Matthew Maschler:
I’m Matthew Maschler, the Real Estate Finder, and with me, Stacey
Staci Garcia:
Garcia, also a real estate finder.
Matthew Maschler:
And we are having a good show today. We have a very special treat for you. We have Real estate broker Ben Schachter.
Ben Schachter:
Hey Matthew, thanks so much for having me. I’m thrilled to be here with you and Stacy this morning.
Matthew Maschler:
Ben is one of the few people in the world that I can call Boss because he is my boss at the signature real estate companies.
Ben Schachter:
I definitely prefer partner, but, uh, whatever folks you brought my friend.
Matthew Maschler:
Yes, we are, we are partners, uh, with, of the, uh, signature Real Estate Finder brokerage firm, which is a division of the signature real estate companies that Ben is an owner of. And we’re here today to tell you a little bit about Ben and the signature real estate companies.
Ben Schachter:
Really, really great to have a chance to spend time with you in this setting. I’ve watched your growth for the Real Estate Finder podcast, and, uh, what you’ve been doing online and to your audience has been spectacular. The way you’re positioning yourself as really an institution of knowledge here in the real estate space has been great. And, uh, just seeing your success from the podcast has been dynamite to watch. And, uh, I applaud you for it and thrilled to share a little bit about with, uh, what we’re doing here at Signature.
Matthew Maschler:
Well, thank you very much. Those are very kind words coming from you. When I first started at the Signature Real Estate Companies, I was, I, I, I would say one of the top producers, but I was probably the top producer. I was, uh, selling, uh, you know, I was setting records and selling, selling, uh, homes for, for lots of money. Um, and, uh, I’m very proud to say that over the years, uh, I’m no longer a record setter. I am, I’ve fallen, uh, not to the back of the pack, but to the back, back of the top of the pack that we’ve had such growth at the real estate companies, that people have been able to come in and outsell me both on volume, number of houses and, and on sizes of the houses. So at the year end parties, and when, when, when other people get the awards, and I don’t get the awards, I don’t feel bitter at all. I feel very proud of, of what we were able to accomplish.
Ben Schachter:
Well, it’s definitely a, a teamwork effort. And, uh, no doubt you deserve a ton of credit for all of your continuous accomplishments, uh, from the outset of your real estate career. And now, right through 2022, you know, at Signature, we’ve had really stratosphere growth over the last 16 years. Our biggest growth has really been the past five years, uh, just before and during, and now post the Pandemic. Uh, we have attracted tremendous top talent from around the marketplace. And we’ve been fortunate, you know, our, we’ve positioned ourselves as the real estate experts in South Florida, and by providing a phenomenal value proposition to top quality real estate professionals, they are attracted to our firm and they wanna do business with us as a broker, a non-competing broker. Specifically, I don’t sell real estate. My customer audience is real estate agents, whereas real estate agents, their customer audience of course, is buyers, sellers, landlords, and tenants. So I have to consider every decision I make in running our business, what’s in the best interest of my customer base, which is my
Matthew Maschler:
Agents. And that is one of the reasons I chose you, uh, to come work here and to come work for you, is the, the concept of the non-competing brokers. There are a lot of brokerage firms in town where the broker whose name on the door also sells real estate. And I couldn’t imagine working at a company where I’m competing with my boss. I’m competing with the company that when people call for Ben Shater, Ben’s not gonna go sell them real estate. But in a lot of these other companies, the guy whose name on the door is gonna intercept that call. So, what, what’s left for me? Certainly, I, I have my own business, but, you know, any leads or referrals that, that come in, you know, if, if they get to me, well, they can’t be that, that good if, if if the guy whose name on the door, uh, passed up on them.
And I, I just, I’m not comfortable with the idea of, of working for a competing broker. And, and that being said, I do recruit people and to my team, um, and I’m a broker of the Signature Real Estate Finder, um, brokerage firm, but I don’t consider myself a competing broker to my agents. I consider myself a resource to my agents that my agents, they work for Signature just like anyone else who works for Signature. They work for you, and they have the support. And the support you get at signatures is incredible. Um, they just have the added benefit of being able to call me and I can accompany them on showings and listing appointments and help them out when, when they’re in trouble. So, I don’t see myself as a competing broker with my agents. I consider you the broker of my agents. I just, um, consider myself a resource for my team members, which are who are really my friends.
Ben Schachter:
You know, being a competing or non-competing broker is a big decision that each real estate broker has to make for themselves. Unfortunately, most brokers are not successful enough working with agents where they’re forced into a financial corner where they have to compete. Their primary source of income is the buyers and sellers of real estate and the commissions that are generated thereof. I decided when I began this company with my partners, Jack and Mark many years ago, that the best way I could help my agents is by being completely transparent, not competing against them, and spending a hundred percent of my efforts on ensuring that they were successful. Now, Matt, I can tell you and Stacy that for the first couple of years, there was some financial pain. There’s financial pain when you, there’s financial pain, when there’s financial pain, when you are trying to help your salespeople who may not necessarily be as good as you are to sell real estate, because they’re not necessarily generating enough income to share that revenue on a substantial meaningful basis with you as the broker.
But once you get your agent base to a substantially performing level, and you attract enough quality agents to your firm, then the financial money flows upstream to the brokerage. But there was probably a three, three and a half, almost four year timeframe that I was actually at a deficit from being a practicing agent myself, starting the company, of course, you have all the initial startup expenses, you’re hiring agents, you’re paying for all your operational expenses, and the agents are producing at a modest level. But we have a very strategic training program at Signature. We have a tremendous technology platform at Signature, we have world-class support, and that caused our initial group of agents to get better and better and better at your job. Not only are they performing at a higher level, but they’re out there in the street doing business with other agents from competing firms, and the other agents are taking note, wow, your business is really skyrocketing.
Wow, you seem really happy with your job. Wow, you’re raving about the company you work for. Happy agents create the best form of lead generation for more happy agents. So as my younger team members were out there in the street selling real estate, they’re attracting additional realtors to us. We’re growing and growing and growing, and the cycle just goes on and on. Here we are, uh, a decade and a half later with, uh, an excess of 1400 agents and 20 plus offices, all because of the happy agents we had at the core who continually excelled, grew, made money, and the cycle goes on.
