead of you know we charge seven percent like what is the reason that you want to buy in this area right now? Is it because of your kids? Do you want to move to the coast? What does that look like? And then also stripping away the non-dollar productive activities, I think that's the biggest one that has marked as well Beautiful, beautiful.

Tom Panos:

I'm curious Do you use a manual diary or just your own productivity stack? Tell me the things that you use, jordan.

Jordan Slinger:

So Outlook Outlook Calendar.

Tom Panos:

All right.

Jordan Slinger:

Yeah, I don't do any admin, I don't do anything like that. It's all done through Wingman Offshore. I've got one EA that does it all. That EA is split between another medium on the Gold Coast.

Tom Panos:

Your communication with your staff, your remote professionals, specifically, that are offshore, is doing? What is it through whatsapp?

Jordan Slinger:

through teams, microsoft teams. I facetime jean every morning on the way to work or to my first meeting and she gives me a list of what I've got today. Every single lead that comes through I send to to her. Every single proposal I need to send. She will email me at 3 o'clock every day. So I know that those are done and she gets BCC'd into those emails so she knows that they're all done and then, when they're done, she will let me know to go home, basically.

Tom Panos:

Okay, there's a common theme of questions coming in on incentives to referral partners, incentives to get there. Does that happen in that space?

Jordan Slinger:

It does. It depends. My biggest referral partners don't want a referral fee. They just want exceptional service which we can provide. That's what we've built this business about. It's relationships and exceptional service, service which we can provide. That's what we've built this business about. It's relationships and exceptional service. It's not. I think that if you've got a sales business, they're probably referring to someone else, not because they're getting an extra week's rent. It's because they feel like their clients are being looked after in a better way. So then when they go to sell, they sell through that agent.

Tom Panos:

And I'm curious and I know, jono, that your own business does not really focus on sales yet many real estate offices that have got sales also have rent rolls. Do you have any views on the way a sales office deals with their rent roll and whether there's a bigger opportunity that already exists in the industry in the way that they speak to each other?

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, definitely. I mean, what sums it up right? Go to any real estate office. The salespeople sit at the front in the beautiful offices and then the property managers sit in the back corner. Awards nights every awards night you go to all the salespeople, get up, win the awards, then the property managers win the awards. So I think that it's just a cultural thing and it would be as if I was.

Jonathan Bell:

I always think I try and put myself in someone else's shoes.

Jonathan Bell:

If I was a property manager earning a salary and every single day I have 3 salespeople walk past me wearing a watch that's worth more than an annual salary of a property manager, wearing a watch that's worth more than an annual salary of a property manager, it would sting a little bit.

Jonathan Bell:

And having them celebrate oh look, I just made 30 grand com, I just made this, I just made that and having a property manager sitting there going like I'm the one doing all the hard work you come and go whenever you please and you're earning quadruple me. I know they're completely different industries and you've got to have a certain skill set, but it wouldn't be a nice feeling to be reminded of that every single day. I don't have the solution to it. But I think, culturally, I think principals could look at how do we make property managers feel more worthy and how do we get them to respect their job and respect this business. And I think, first things first, sit them at the front of the office or give them the awards first and do some little things that give them that recognition of the tough job they do that ultimately is the asset of the business.

Tom Panos:

And I think, listen, when I go to the UK and speak at conferences, I'm just gobsmacked that you're right. In sales in Australia, you know the Gav Rubensteins, the nice cars, the nice clothes, the people that have got a spring in their step you look at them, you think to yourself, oh, that'll be a salesperson. But in the UK I was so gobsmacked like BDMs and property managers are seen like the winners in. There are no different to the winners in sales, right? And the reason is, I think, that they have seen that you can work in a real estate business for 20 years.

Tom Panos:

At the end of the year, the owner, all the commissions that have come in, has gone. It's gone to salespeople, it's gone to expenses, depending on what kind of a principal you are. It might have even gone on cars, it's gone on holidays, it's gone on whatever. But what they have got is this asset worth $20 million, right? So they understand if we look after our people, they will look after the clients, and if we look after the clients, the business gets looked after. And that's what you're saying. If you want your clients to be looked after and if you want a momentum spread saying, use House Smarts, you've got to look after your people, because then they feel proud. A couple of other questions. Alex B is asking what about remote areas like Cairns? Are you thinking we can still achieve the same numbers, such as the Sunshine Coast, brisbane and the Gold Coast? Any views there?

