Sean Carpenter - Build Relationships, Solve Problems and Have Fun: A Conversation About Golf, Beer and Real Estate.

Voiceover: 0:01

Welcome to the SUCCESS Coaching Podcast. On today's episode, our guest, Sean Carpenter shares his own personal journey to success because success is a journey, not a destination. Here's the hosts of the success coaching podcast, Todd Foster, Alyssa Stanley and Kelley Skar.

Alyssa Stanley: 0:25

Hello everyone and welcome to the SUCCESS Coaching Podcast. My name is Alyssa Stanley and I am here with co hosts Todd Foster and Kelley Skar. Today we are sitting down with Sean Carpenter whose business model revolves around building relationships, solving problems, all while having fun. He is a speaker, educator and trainer, author of the award winning blog called Carps Corner. He's a coach. He's a realtor and a huge influencer plus so much more that he's gonna fill you in on during our session. So Sean, welcome.

Sean Carpenter: 0:57

Thanks Alyssa, Kelley and Todd. So, so good to be with you guys.

Kelley Skar: 1:01

Yeah, right on man, thank you for for agreeing to be on this crazy ride that that we're that we're currently on. So I appreciate you appreciate your time. Why don't you give us just start off a little bit of insight as to who you are, what you're about. I know Alyssa gave you a pretty good intro there. But if you could kind of fill in some of the gaps that would be fantastic. And then we'll jump into the conversation.

Sean Carpenter: 1:21

Sure. Well, I'm born in Billings, Montana. And grew up in Columbus, Ohio, as my father moved from Montana into the education field, taught at Cornell in Ithica New York for a couple of years. My younger brother was born there. Then we moved to Columbus where my dad taught at Ohio State for many, many years up until the day he died, actually, so grew up in Columbus, Ohio, and, you know, enjoyed a nice Midwestern lifestyle, went to school, University of Florida wanted a big school like Ohio State but wanted it to be somewhere warm. So I picked University of Florida loved being in Gainesville, major in exercise and sports science. kind of my goal guys was I wanted to work front office of a sports team, you know, wanted to work for the Yankees, the Red Sox or the Cleveland Indians or something like that. But I after college, I got in the golf business, worked in the golf business for three years out of college, that started in outside of Tampa then brought me up to Cleveland, Ohio, moved back to Columbus, after being married and got a job in the beer business, worked for the Miller and Coors distributor here in town, and called on all parts of the city but eventually landed at The Ohio State campus territory was my was my it was my spot to sell beer. And as you can imagine, Alyssa Kelly and Todd, if you're going to sell beer, pick a spot where there's 45,000 students, and that's a really, really good spot to sell beer. But I after after a few years of doing that, I realized I was kind of more of an order taker than I was a salesman. And so I thought to myself, what would be a career that allowed me to drink beer and play golf? So I got into real estate, and I've been in that career ever since. I've been an agent. I've been a manager, where the director of education for the coal banker companies in Columbus and Cincinnati. And then about five years ago, I decided to retire from the corporate role go back into being an independent contractor kind of bet on myself and and start selling again, as well as open up my own company called Shawn speaks where I travel the country and talk to real estate audiences and other sales audiences about as Alissa said, building relationships, solving problems and having fun.

Todd Foster: 3:15

What I love about this is that you golf, you can drink beer, and you do real estate. So as you said, you're a perfect candidate for being the most successful realtor out there. Were you a golfer at a young age or how did you fall into the golf world?

Sean Carpenter: 3:30

Yeah, you know, I grew up in a town called Upper Arlington, Ohio. I still live there now. Now, Burlington High School is where a guy named Jack Nicklaus went to high school. And we are the Upper Arlington Golden Bears. Interesting. Interesting fact, Jack was named after the school, not the other way around. In fact, when he was a up and coming, you know, young golfer, they would say, Here comes that Golden Bear from Upper Arlington. And that's how he got his nickname, The Golden Bear. And he went on, obviously, to become the greatest golfer to ever, ever live, arguably, depending on your generation. But, so I grew up Caddying, Todd I caddied at Scioto Country Club, where Jack Nicklaus learned how to play golf and really got hooked on the game and started playing on a regular basis and played all through college didn't play at the collegiate level, but got good enough where I could get in the golf business. And so it's just been a ton of fun. And obviously, when I travel the country to watch golf in to see some of the great golf courses around our country and around the world is always always a treat.

Todd Foster: 4:27

That's awesome. So you went from golfing to then the beer business? Did something happen in your life where you said golfs done? Or how did you accidentally accidentally fall into the beer business?