Matthew Maschler:
So tell me about the signature of real estate companies. Where do you operate?
Ben Schachter:
We’re headquartered in Boca Raton. Our primary source of business is in Southern Palm Beach County. However, we have operations and teams of agents throughout Broward County. We have agents in Miami-Dade County, and we have gorgeous offices and spectacular agents as far north as Osceola, which is New Orlando, as far west as Naples, where we’re fully functioning as a brokerage. We also have two out-of-state locations. Some of our South Florida agents actually relocated out of state, and we supported them in opening up signature branches in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and in Spokane, Washington, both border communities to the Idaho, Washington State, uh, state line. Um, so we’ve got great operations there. Our, uh, business though, generates all across the country and internationally. Why? Because we have a spectacular social media marketing push, and we have a world class web department that generates buyer leads for us from around the world, folks looking to relocate to South Florida and the rest of the state. And, uh, we have some new agents coming on board from the Florida panhandle as well as the, uh, Northeastern Jacksonville market as well.
Matthew Maschler:
I was gonna ask about the Panhandle in Jacksonville, but first I was gonna ask about the keys. Are we in the keys at all?
Ben Schachter:
So we have a couple of agents, uh, in South Dade County that will go to the Keys to do business. We don’t have a very active Asian population in the Keys. It’s a very close knit community. We’ve sold property down there, but we don’t have a regular presence.
Matthew Maschler:
Right. So right now in Florida, from Miami to Orlando, east to West, where Signature is fairly saturated and fairly well represented, there’s not that many areas where, where we’re not. I know that I practice in Fort Myers, Bonita Springs on the West Coast, Palm Beach Broward in Miami. And then I’m a member of Orlando also. So Miami to Orlando, uh, east to west, not so much the keys. So if you are listening from the Keys and you would like to join the signature Real Estate team, we would love to have you. And then expanding from that, from, from, so we’re, we don’t have that much presence in Tampa or North, so Jacksonville in the panhandle, but you say we’re expanding into there soon?
Ben Schachter:
Yes. We actually have one of our top agents from South Florida that recently relocated to the Jacksonville suburbs, and we’re rolling out a brokerage there in the next 60 days. We’re already in the licensing process with the state of Florida. Uh, we have a couple of agents that are taking their state test in the panhandle that will be joining us once they pass the state exam. Uh, there is not a county in Florida that we haven’t sold in over the past 15 years, but it just depends upon what the appetite of the customer population is. We can always join a board of realtors in a local market. We can always show property because of the technology tools at our fingertips when we have a buyer or a tenant. So, uh, Florida is our oyster.
Matthew Maschler:
I, uh, I recently joined the Heartland Association to get Hardy County, I believe it is, and one of my agents just listed something in Citrus County north of Tampa. So it’s, uh, it’s exciting. And, uh, I’d love to hear about Jacksonville because that’s a market I’ve been looking to, um, grow. Because personally, um, if you listen to my other podcast, the Wrestling podcast, uh, Jacksonville has become the hub of a, of a new wrestling company. So what I like WWE is based in Orlando, which is why I’ve been expanding in Orlando. But then Jacksonville has opportunity too. So there’s two big wrestling companies in the US both like located in Florida, which is why during the pandemic, our governor declared, uh, wrestling to be an essential service to keep those companies afloat during the pandemic, which, uh, which was exciting. So, uh, so I’m, I’m interested in hearing more about Jacksonville. Um, gonna be going for the first time, uh, in June.
Ben Schachter:
Oh, have you ever been to Jacksonville before? No, it’s a great place. I’ve been many times. I’ve got a great riverfront mm-hmm. <affirmative>, lots of nice entertainment. Very different from Miami and Tampa. Yeah. But equally as beautiful, so I think you’ll have a great time.
Matthew Maschler:
Yeah. I’ve been through it on, on the drive, but I’ve never, I’ve never stopped. So
Ben Schachter:
The county in which Jacksonville is located in is actually the largest acreage county in the country on Florida, excuse me. Largest acreage county in Florida. I beg your pardon?
Matthew Maschler:
I heard it like, it was like the city of Jacksonville was like the largest acreage city, correct. In
Ben Schachter:
The world. This, the city covers for entire county.
Matthew Maschler:
The city’s the whole county, so mm-hmm. <affirmative>, like if you’re looking at Miami Dade, you know, the city of Miami’s fairly small. If you, the, the region at Miami Gardens, at Miami Beach, at North Miami Beach, the region’s large, but the cities themselves are small, but mm-hmm. <affirmative> Jacksonville is a city, I think is the whole county. Yep. So it’s the largest city in the country. Is is, is the fact that I heard about Jacksonville mm-hmm. <affirmative> from a land wise. So that, that’s very exciting and that, so tell me more about the signature real estate companies. You know, there’s, um, signature International Real Estate is is the main brand. My brand is Signature Real Estate Finder, and you have other brands within the signature real estate companies. So tell me how that works.
Ben Schachter:
We’ve got a dozen and a half different brands at Signature, and people ask me all the time, that’s so confusing, how come, and I always point to top shelf brands like Marriott Hotel Corporation, you’ve got super deluxe luxury hotel brands at Marriott International, such as the Ritz Carlton and the JW Marriott. You have mid-tier brands such as Marriott Hotels and Renaissance, and you have more budget friendly brands like Courtyard Inns and Suites and SpringHill Suites, but yet, Marriott Powers all of them. You have something similar in retail. If you look at the Gap Corporation, you’ve got mid-tier the Gap, you’ve got less expensive at Old Navy, and you’ve got super premium at Banana Republic. You’ve got the Bloomingdale’s Corporation that has less expensive products at Macy’s. You’ve got car brands. Lexus has luxury products, and their sister company Toyota has less expensive products. We recognize that the real estate business is hyper-local, and that’s why independent brokerages do exceedingly well, because they focus on the local market.
We want to take the hyper-local concept to a whole new level by having sub branded brokerages within the signature real estate companies. You’ll notice the name companies is plural in our corporate, uh, in our corporate name. Why our international clients wanna feel that they are the focus of our attention, hence Signature International Real Estate. They’re moving here internationally to South Florida, or they’re buying investment property or second homes. They feel appreciated. Real Estate Finder Finder would suggest that you are out there finding, digging, uh, mulling for the best value, regardless of price point. It could be a multimillion dollar property, it could be a modest condo or anything in between, but your name suggests you’re gonna dig out the best value for the customer. We have.