Jonathan Bell:

Yeah, I think it's just a mindset. It's like I always make sure we hit a record month in December because everyone thinks that you can't make sure we hit a record month in December Because everyone thinks that you can't. Everyone thinks that everyone tapers down in December and I think that for us we want to ramp up. So I think I mean I don't know the stats, but why not? Like, if you tell yourself that you're not going to be able to hit the same numbers, you probably won't, but I can't see why you can't get the same results? I think a lot of investors buy in Cairns. I think there's a lot of townhouses and apartments from memory that investors buy in those areas. So why not? I don't have the stats to back that up.

Tom Panos:

You know it took decades and decades and decades for someone to achieve a four-minute mile. The minute it was achieved, then everyone started doing it. Right? It's the most bizarre thing, right? The most bizarre thing that once it's done, it shows it can be done. So often it is your view on it. I'm going to ask maybe one more question. It's a difficult one. I don't even think you'll have no one's got the answer to this. It's an ongoing project, I think, but I'd love to hear some of the views you've got when looking to recruit property managers. By the way, thank you. This is a record number of questions, which says to me the appetite of people on this subject is very high. Which says to me the appetite of people on this subject is very high. Where do you find property managers?

Jonathan Bell:

yeah, it's tough. I mean you should have it. If you're a business, if you're a head of department or gm or um principal, you should have a pipeline of property managers no different to a pipeline of sales or a pipeline of um of landlords. So we know that if someone leaves in our business, we know who the next property manager is. So our, our theme of our leadership team has always be recruiting. We've got a floor from sales, which is usually the other way around. You can find property managers. They're everywhere.

Jonathan Bell:

I just don't think that people are spending the time and effort in always be recruiting. So I think you should have a pipeline of property managers that you continue to meet and you should just have a KPI of meeting three potential property managers a week. Speaking of have a KPI of meeting three potential property managers a week Speaking to property managers from other businesses saying, hey, we're not looking yet. If an opportunity opened up next year, would you be open to it? What are you looking for in your career? How can we support you Just continuing to be having meetings and building that pipeline?

Tom Panos:

I love that line. I love that line. We're not looking yet right, and you know what? They're probably not looking yet either, but there's going to be a fight in the office at some point in the next year. They're going to walk out of the meeting and the first person they're going to ring is the person that's been jabbing away quietly and saying I like that person. So what you're saying is instead of just listing property, start trying to list people. Make that a process in your business property. Start trying to list people. Make that a process in your business. Right, jordan, you'll be kind enough. We're going to select a winner at the end of today. Susan will pick a winner up on social media. I want to thank you so much for joining us today.

Tom Panos:

I also want to let people know that, prior to coming on camera, I spoke to Jonathan about we believe the marketplace is dying for on-the-ground content that is done from people that are already doing it their audio matching, their video, people that have walked the path that you want to walk, and on March the 6th, we are going to have a BDM property management day that is purely targeted to owners of businesses with their team, and you will be receiving the full blueprint. You're going to end up getting a manual. You're going to get a manual that is going to be A to Z, that's going to tell you this is number one how to run your rent roll, how many people you should have. We're going to look at ratios, kpis, profitabilities. Then we're going to also have a look at the system to adding 30 properties every month. March the 6th is the day you guys that are on here are going to get first crack at it. We're only going to get a venue that's going to end up having around 200 people. So this will be a genuine sellout.

Tom Panos:

Jono Slinger, I want to thank you so much. Unless you want to add anything else, all I can say to you is that you know what I'm pumped about. I'm pumped about because I reckon that there's at least five people that are sitting here that, all of a sudden, have got excited, thinking to themselves. It'll be a principle thinking to themselves. Man, all I've got to do is take the process that I've got in sales. Then what I've got to do is find people that are already doing it. Go off and plagiarize how smart's doing. Why go off and reinvent the wheel? And you've been very generous and kind. I know that you've been running around the country various. What do you call them? I see them online where people come together.

Jonathan Bell:

Roadshows.

Tom Panos:

Roadshows.

Jonathan Bell:

What are those roadshows? They're just a one-day event similar to what we'll do together, tom, in March, but we're going to ramp things up in March. But basically we just give people the playbook of how we've done what we've done and how we utilise Wingman to be able to give growth within businesses and profitability.

Tom Panos:

All right To all the others. I know that there's 23 questions there that haven't been answered. We'll make sure they're answered on March the 6th. Time is up, guys, time is up. Please, if you haven't done it, take a photo right now, put some of your learnings and then what we will do is pick a winner. Susan will pick a winner tonight, and then we will line up a Zoom one-on-one coaching session with Slinger and Jono. I want to thank you so much for joining us. Everyone. Suns out, guns out. Have a great day, enjoy pickleball.

Tom Panos:

I have got one common thing we love, and that is we both love Pickleball Because he's the next tennis player. But that's another story.

Jonathan Bell:

All right, thanks, tom, see you guys. Bye, see you.