Sean Carpenter: 4:38

You know, I got a golf business because as you can probably imagine the golf business you work a lot of weekends you work every holiday you work from sunup to sundown. It's a really challenging business, especially at the private club level because you're really your only day off is Monday when the clubs are usually closed. And so on Monday, you have to get your oil change. Get your dentist appointments, do your Shopping, but you also want to play because it's really the only day that you can go out and play with your fellow pros and other other club pros from around the area. And so it was just a challenging lifestyle and to have a family, it just, it wasn't super conducive at the time. And, you know, I also just didn't see myself doing it career wise. So we moved back to Columbus, I waited tables and was in the foodservice business and then kind of had the opportunity to learn about you know, being in the beer distribution, distribution business and got involved in that and just kind of really excelled at it, love the product, love the love to love helping people at the grocery store level on the convenience store level, which was kind of the more the order taking part. But then when I got into the Ohio State area that worked in the campus bars and getting to know the the bar owners and the bartenders and the staff and doing the promotional things, it was just a lot of fun. That was kind of the first advent of the craft beer industry. Back then when corps, you know, invented this little beer called Blue Moon, and Killians, Irish Red, if you remember, back in the day, and so I was really one of the first people to kind of understand the, the, the intricacies of the different craft beer styles. And so the company used me to go in and talk to the restaurants and the bars about why they should put our beers on tap. And so it's just something I just really enjoyed. And, you know, the aspect of, of working for an industry that's been around literally for hundreds and hundreds of years, that was kind of fun. And the story, the story that each beer tries to tell, you know, and what we see now you guys with the advent of the local craft beers exploding around the North America, you know, when I travel the country outside, it's fun to go into the local craft breweries, because each of them has such a cool story to tell about the product in their community. And so that's something I really enjoy.

Todd Foster: 6:49

With the beer industry, the way it's so competitive. I could see where real estate and beer sales go hand in hand. Did you find that the same thing where you know, I mean, we have Budweiser, we of course, we have the craft beers, and we have other real estate companies out there as well. At that time, did they teach you how to close? Or did you have to really learn how to close them yourself? Or did the product sell itself for you?

Sean Carpenter: 7:12

Well, the package part of it was literally just going into the local convenience stores, the grocery stores and kind of you know, hitting a quota so to speak, we got to sell this many cores like 12 Pack bottles, we got to sell this many Miller Lite cases. And then building the displays. You guys probably think you know, you guys don't think of it much as a consumer but your ceiling when I mentioned it at the end caps in the grocery stores, that'd be the big cores light, you know, case displays, and there'd be the themed with the Super Bowls, or the Stanley Cups or whatever it was. And so there was that part of it. But then there was the, you know, how do we get our beers on tap and it really what it came down to guys was the relationship because a lot of people would just put whatever beers on tap, you know, bud, Bud Light, Miller Lite Coors Light, they put all the same beers on tap with different colored tap handles. And hey, what if we put this beer on tap and got your waitresses and waitstaff to tell a story? It's kinda like, when you order a salad, even though we know what they're gonna say, we say what kind of dressing Do you have, and they say, ranch, blue cheese, Italian, 1000 island, I'll take the ranch. And so having that other thing, that other piece of the story, Todd to sell was was I thought always cool to not just give the same thing that every other restaurant or bar had on tap, have that one extra thing and then obviously closing and telling him look, this beer at this price, you know, per pint or pitcher could make a lot more money than, you know, this this beer at this price per pitcher.

Kelley Skar: 8:31

So what was it Sean that pushed you towards real estate then I mean, you know, beer and real estate, they may go hand in hand for, you know, realtors, beer golf in real estate. But, you know, for people listening to this podcast, it's like, one end of the spectrum kind of to the other. Right?

Sean Carpenter: 8:46

Yeah, you know, Kelley, it was a it was a conversation that I had with my wife early, early, early on the morning of November 1, which would have been what 1997 Let me let me just let me backtrack a little bit. I was good beer sales. I loved what I did. I spent a ton of time waking up early and doing the carry outs and then staying out late meeting the bar owners in the in the restaurant owners because you know, most of them don't show up to till three or four o'clock, especially around the campus bar. So I was out doing a lot of things. But I came home after a Halloween night promotion at one of our new restaurants near Ohio State campus. And I got home about three o'clock in the morning. Maybe I if I remember, right, I took out the staff, you know, after the bars closed down, we went up to breakfast. And, you know, I rolled home and I came in the house quietly like I usually did, you know, I didn't wake my wife up and she was sitting up watching TV about 3:34 in the morning. And I thought what's wrong, you can't sleep and she says no, I'm fine. Just go look on the kitchen table. And I walked in on the kitchen table and I thought I was gonna see divorce papers. I really did. I didn't know what to what to think. And she had taken one of those big desk calendars. And she had circled all the days of October that I was out past midnight. And there was 26 days out of 31 that I was out past midnight.