Matthew Maschler:
Well, it doesn’t have to necessarily be value. It depends on what the customer’s looking for. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, if the customer’s looking for Horse Ranch, if the customer’s looking for beachfront, I’m gonna find them what they need. Some customers being value driven, that being the driver, that’s what I’ll find. But, you know,
Ben Schachter:
But Value Driven could be a $5 million home that you might find somewhere in your portfolio for $4 million. Sure,
Matthew Maschler:
Sure. So, right.
Ben Schachter:
But it, it depends on what they’re looking for.
Matthew Maschler:
What they’re looking for is what I can find for them. Your
Ben Schachter:
Name is, you’re really going to pursue aggressively finding the right
Matthew Maschler:
Product. And when I’m, when I’m selling a property, when I’m listing the listing agent, I’m finding them the right buyer. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So the, I, I like, that’s what I liked about the name.
Ben Schachter:
And we feel the name speaks volumes. We have branded brokerages like Paradise, that’s focusing on the beach front and the tropical climate of South Florida. We have Premier, which is focusing exclusively on a certain price point. We have Century Village that focuses on retirement community. We have Glen Eagles that focuses on a luxury country club. So we have lots of different brands and sub-brands within Signature, but yet they all share a common back office, a common broker, a common management team, accounting, training portfolio, common accounting systems, common software technology, because you can provide much more in terms of a back office infrastructure for your company if you have one consolidated backend, like the Marriott reservation system, which is still powering the same selection of flat screen TVs and pillow purchases and hotel reservations for a dozen and a half different brands of Marriott hotels.
Matthew Maschler:
And I find that regardless of which Signature office they’re in, which brand they’re in, they’re all highly, highly trained. I’ve never had an issue with another signature agent despite, you know, didn’t matter which brand they’re in. So they have, we have common resources, common c r m, common Networking, you know, agents that get along and like where they work and like who they work with. So how many
Staci Garcia:
Agents are we talking about here?
Ben Schachter:
We have smaller brands that have as little as five agents. We have larger brands that have as many as 300, 400 agents, but all tall. The company is, uh, close to 1500 people at this point.
Staci Garcia:
And, um, you guys, do you all work in the same office?
Ben Schachter:
We have offices, physical offices, all across the state, which is one of our many differentiators.
Staci Garcia:
So when it comes to Century Village, you have an office at Century Village.
Ben Schachter:
We have an office at Century Village. We have an office in retail shopping centers anchored by Walmart’s, targets and Publix. We have offices at Country clubs. It just depends upon the specific niche that we are chasing down. Um, the Real Estate Finder brand obviously has, uh, numerous office locations because they’re finding great properties all around South Florida. Um, which is one of the benefits of being part of Signature because you have access to physical resources everywhere.
Staci Garcia:
So lots of our, our audience is, um, real estate agents and we reach a lot of people that are thinking about becoming a real estate agent. Tell us about the things that you offer, uh, people that have just gotten a license.
Ben Schachter:
So we
Staci Garcia:
Have or are looking to get licensed,
Ben Schachter:
We do have a training program for new licensees here in the state of Florida. It’s a 63 hour pre-license requisite course. We are, uh, accredited by the state D P P R, department of Business and Professional Regulation. Uh, we do offer that class, both live in person face-to-face, which is very unusual in these times. We also offer it on Zoom for those that wish to learn remotely. We also, uh, offer a cram course to get people state ready for the prep exam, for the final exam. Uh, and then we offer refresher courses. So they’re ready, uh, you know, if they have to come back at a later date to do their state exam. Once they have a license issued by the state of Florida, they can come back into our aggressive agent training program, which is designed to take agents from being newly licensed and having the state regulations under their belt to actually being successful.
Real estate agents, contract negotiations, marketing, listing presentations, sphere of influence, building, technology usage, you name it, we offer it. Uh, we are pushing out between 1800 and 2000 hours per year of live training at Signature. Uh, you can participate live in our classes. Some of our classes are in person. Many during the pandemic are delivered via Zoom. We also record all of our classes. So if you are, uh, a dual income, perhaps you have another job elsewhere and you’re busy nine to five, Monday to Friday, you can still take advantage of our Library of education that’s available 365 in the cloud, uh, on demand.
Staci Garcia:
I think that’s pretty funny actually, because yesterday I sat through, um, Gail’s, uh, everything rentals class, and during the recording my cat threw up twice and it’s recorded <laugh>, so I wanted to watch it later just so I could laugh at that. But, uh, one of the things that I think is unique about Signature that I would like everybody to know is that when you go to school for real estate, you learn about everything real estate, which is mostly what not to do and how not to get in trouble, and when your licensing expires and what to do to renew it before it does, and that sort of thing. But you don’t learn actually how to do the job. So, uh, what you offer is how to do the job. I think that a lot of people get their license and then join a, a brand and then don’t know what to do next.
So the what to do next part is huge because it stops people from, uh, being successful and they get intimidated because they’re not sure how to actually do the job. You don’t learn how to do the job at Signature. You do. So yesterday I took a refresher on everything rentals, because the contracts do change, and I wanted to make sure I was with the current, um, contract in, in rentals. And there’s a lot of, uh, you know, a lot of, a lot of things to fill out and you can constantly tune in on any topic. So, um, tell us about the school part of it.
Ben Schachter:
One of the reasons that the real estate industry has a tremendous fallout rate of new licensees is because they are independent contractors. And very few brokerages provide core education. Once you have a license, that’s really a shame because there’s so much to learn in this industry. And while the laws and the technical rules that are necessary to pass the state exam are important, they may not put dollars in your pocket. I think we all remember back in the day when we got our driver’s license. We have to know that caution is yellow and stop as red and green as go and follow the speed limit. And we have to have a parallel park. But in reality, when you put somebody on the highway with a bunch of Bobs barricades and five Kawasaki ninjas blowing past you at 120 miles an hour, and a drunk driver swerving from the next lane, and it’s lightning out and raining all at the same time, they never cover any of that in school.
