 Hey, what's up guys? I hope you're doing super well today. I'm sure you've heard about this NAR antitrust lawsuit going on right now. Basically it states that there's specific rules that NAR has in place that creates a price fixing situation with the buyer agent commission. Okay, so I want to dive in on this. I want to give you my opinions. I'm hoping that my opinions really kind of eases the pressure for you on this. I don't think this is a big deal whatsoever. And there's a lot of people out there that are stating that they feel like commissions are going to be cut 50% if this thing goes through and that buyer agents are going to go away. Well, let me just go on record here and say that this lawsuit has absolutely nothing to do with how much agents get paid, what the commission rates are. That's going to be dictated by the market itself, what our value is actually worth. And I think the market is speaking loud and clear. As far as buyer agents, they're here to stay. People need representation, want representation and will continue to have representation regardless of what happens here. So to say that commissions are going to go down 50% and there's going to be no more buyer agents, that shouldn't even be part of the conversation right now. Okay, so the reason I haven't made a video about this yet is because this has been such a non-issue for me. And the reason I'm doing it now is because so many agents are reaching out to me kind of freaking out about it. So I figure let me go on here and express my opinions on this, maybe give you a different perspective so that you can just carry on with your career here and go out there and crush it. I'm also going to start doing question of the day here on these videos. Today's question comes from Jamie Butler in New Hampshire. This is from Instagram. She says, hi Ricky, I need your help. I have some buyers who can't get motivated. Some even have their pre-approval letter and they won't make a move. I don't really want to be pushy. What do you recommend that I do? And I responded very quickly here. I said find other clients but stand close touch with these clients. You can't make people do stuff. Let them do the deal on their timeline. Your job is to help them, not push them. So I think this is very interesting how agents feel like they have to try to do something to get people off the fence. No, that's not your job. Your job is to help them through the process and people know when they want to buy or sell. It's not our job to help them figure out when to buy or sell. The reason why I've closed so many deals is because I do the deals on their terms. I help them do what they want to do. I don't try to get them to do what I want them to do. There's a big difference here and I feel like this has been one of the big pinnacles of my success because through that process of allowing them to do it the way that they want to do it has helped me create such a strong connection with my clients that they know that I'm not going to try to get them to do anything and they like that. They love an agent who allows them to do the deal on their terms. The real problem here is pipeline. You're going to have 15 to 20 active buyers and sellers at all times to close one deal a week. You want to close one deal a week? You have 15 to 20 active buyers and sellers at all times. If you're thinking about switching brokerages and would like to work directly with me and my organization, I would love to set up a call with you. We have a massive success rate with new agents, experienced agents, team leaders and brokers. Just shoot me a message on Instagram or email me ricky at zero to diamond.com. Let's dive into this lawsuit. The first thing I want you to realize is how incredibly grateful you need to be that we even have MLS and the way that it's set up and the efficiency that it brings to our industry. A lot of countries don't have it. They have open mandate listings, which means the seller picks eight different listing agents and the first one that brings the buyer wins and all the rest of them lose the deal altogether. We're incredibly blessed to be in the situation where we can do an exclusive right to sell, put it on MLS, and then the entire population of agents in our market are fighting to go sell it for us. We need to be thanking our lucky stars that were in this situation to begin with. Now, without being said, there's always going to be people out there with something like this that says, that's not right. You can't do that. That's no way. That's against the antitrust rules. Now, the argument here is that sharing of commissions between listing and buyer broker violates the Sherman Antitrust Act by inflating seller's cost. Are you kidding me? Absolutely not. That seller agreed to that commission regardless if there's a buyer agent involved or not. They're going to pay me that five, six percent, whatever it is, regardless if there's a buyer agent involved. What should it matter? It's kind of like a contractor. When they work and deal with a homeowner to do a project, they have a subcontractor come in and do the work and they pay the subcontractor out of the negotiated price with the homeowner. How is this any different? I love what one of Edmunds' publishers, Bernice Rawl said. She's also the CEO of Broker Jump and realestatecoach.com, but she called these lawsuits against our Duds. Now, she did say that there are some problems and that we need to make