Todd Foster: 9:58

Wow.

Sean Carpenter: 9:58

And I quickly got defensive When I was like, Yo, this is my job, this is what I'm supposed to do. And she said, Look, you're good at it, you love what you do. But if we want to have a family, you can't be out past midnight, 26 out of 31 days. And so we slept on it, we had a conversation, and I said, What do you think I should do? And she said, Well, why don't you call Bonnie? Bonnie was the agent that helped us buy our first house a year ago, at that time. And she says, I think you'd be great at real estate. So that day, I called up Bonnie, we did we had a great time searching for a house. And I said, Hey, Bonnie, do you think I'd be good in real estate? And Bonnie said, Oh, my gosh, Shawn, with your personality and your stuff, you know, your energy and your knowledge of the city, I think you'd be great at it. And that's kind of where it where it started. Kelly, it started out of a finding another career opportunity that would fit my skills that I could, you know, find a passion for. But also they would allow us to, to start a family.

Todd Foster: 10:54

If your wife wouldn't have, I guess, had that sit down with you that night, which we've all had, as

husbands, especially at 3: 11:00

30 in the morning? Do you think you'd still be in the beer sales? Or do you think you'd have fizzled out of that?

Sean Carpenter: 11:08

That's great question. I don't know. I mean, I like to think you know, that I, I would have been doing something I'd love. I'd love the, you know, looking back, I didn't really have my philosophy of build relationships, solve problems, and have fun until I was in real estate. But I would have probably been doing something with people Todd. I don't know, though, that you look at the evolution of the beer business. I mean, I might have been a rep for a brand I might have got into the distilling business or, you know, the brewing business. I don't know. Because, you know, out of college, I was a golf pro for three years, then I was in beer sales for three years, then I sold for for three and a half years. And I became an assistant manager for a couple years, then I became a manager for a couple years. So it kind of became my evolution of finding that new that new Sean Carpenter 2.0 3.0 4.0. So I don't know I, I've always been engaged in the product, so to speak, but not in the, in the business, so to speak.

Kelley Skar: 12:00

So I want to back up for just a second because what you said, you said something that really resonated with me, I can think back it actually kind of triggered me just a little bit. And that was, you know, your wife had the calendar out circle 26 days on the calendar on a 31. And you immediately got defensive, I can, I can picture myself multiple times where my wife is, like, you know, you've got to put, you've got to put some boundaries around your life, like you can't, you can't just put the kids to bed, open up your laptop, laptop and go back to work. You can just finish at the dinner table, go and sit down on the couch, or sit down at your desk in the office and open up your laptop and go back to work. Like, what what was it? I mean, she obviously didn't have divorce papers. And I understand, you know, her saying that she you know, wants to have a family. But what was it that that kind of that trigger point for you that that kind of snapped you out of this? And you actually were able to sit down and say, Yeah, God like this is this is this life is insane. I need to make some changes here. And on top of that, has that happened to you? Since? Has there been other instances where where this has actually happened?