They just tell you don’t go over the speed limit. And if you’re moving slower, stay in the right hand lane. There’s no Bobs barricades, there’s no Kawasaki ninjas, there’s no lightning strikes. We put our agents through rigorous training for real world, not just how to survive, but how to thrive in the real estate business. We don’t want agents to just be a number, we want them to be a success story. And that takes me to a point of another posture position that we take. And that’s being a fee free brokerage where most brokerages charge their agent fees as independent contractors, which is really mind boggling for folks outside the industry. We charge no fees. Why do brokerages typically charge fees? ’cause most agents will fail and will not produce, and they won’t generate commission income. So if the broker can be charming and sweet and coax the agent to lay a Visa, MasterCard on the table, then the broker’s gonna generate their revenue through desk fees and franchise fees and monthly fees and subscription fees and closing fees, et cetera.
At Signature, because we are so vehemently confident in our training and education of helping people thrive, not just survive, we don’t charge a single nickel to our agents. Everything we do is on the come. We get paid a portion of commission when a property is sold. ’cause we know full well that if we scrutinize in picking high quality people always select quality over quantity. We know we will help them accelerate their careers and be more successful than they could be elsewhere. They’ll generate more commission and the company will be successful making more money. It’s a partnership. And our training is designed to ensure that an agent is never left behind. They want to go through role playing. They want to be mentored, they want to be coached. They want to ask real world scenario questions, not just hypotheticals from a textbook. And we provide that. We provide that. You know, there’s an old adage that Matthew probably knows from law school. I think the A students are the professors, the B students are the judges. And I think the C students make all the money ’cause they’re the attorneys
Matthew Maschler:
<laugh>. They’re the ones that actually do the work, right?
Ben Schachter:
And, and there’s a big difference between doing the work in the street versus sitting on the bench of the robe and dropping the gavel from a textbook.
Matthew Maschler:
So I have to say something about the, the training and the education aspect of being at signature real estate companies. Uh, and and it’s twofold, right? You have people that are new and then you have experienced agents. So if, if you’re out there, if you’re thinking about becoming a real estate agent, we can get you into the class licensed and start you. And, and this is what we’re talking about here with that training. And if you’re, uh, an agent, you have your license already, but you’re somewhere else and you, you, you’re not as confident and you want to get your career, uh, to the next level. Um, we do new agent training and new agent training isn’t for brand new agents, it’s agents for that are new to our company. We do new agent training, uh, the first week of every month. And it’s so easy now to just record it and play it on Zoom.
But no, it’s still live every week, every, you know, every month, the first week of the month for new agents. And I tell my new agents, um, to go through that three times. And it doesn’t have to be, you know, the next month and the next month, but, um, within the year to go through it a second time, a third time, there’s so much thrown at you when you get new license and you get the test, and then you get this orientation and you’re learning about CRMs and contracts and everything. Take it again. And, and everyone’s notified in the whole company. And you could just, you could just take one class. So you could be practicing for five years, six years, and like you said, the ooh, that everything rentals class is coming on and take that again. And, and it’s very important to, to do that.
And so any of my agents out there that are listening, take it again or look at the calendar and refresh yourself. Um, then for the more advanced agents, Ben has a, a coaching program every Wednesday morning for an hour. And I’ve been doing this a long time. I think I like, there’s not many people that are better than me at real estate. Bet is one of them. He’s, he knows more than me. I don’t know how he has more experience, much more experience than me. He’s significantly younger than me. I don’t know where it came from.
Ben Schachter:
<laugh>. You know, it’s not that I’m better than you, I just, I’m, I’m involved in a thousand people’s books of business. You have an awesome team, a dozen and a half
Matthew Maschler:
People in, in five years, you’ve never asked me a question. You’ve never called me up and said, Hey Matt, I’m stumped. What do you think of this? And I’ve called you five times a year <laugh>. So, um, that’s just, that’s just saying something. So, so we have this coaching and, and I can’t tell you a, a time, I’m not trying to kiss your ass, but I can’t tell you a time I haven’t left coaching with a nugget or something I learned or something I figured out. And especially, you know, the market changes, right? A lot of people saying, I’ve never seen a market like this before. Well, I, I have, I’ve seen seller markets. It’s not this, you know, roit it up. But there, there’s parallels. There’s been up markets and down markets, and we’ve seen them before. Um, again, I don’t know how you have, you’re very young, but <laugh> we
Staci Garcia:
Did use, we did use some of your, um, how to get an offer accepted, right?
Matthew Maschler:
I did. I did a, a show, I did a top 10 ways to get your offer accepted. And I, it was based on some of the coaching that, that you gave us. Some of the things you said, I was trying to write down some of the things that I’ve incorporated. Um, but even, even at the beginning of this, um, some, some strategies both as a listing agent and, and as a buyer agent to adapt to the, the new normal of the pandemic that we were going through in 20, and then also in 21 and, and now in 22. And, and these were three months were years, right? I mean, every three months the market changed the way it would, you know, it could take a year or two. And, uh, and, and it was crazy. But, you know, but I, I’ve, you know, with my experience and, and knowledge and, and and background, I’m still getting a lot.
I don’t wanna miss my, my my one hour or hour and a half coaching with you on, on Wednesday mornings as as, and, and that’s as an experienced agent. So, you know, there are people that maybe they don’t know what this industry real estate companies are, or, you know, they, they’ve heard of these other brands, these national brands. But you know, if you look around in your neighborhood, wherever you live in the, in Florida or the country, look at some of the local, some of the top producers and and, and tell me if they’re with a local firm or a in, in Boca for the longest time, everybody, you know, the, the top, top agents were all with local firms. A lot of them have now sold to some of the bigger national, newer firms, you know, and they’ve cash
Ben Schachter:
Down. And that’s why some of the larger firms bought the local firms, right? Because they were buying the agent population
Matthew Maschler:
And, and to get the presents right. So, you know, we we’re seeing, you know, not to call ’em out that nothing wrong with or anything, but some of the newer firms like Compass Element and location have come onto the scene. You know, when you have, you have older, more established brands. So they’ve, they’ve, they’ve bought some of, some of the independents, but still a lot of the, a lot of the best agents are still with, you know, local and small agencies. Um, not that signature’s small by any means because 1500 agencies said,
Ben Schachter:
Coming up on it. And, uh, we’re working on a pretty sizable, uh, merger right now that’ll help us, uh, substantially grow our number very quickly in the next 90 days.