some adjustments in terms of the rules and however things addressed, which I 100% agree. Now, what's so funny here is that I was at Inman a few weeks ago doing a breakout session and Bernice actually heckled me. What's the number one reason why a buyer or seller chooses a particular real estate agent? What? Narnana study and it was that they had a friend in the business with a great reputation. Yes, ma'am? That's not the correct answer. Actually, 80% of the most recent profile of buyers and sellers shows that 82% of the sellers only interviewed one agent who they hired. The first person who gets to them when you're ready to transact is the one who will get to deal. And I would fear to say that if they had a friend in the business, that's probably going to be that first call, right? They have, well, I understand. I understand. Thank you. So for my business, not the rest of the industry, let's just say, not the rest of the industry, just my business. Right? I've created friends in my market and they use me and only me, right? And I teach other agents who do the same thing and they've been highly successful. We have a guy that's 20 months in. He closed 100 deals in his first 20 months. Two agents close 10 million in the first two new agents in the first year close 10 million in the first year just by doing what I'm talking about. What's the definition of a lead? What would you say, ma'am? Is the definition of a lead, ma'am? The definition of a lead, I'd call it to hear from definition of a lead. A lead, there are certain different white people categorized cities, but some people, you know, for me, a lead is someone who's either raised their hand that they're going to, they're interested in purchasing or listing. Got you. My definition is any human being in the market because the fact is, is that the humans who raise their hand are human and if they're not raising their hand now, they're going to raise their hand at some point. And if I have made the connection, had a real live conversation with them and they're marketed and branded to them in a way where I'm showing them who I am as a person that I care about them, there's a good chance that when they raise their hand, they're going to be raising it to me, right? So I'm just trying to collect humans, right? Leads are humans. So here's what we know. All closings originate from relationships, the more relationships you have with people in your market, the more closings you'll have. It's not official, guys. Now, as this was happening, I had no idea who this was. This lady is a legend in the industry. I talked to her for a long time after the session and she's a great, great woman. Now back to the lawsuit. This has nothing to do with the amount of money agents make, the percentage of commission or if there's even buyer agents. And I would argue that if there ever was a scenario which I don't believe ever would happen where buyers basically had to go through the listing agent, we would still be five, six percent, whatever it is that we charge now, whatever the normal is, because even in that instance, we're still representing, there's two people involved and we're doing twice as much work and we're juggling more balls, right? It's going to be really, really tough for this to happen in a manner that really decreases commissions, just not even, it's not even part of this. Now, the rules that are not having place that we're fighting over here basically states that if you're a listing agent, you put a property in MLS, you have to put a buyer agent commission in there and that that commission cannot be negotiated, right? And they're arguing that this is where the price fixing is. This is where the price fixing problem occurs. Now, again, my fault on this is very simple, okay? Even if this went to the very worst case scenario, not a lot's going to change. Sellers are still going to opt in to pay that buyer agent commission, right? Especially when they see other sellers doing it, right? There may be a shock to the system, but everything's going to pan out, the dust is going to settle, right? Let's say that doomsday happens and the seller can't pay, right? Never happened. Let's say it happens, the seller can't pay, right? Out of that listing side commission, the buyer has to pay their own fee, okay? In that scenario, you may say, well, buyers can't afford it and you can't figure it into the loan and all this and that. Listen, if something happens to that capacity, it's going to be figured into the loan, right? I think that in that scenario, all right, the banks are going to go back and there's going to be new roles in place, right? This actually going to allow that to happen, right? So there's a lot of different scenarios here. At the end of the day, nothing to worry about. We need to keep doing what we do best. Go out there, build relationships, help people, buy and sell real estate, continue doing what you know you need to do. If this is your first time seeing me, my name is Ricky Karuth. I've been selling real estate for 20 years now, right here in Gulf Shores, Alabama. I've closed over a thousand deals and I just love to help agents. I created a free real estate coaching program at zero to diamond.com. Go there, check out the 60 day challenge. Let me know if there's anything in the world that I can do for you. I'm here to help you and reduce the failure rate in the real estate industry. We'll see you guys on the next video. Let's go.