Sean Carpenter: 13:07

Well, I think probably at the time, I sat down, I looked at at all the work I was doing and in the beer business, the the hours and hours upon hours I was putting in and then really at the end of the day looking at, you know what I was making back then. And granted, this was you know, 24 years ago, but you know, to think I was probably only making like 35,000 a year, you know, and that became kind of one of the things like, gosh, if I'm putting this much effort into it, what if I was putting in that much effort to something that that I owned, that was my business. And that's when I kind of learned about real estate because honestly, the guys, I didn't know anything about the real estate industry. Even as a buyer of the house, you know, we called up my mom and dad and said, Hey, we want to buy a house, you know, what do we do? And thinking back? It's funny, because my dad, you know, he said, well call Bob Kidwell. And I said, Who's Bob Kidwell. And she and my dad said he was our realtor when we bought this house in 1971. And it's that power of WoW, me. You know, it's not like Bob Kidwell hung out at us. And I didn't know who Bob Kidwell was. But so so that's how we got into it. So I think Kelly it was the opportunity to to make something more out of my life and kind of start a career instead of a job. If that's, you know, I know it might be cliche to say that, but it became a career versus just a job that I was doing. Has it as it reoccurred probably a lot because I think a lot of what our what we do is real estate is who we are. It's part of you know, I'm a dad 24/7 I'm a real estate agent 24/7 I'm a husband 24/7 I'm a Florida Gator fan. 24/7 I'm a beer drinker, not 24/7. But I you know, I'm saying like my brand is part of who I am. And so So I think part of what we do in this business, as opposed to someone who let's say works at Walmart or department store. They get to punch out at 330 on a Friday afternoon and they don't have to think about stocking shelves until Monday morning at nine o'clock. When we punch out of our office or our home office. We're still a real estate agent when we take our family out to dinner and we talk to the waitstaff and we see one of our former Clients, you know, at that restaurant, we're gonna have engagement with them because we have relationships with them. And it just reinforces that we're in the relationship business. Right, the house just happens to be the widget that we use in real estate. And so I don't think we turn that off, Kelley, but I think there are some boundaries that we need to set where we, you know, to be honest with you, I think, life balance is kind of a BS word, because balance implies an equal time spent on each side of the fulcrum, so to speak, and I think I heard Jeff Bezos say at first and other people have said it, but I like to think of a work life harmony. And, and so I really feel like where I'm at now, certainly, when the kids were growing up, the harmony had to be different, I'd spend more time at home, doing homework and bathing the kids and being there for feeding time and things like that. Now, the kids are older and self sustaining. You know, I can be down here in my home office getting worked on in the morning, I can get stay out late. And if the harmony is good, I mean, Todd and Kelley, you guys have all had had those times where you have a great day at work, and you bring that energy home to your family, right. And when that other time, you have a great weekend with a family, and you bring that energy to your office in the daytime. So I think Kelley and Todd if we can find that harmony, of balance of life and work, that's where I really aim for. And so long answer your question, because Sure, I've had lots of those times where I feel like do I really need to be doing this right now? Or can I go upstairs and just turn on a football game and not have my phone? In my hand? Can I go pick up a book and not check text messages in between every chapter?

Kelley Skar: 16:34

Yeah. 100% I love that answer. And I was actually my follow up to that was gonna be can you coach me out of this, right, like putting your coach's hat on, but I think he kind of nailed it in some aspects, talking about, you know, how work life balance is bullshit. And, you know, this this harmony that could exist? You know, how do you I guess the question then would become, how would you find that, you know, if you're, if you're at a point right now, in, in your business and your relationship at home, where your partner is, you know, constantly on you about putting your phone down and putting a laptop away, and not bringing your work home? And, and all that kind of stuff? How do you then institute some sort of in and you're self aware enough to realize that this is affecting your relationship? How does that how does how does one then put a boundary into place and say, Okay, well, I need to put this down. And, you know, considering the fact that we're all entrepreneurs, that we're all working for ourselves that, you know, if we don't actually get out and do the thing, the money doesn't hit our bank account. Right. So how do you how do you? How do you balance that out? I guess, is the question.

Sean Carpenter: 17:36

Yeah, I think that's some that's maybe the the myth that sometimes people feel like they have to spend quality time with their family, so to speak, but then they also have to balance out the all the work we do. earning an income is usually going to be fed back into where we live and how we live and the lifestyle we choose and where our kids go to school and the car we drive and the clothes we wear, right we have this this belief boundary. And so so understanding that the the work we put in is is also for our family. But I think something I've been using a lot with the the agents that I work with on the coaching side is that you guys have probably heard the Eisenhower matrix, right? And maybe we've talked about it in previous episodes, right? That urgent and important not urgent, not important. And I think, in our business, because most people in the real estate industry most not all, but most people are people people, right, we like to help people we like we're that, that Hi, I, you know, personality, where we want people to like us. And that means we don't say no to people, because we don't want them to not like us. And so we elevate a lot of things from our customer standpoint into that urgent and important matrix. A lot of our clients put everything into that urgent important, but really, you know, like, you can imagine Kelley, like, you get a text message from a client, they say, Kelley, I need you to call me ASAP, and you're thinking like, oh my gosh, something must be wrong. I gotta stop what I'm doing and call them back and then they say, Hey, what time was the inspector coming over tomorrow? And you say to yourself that that was not ASAP that was not an ASAP issue. So catching yourself, coach you know, kind of managing yourself Kelley to say alright, is this urgent and important? Can this get done today? Does this call need to be returned immediately within the hour? Or by the end of the business day? Can I do this tonight when the kids go to bed right after I've had some quality time a glass of wine with my with my spouse or partner you know, like once again, just kind of prioritizing the tasks that we have on our either our written to do list or on our mental to do list I think is is a skill that we all can get better at putting a priority on things and not prioritizing everything as a one.