Matthew Maschler:
Ooh, I’m very here interested to hear more about this when we’re not recording
Ben Schachter:
And when my n d A is over, you’ll hear all about it.
Matthew Maschler:
I’m, I’m excited.
Staci Garcia:
So Ben, how do you fit all of this into one day? Like, how, what’s your regular day like?
Ben Schachter:
You know, this is gonna sound like a canned answer. Like, I’m prepped for this and I really wasn’t. But I sleep very, very little. A typical night for me is maybe, maybe five hours. Uh, I start my day every day, every day at four 30 in the morning walk my dogs put in 18 miles every day on my Peloton bike, which I’m completely addicted to having missed a day in 26 months, not a single day in 26 months. Then get my kids ready jointly with my wife for school. She wakes up after my 18 mile ride, after my 30 minute dog walk with my two dogs in the morning. Uh, and then we take the kids to school. Uh, she’s at home and, uh, I take all three of them to school. Two in elementary, one in middle. And I’m in the office by eight 30.
Uh, if it wasn’t for kids in a dog in a Peloton, I’d be here at 5:00 AM But, uh, obviously family comes first before anything. Start my day, eight 30, and I work in the office till around five or five 30. Pick up my son from middle school, head home, and, uh, have dinner with the family. Get the kids ready for their bath. Then I’ll put another two or three hours in after I get the kids tucked in at night. Um, so I’m, I’m confidently working at least 11 hour days, eight or so in the office, and at least three hours a day at home. And, uh, that’s just the weekdays. The weekday weekends are not all that much different. Um, I’m still putting in at least five, six hours a day on the weekends. There’s not a day that goes by battle work. And it’s not because I have to, I love what I do.
And you know, you’ve heard before, you know, love what you do, and you’re not gonna work a day in your life. I’m passionate about it because two things. Number one, I’m able to help other agents experience the kind of success that I’ve had by teaching them, coaching them, training them, and equipping them with the right support and technol technological tools they need to be successful. Uh, and number two, we make good money. And I’m the supreme capitalist. And if you put in the time and the energy and you love what you do, and you can make money, you should have the sky as the limit. So I have no plans of retiring ever. I love it. It’s fun. I, I get a kick out of every day. There’s frustrating days, you know, there’s agents that are frustrating. There’s certainly customers that are frustrating, but 99% of the time I have a smile on my face.
And, uh, I always speak highly of it. My last sick day was, uh, when I had covid, I was out for four days, but that was being physically outta the office. I worked with Covid and, uh, prior to Covid, uh, my last sick day was the two days I was outta the hospital, in the hospital having a double hip replacement surgery. And then I came from the hospital wearing a kilt, which was a hospital bedsheet into the office. And I finished my workday after checking myself outta the hospital. ’cause I was so stir crazy. So I wanna say that I didn’t pull in a full eight hour day or an 11 hour day, maybe five days in the past five years total, um, because of extreme medical situations. Um, but nothing’s gonna keep me down, period. End of story.
Matthew Maschler:
So, because I have, uh, juniors in high school, we’re, we’re doing our college search. Uh, tell us where did you go to college?
Ben Schachter:
I have a degree from the University of Florida. Uh, I was studying business and because I was the ultimate Playboy being the president of my fraternity and drinking a lot and dilly ding lot, I think there was about an 18 month period of time I never walked into a classroom. I was actually recommended How long? About an 18 month period of time during my four years. And I didn’t go into a classroom 18 months. About 18 months that the College of Business gave me the boot. They told my parents I would never be successful in business and I should relocate to another college within the University of Florida if the dean would let me stay. So they sent me to some, what was it? Liberal arts. Uh, I have a degree in political science. Uh, why? Because they were the only ones that would accept me.
I think it was that, or it was art school at the University of Florida. I was gonna become a decorator or something. Um, but meanwhile I graduate and I run one of the top five largest real estate companies in the state and that does billions of dollars of transactions per year. But they said I wasn’t cut out for business. Do you wanna give them a shout out University of Florida? Yeah, you know, I will. I’m still big Gator fan except my donation dollars. Just don’t go to the business school. They go to the liberal arts school. So their loss,
Matthew Maschler:
I, um, it’s amazing how selective, how, how difficult it is to get into University of Florida nowadays.
Ben Schachter:
I would not have gotten in then. I almost didn’t stay in when I was there 20 years ago, is by the skin of my teeth that I graduated. I think my parents popped for about 160 hours worth of credits and I earned 120 of them.
Matthew Maschler:
Oh my goodness. Are you from
Ben Schachter:
Florida? I am not. I was, uh, born and raised in New York City. I lived there till I was 15, started my real estate career when I was a sophomore in high school. Mom and dad brought me here kicking and screaming from private school in New York. Uh, told me that, uh, I was, uh, upper middle class and I had way too much free time on my hand, so I should get a part-time job doing something to stay outta trouble while attending Spanish over high school. So I got my first job in real estate, Stacy, when I was 15 cold calling telemarketing for Arvada. Hi, this is Ben. I work for so and so at Arvada. Do you wanna list your house? No. Stop interrupting my dinner up. Click. So my cutting my teeth in the real estate business was not by, um, my desire or aspiration to be some superstar real estate broker. It was because nobody else would hire me except some shyer real estate agent that paid me cash under the table. Five bucks an hour, uh, to, uh, to sell real estate.
Staci Garcia:
Was that ever at Boca West
Ben Schachter:
<laugh>? No, no, no. <laugh>. Sorry. So, uh, so, uh, for two and a half years I cold called after high school every day. And, uh, I kind of got a knack for telephone sales. But in real estate setting appointments for an agent, I then go to the University of Florida. And because of course I’m the prince of my family and everyone should wait on me tooth and nail. Uh, I never filled out my housing paperwork because that’s mom and dad’s job, not my job to pay attention to the mail. It comes with your tuition and your application. So I show up the first day to UF in summer of 96. Yo, what’s up <laugh>? Uh, where do I park? And they’re like, excuse me, where do I park? Where do I like, uh, stay dude. And they’re like, did you fill out your housing paperwork?
No, no. I’m here to like do that now, son. School starts tomorrow. Housing was due six months ago. You are outta luck. What do you mean I’m outta luck. You know, I’m a student here. I need a place to stay. Where am I supposed to sit? Welcome to the real world. You’re 18, you’re an adult, take care of your business. What am I gonna do? The dorm’s a thousand people deep on the wait list. I go to a local real estate office in Gainesville at 18 years old to find off-campus housing unrelated to the school. And wouldn’t you know, it’s second time. I’m lucky in the real estate business after that first job, there’s a sign on the desk help wanted, I got a great job in college in the real estate office. I got to clean the bathroom. I got to, uh, wipe down the counters and get the fingerprints off the glass.
I got to stock up the copy machine and the fax machine with paper. I mean, fascinating high tech stuff. They gave you a place to live. Uh, I rented a place to live, no favors, no handouts. And I worked my way from menial bathroom cleaning and real estate office and sweeping the front porch to eventually over four years becoming the assistant manager of the office. It was then that I was really bitten and smitten by the real estate bug. And I said, mom, dad, great news. Now that I’ve graduated, uh, uh, I know what I wanna do and I’m not going to law school with that political science degree that you just overpaid for. And they said, what are you gonna do? You’re a Jewish kid from Boca that talks way too much. You’ve got a New York attitude and you yap, yap, yap, yap. What else are you capable of doing besides gonna law school?
I said, I’m gonna be a realtor commission only. It’s gonna be awesome. My parents strung me up by my bootstraps. They were not happy. Stacy. So at 21 I got my real estate license. I’ve now had six years under my belt in various real estate admin, clerical jobs. And I started selling. And, uh, the rest is history. Did that for about five or six years until What was your first office? My first office was actually an apartment relocation service called Apartment Hunters. My college roommate also was a real estate, uh, uh, agent, but he got his broker’s license. I didn’t pass the class the first time. And, uh, I hung my license with him. ’cause of course, I I wanted was a hundred percent commission split at the time. I wasn’t gonna take any office support or tools, I just didn’t wanna have to share my commission. So my buddy hung my license in his Tampa brokerage while lived in Boca Raton. And I sold real estate for six years while also co-working in my family’s, uh, real estate mortgage office. Uh, and then I started signature with my partners Jack and Mark, uh, in 2006, after I had about six years of selling during the first real estate runup prior to the bubble. And here we are 16 years later.
Matthew Maschler:
You started at Signature in 2006.
Ben Schachter:
2006. It wasn’t called Signature at the time. What was it called? It had an awesome name. Really Sexy Quad Realty Investments. Why Quad? There weren’t four partners. There were four markets. Century Village, Boca, century Village, west Palm Century Village, Deerfield, and Century Village Pembro Pines. So we had this great name, great for marketing, very, very sophisticated Quad Realty. First thing I did coming in the office was buy a bunch of computers, sign up for wifi service, which we didn’t have. And file for a name change.
Matthew Maschler:
<laugh> <laugh>. I, um, my, my grandmother lived in Century Village, west Palm.
Ben Schachter:
It’s a popular place. It’s a super, super desirable, especially for, uh, more economic cost conscious senior citizens. And, uh, we still do a ton of business there to this day.
Matthew Maschler:
And, uh, 2006 I think is when I got my real estate license. That’s when I moved to Florida at the end of oh five. Yeah, so
Ben Schachter:
Good times.
Matthew Maschler:
That’s
Staci Garcia:
Interesting. I have a question. How did you think about, um, okay, how did you think about, uh, having a Gretchen and a Sarah and, and real quick explain what they are.
Ben Schachter:
Sarah Signatures, agent, resource, and helpline. I am sitting in the hospital as my father had a heart attack helping him nurse to recovery. And my agents are blowing up my phone and I’m telling my agents, you know, I’m trying to care for my dad, but I wanna be there for you. I need to spread the wealth and have you speak to some of my fellow salaried managers and brokers in the office. Well, can you gimme all the numbers? And I said, this is ridiculous. I’m not a human address book. I need some time with my dad. He had a heart attack. So I’m sitting there in the office and I’m thinking about setting up a phone tree where they can call one number and reach everybody. And not only me. ’cause we’ve got 40 unbelievable lawyers, brokers, managers, trainers, compliance officers, administrators, clerical, human resources.
We do it all. But how do they reach everybody with having to dial 40 different phone numbers? So we set up this technological phone tree where they call one number and they reach dozens of people simultaneously. It’s not round robin. All the cell phones are auto forwarded at the same time. So hence I’m a big acronym. Guy Signatures. Agent resource and helpline. Kind of a takeoff of Siri for the iPhone users. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> Sarah was born three years later. Agents are calling us nonstop. Can you help me with my paperwork? I’m so busy, I can’t do the paperwork on my own. Somebody help me with the paperwork. You know, this is not an exciting part. It’s not a, a really thrilling part of the business. A lot of paperwork in real estate. So, Sarah, uh, she developed a cousin and her cousin’s name is Gretchen and Gretchen’s another acronym. Acronym Greatest Real Estate Transaction Coordinator, help Enterprise Network. We basically put a Gretchen hat on 10 of our office managers who, uh, share the workload of processing and creating all the m l s entries, writing the purchase contracts, writing the listing agreements, writing the, and helping our agents be more efficient so that they can do what they do best. And that’s what sell paperwork is not what makes money selling and buying and listing is what makes money. So we try to help them by offsetting their time consuming paperwork using Gretchen.
Matthew Maschler:
Ben, I wanna thank you for joining us today. I, I know you have another appointment. You’re very busy guy. Um, so I want to thank you. Yeah,
Ben Schachter:
Thank you, Ben. It was awesome. I love being here. I hope I get invited back. Hopefully the audience appreciates the messaging today because this has been a lot of fun. I wish you tons of luck with The Finder podcast. I just love watching your growth and success. You are one of my favorite human beings working with the two of you who’s been a joy. I love working with your teammates at Signature Real Estate Finder. I wanna see us celebrate lots more successful accomplishments together, and I look forward to seeing this podcast continue to explode in growth. Best of luck, and thank you so much for having me.
Matthew Maschler:
Thank you for being here. So that was, uh, Ben Schachter of the Signature Real Estate Companies, and I was very fortunate to have him as my guest. We, uh, we came to his office with the podcast equipment. Uh, we went mobile today instead of recording out of, uh, the secret location at Pod Populi, the Royal Palm Plaza. Uh, new offices, by the way, in Palm Beach Gardens. Um, you know, Ben embraced Zoom, uh, very, very early on, uh, in, in the Pandemic. And I had heard of Zoom, uh, before that, and I was very reluctant to use it. And then 2020, we were, we were all forced to. And, uh, so, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s become a very efficient, uh, way to work because you can have an appointment at 10, 11 and 12. Um, whereas if we were scheduled for 11 o’clock and he had to drive a half an hour to come to us and try, you know, and then get back to his office, he’d have to leave at 10 30, get back at, uh, 1230, uh, to do a one hour podcast here.
We were able to meet, meet him at 11, and he was able to leave at 12. Um, if I could never leave my house, <laugh>, you know, I’m not that type of guy. I’m not, um, you know, I’m not the type of guy that would never leave my house. I, I, I like, I like going out and, you know, the pandemic was hard for me, but it was, I was lucky to live in Florida. I got to go to all football games and movie theaters and et cetera, and it was just, it was just empty. But we were very lucky to, to have Ben. I had, uh, um, uh, I hold him in, in, in very high regard. Going back to the, um, the Sarah helpline I wanna talk about for a minute. Uh, so any, any agent at Signature over over 1,015, 1500 agents can email any question, any, any problem that they’re having to the Sarah Helpline.
And because I’m one of the managers, uh, I am, I’m a recipient of, of, of these emails. Um, you know, I’m supposed to handle it for, for my agents and on, on, on my brokerage and not really respond to other people’s, um, agents. Um, but, you know, but I can. And then, and then there’s a lot of people just who are at Century International or Cent, uh, premier Properties. Um, and, and it’s okay if I, if I answer ’em, and, and I’m always amazed by, by Ben’s answers and, and insight. And, and for the longest time, I didn’t have the confidence to be able to answer somebody. I, I, I wasn’t always sure. I, I thought I knew the answer. Um, plus I have a lot of, um, I’m very wordy. I have a lot of words, so I don’t know how to edit so much.
So I’ve, I’ve watched him and how he answers and how he edits, and it’s really, really helped me, uh, come out, uh, learn how to answer, uh, questions from my agents. And really, it, it was really actually one of the reasons I wanted to get on this podcast because there were thoughts and ideas. So, you know, in the germ of the question, uh, there were thoughts and issues I wanted to explore. So a lot of times I get ideas for the podcast, uh, from the questions being asked to Sarah, um, from the, the Signature agents. I, I I I, I tell Ben all the time there, there’s enough in there to write a book about real estate because there’s so many answers to so many questions. And it’s, and it’s interesting to see what other people are going through in common mistakes and, um, and, and things that if I see the same question over and over again, then I realize that this is something I have to either address on the podcast or address to my team.
Uh, for instance, you know what I see a lot in, uh, in, in leasing, and I don’t know what you covered in your, you talked about the everything rentals in your rentals class. You know, when you buy a house, you make an offer and then the offer becomes a contract. Um, in leasing it starts with the contract to lease a contract is an agreement. It’s an agreement to make a lease. And, and you have the terms in the contract to lease. So the two parties are agreeing to make a lease with these following terms. And that’s, that’s the offer in, in a, in a, uh, when you’re, when you’re in a rental situation. So the contract to lease has a deposit. ’cause all contracts need deposits later on, the lease has a security deposit, right? When you’re a tenant, there’s a security deposit could be one or two months held if there’s any damage.
So there’s a deposit in the contract to lease, there’s a security deposit in the lease. And quite often people confuse these two topics. These two concepts they call something the deposit. Because what starts out as the deposit in the contract to lease sometimes becomes a security deposit. But not always. It depends on the terms of the lease and the terms of the contract to lease what happens to that original deposit. So I’ve, I’ve learned to be very careful. I’ve learned that that’s a buzzword in in when, uh, when my agents or or, or my customers ask me questions about the deposit and the lease, I, I always have to make sure I, I’m really listening to figure out are we talking about the deposit and the contract lease or the con or, or the, or the lease itself. So those are the type of things that, for me, being on the recipient end of the Sarah emails makes me a better real estate agent.
And I’m, I’m, that’s one of the, one of the things I’m grateful for, uh, being at Signature is, uh, being able to, and then being able to help, uh, agents, uh, when, when they have problems. Because sometimes the hardest part in asking for help is to formulate the question. And you see it sometimes where someone will just, they’ll just give you a fact pattern ’cause they just don’t know what to do. So, so then we have to figure out, okay, well where are they? What’s the problem? What’s the issue? And how do we take the next step? But so often in life, when you have a problem, if, if you could actually figure out what the question is, then you can get the answer. But, but, but if you don’t know what the question is, it’s impossible to get the answer. So the contact Sarah Helpline has, has helped me with that, uh, enormously. And then the Gretchen, uh, the transaction coordinator, um, I haven’t personally used, um, but I think it’s something I, I would use. I think it’s a great idea if you’re, if you’re a busy real estate agent and you need to take a little bit of pressure off your back, I’ve recommended it to my agents and especially new agents.
Staci Garcia:
Yeah, I definitely use Gretchen. I would like to say that I think, uh, Gretchen and Sarah, they, they separate signature from the rest of the companies because where else can you have a transaction coordinator? Um, they might just have a designated transaction coordinator, but in here, in this situation, you get your transaction coordinator for your, uh, transaction and you can go on, move on to the next thing and keep on going and not have to slow yourself down. The other thing is, if you have a question and you ask Sarah, where else can you ask somebody without being judged that you don’t know? Right? Right. Everywhere. If you ask a question, people are gonna judge that you don’t know. And it could be something that you think, I, maybe I shouldn’t ask this question, I should go back and look it up. But there’s nowhere to look anything up, right? Because when you do take the real estate, um, exam and also the, all the education, there’s no, um, there’s no training on the actual job. So there’s no, um, real life situations solved.
Matthew Maschler:
Plus there’s also, there’s situa. We can’t teach every possible situation that’s always going to happen. And there’s still surprises. There’s still things that, you know, we don’t expect. So, you know, we have to figure out how to adapt and, you know, being a real estate agent could be lonely. And for people who are at these a hundred percent, uh, real estate commission, places that, that don’t have the resources, you know, Ben’s a sharp guy. He figured it out. I’m a sharp guy. I figured it out. But, you know, for a lot of people, they’re like, oh, what do I do? Right? My inspection, my inspection deadline ends today, and, and I don’t have an agreement. I don’t know what to do next. And, um, and then, and then people, people get scared. So if, if you don’t know what the question is and you don’t know what to do and you don’t have a resource, I mean, to me, that, that, that, that’s, that’s crazy. And, and, and you’re, you’re helping someone buy something for half a million dollars.
Staci Garcia:
Yeah. The biggest purchase of their life. I mean,
Matthew Maschler:
There’s a lot of money at stake. And if you don’t know what to do, you don’t have anywhere to go. Oh my goodness. So, um, I’m not saying that other firms don’t have their resources. They do, they offer tons of training. I, I tell any of, whenever, actually somebody says to me, my, my, my, my friend, um, just got her license. Where should they go work? I said, well, do they want to hang their license and like, not do anything? Or do they really wanna work? Right? They, if they really wanna work, you know, I, I recommend them to signature. Um, there’s places if they don’t really wanna work that I could re recommend them to. And sometimes people might get a little intimidated by signature because they hear this, they hear what, you have all this training. And they’re like, I thought it was easy. <laugh>, right? I thought my, I can get my real estate license and just make a lot of money. I don’t wanna do all that work.
Staci Garcia:
Well, the, that, that, that’s one of the reasons I like Gretchen is because like all last year it rained and poured all in one day mm-hmm. <affirmative>, right? I had all these customers that I had all these deals going. I couldn’t juggle all of it at once. And I had a transaction coordinator handle all of my quote unquote paperwork. It’s not really paperwork. I mean, it’s not like I’m, I, none of my clients were using a mortgage. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it was just a bunch of, uh, signatures and, and contracts and stuff that I didn’t have time to do, because you also have to find the property. You also have to move forward and sell their property. So you, if you do it right, I guess two transactions becomes four transactions, right? You’re finding property for someone, you’re selling their own property. You can’t do all of it at once. There’s not enough hours in the day.
Matthew Maschler:
And if you’re scheduled, if you’re, if you’re next, if, if you’re today, tomorrow, and the next day is scheduled with showings both on your listings and for your buyers, and then all of a sudden you have to draft that offer and negotiate that offer, well, where, where do you, where, where do you gain that time? So having a transaction coordinator to do your paperwork and, and, and handle your file, um, helps you, um, at least then, you know, you could reschedule, you could, you could anticipate, okay, I’m gonna have to schedule something either later today or tomorrow to finish this. Um, because, you know, you could have a very busy week and, and, and then offers on your listings come in and, or, or, uh, or your buyers wanna make offers. So, uh, so yeah, that’s, it’s something that’s, that’s nice working at Signature, um, and having all, all the help and, and from the management team, uh, of which I’m included.
Staci Garcia:
<laugh> Well, I just, I wanna say that to a new agent. If you join a team, and we talked about this before, it en, it enables you to do what you’re good at and learn what you’re not good at. Right. You know, learn what you’re not good at and get either someone to do it for you or learn how to do it better. Something that you don’t like or you’re not good at. And in that respect, one day I showed 10 properties, lined ’em all up, all these showings had continuous showings, and in the middle of that, my client said, make an offer on the first property. Right. Well, when was they gonna make the offer? You know, I had to call my team and say, can someone put in an offer for the first property? We’re going to number seven now. Right. I couldn’t do two things at one time.
Matthew Maschler:
And you don’t wanna cancel those future showings, but, you know, alright. But you know, they were saying sales, right. Once you make the sale stop. Right. So, so if they wanna buy that first property, why see, 7, 8, 9, and 10?
Staci Garcia:
Oh no. Because there, there was also a potential for making the second offer on another property. Right, right, right. So I said, um, let me call my team. Someone can draft up the offer while I’m still out with the client.
Matthew Maschler:
Right. But it’s always, I was just saying, it’s always tricky when you’re at a property, your clients love it and they wanna make an offer and you’re trying to rush ’em out to make the next appointment. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, the next appointment may not be that important if they wanna see if this is their house. That’s true. Let’s, let’s, let’s focus on this a little
Staci Garcia:
Bit. Sometimes I even write the offer before we go.
Matthew Maschler:
That’s, that’s actually smart.
Staci Garcia:
Now, you know, these days,
Matthew Maschler:
In the old days, I just, just kept blank offers in my bag, in my briefcase, and I just fill ’em out right then and there with a pen and paper. Right. But, um, but I’m old. I don’t know if I mentioned that.
Staci Garcia:
<laugh> not as old as me. <laugh>
Matthew Maschler:
Not as old as you. All right. So that’s our show. Uh, thank you for joining us on the Real Estate Finder podcast. I’m Matthew ashler@realestatefinder.com. You can find me on the web or Instagram or any of the podcast places that you listen to. Feel free to shout us, shout, send us a line at matt@realestatefinder.com. E email or text or Twitter or Instagram. Any questions to us? Uh, we’re always around and we love helping people find real estate.
Speaker 7:
The future looks bright and the storms pass by the sky’s dog. Blue. When it’s almost that time, life shows cameras flash when I pass living in the moment, forget about the past. They save the best for last Matthew Mania. We about to make a splash. Life is a marathon full of sharp turns, gotta keep pace while the hands on the clock turns high stakes. Five star. I run a show. You can tell the bus center place electricity, energy vibrates. I’m always on time. Even if I’m late, I make dreams come true. Living my life. Hope the same for you. My sights gotta,
Speaker 8:
You know, it’s on, you know, it’s, you know, it’s, you know, it’s, you know, it’s, you know it, you know, it’s know, it’s, you know, it’s it. You know what song, what, you know what time. Its,
Speaker 7:
You know what time it’s, you know whose time it’s, you know what time’s, man, you, you know time. You know what time it’s May. Yeah. Got him shook, scared. Can’t look. We’re not afraid of the big bad wolf first comes right?