Kelley Skar: 19:52

Yeah, I think the power of no is incredibly, incredibly like being able to say no Two things is incredibly powerful for for some people. I remember Jesse Itzler. He was on Joe Rogan's podcast here a while back and Joe Rogan and asked him a question about, you know, how he's able to run, you know, multi million dollar businesses. He's married to a wife that owns a multi billion dollar business Spanx. You know, he just basically asked him like, how are you able to spend a bunch of time with your family yet run all these multimillion dollar companies and the big chord? The big answer that he has was I just learned how to say no. Like, it's it's these people calling him up and saying, hey, I want to take you out for lunch and spend 15 minutes picking your brain and he's like, no, like, what what is what is the cost benefit analysis here? Like what how does this benefit me in any way shape or form? Right? It's it's the the gotta sec meetings, you know, somebody opens your door and says, Hey, do you got a sec? And you know, damn, well, that isn't gonna last a second, it's gonna last 15 minutes to an hour. Right? So what what is it that I'm actually going to get out of that? So the power of No, I think is is something that that you kind of touched on there that I think a lot of people people could probably take away and implement right away and, and all all of a sudden just have this massive impact on on their lives. Just by setting that one boundary.

Sean Carpenter: 21:11

You know, I want to give it credit, cuz I think it was Derek Severs, who started CD Baby, and he's an author. And I believe I was listening to him on a interview podcast with Tim Ferriss, and Derek's a very busy guy, entrepreneur and doing lots of things. And and Tim's big on, you know, minimizing your distractions. And he asked Derek, he said, How do you say no. And Derek, I believe, once again, I want to give him credit, if it's if he's got said it. But he said, as soon as he started implementing this rule, when someone asked him to do something, if it wasn't a Hell, yes. Then it immediately became a No. If he didn't say to himself internally, Hell, yes, I want to do that. Then he knew that it had to be a no. And so you think about that, guys in your business? You know, there's a lot of things we say yes to, but not a lot that we say hell yes. Like, I'm going to drop what I'm doing to do this, or I'm gonna put it on my calendar. You know, I love that, that that code that says, friends, I like friends who will consult their calendar spend time with you, but I like better friends who don't even have to consult their calendar to spend time with you. Right? It's not a matter of what I can do. And so that hell yes, fulcrum is pretty powerful.

Todd Foster: 22:27

I like to piggyback on the hell yes, thing. So as let's say, you're brand new agent, or you're an agent or any small business out there that starting off, and you're hungry, right, everything you do is dependent on what you do that day and the next day and what you did before, how do you get over the hell yes. Because in the beginning, I believe everyone's going, hell yes, I'll take this, I'll do this. I'll do that. And for all of us, I'm in real estate. You know, I mean, you've been in it for 25 years or so. I've been in for a 20 Kelley's been in for 86 years, we have the option to now say, hell yes to certain things. At what point or what advice would you give someone to be able to, I guess, really figure out? When is the real time in the right time to say, hell yes. Or even hell no.

Sean Carpenter: 23:13

I think you probably have to earn the hell part. I think you don't know what a hell yes, is until you've had a whole lot of Ah, shit, I made the wrong decision with this one right here. Right? It's funny, because when new agents asked me best piece of advice I can give them, you know, I tell them make more mistakes. So many new agents are afraid of making any mistakes. Because these people that teach pre licensing classes, tell them that anything they do, they're going to get sued. If they breathe wrong from a client, they're gonna get sued. You know, we go so far over the spectrum of, you know, client protections, and I'm all for it. But I basically say if it's not lethal, or illegal, try it. Do it. Make mistakes, because I don't know what the wrong script is. Until I've said the wrong script. I don't know what the bad objection handling technique is, until I've said it wrong. And so I think you need to earn that hell part of the hell yes, Todd, because what I what I like about the business might not be what you like about the business? Right? What what Kelley likes or you know, his his mill, you might be FSBOs and expireds, mine's sphere of influence, you know, what's your target? And how do you know so? I saw Kelley maybe nod his head when I said that, but I think you don't know what the hell part is until you've had a lot of yeses, but more importantly, a lot of no's.

Kelley Skar: 24:41

That that hold that whole thing just kind of it brought up a memory for me. I like back when I first got started. So it hasn't been at six years taught it's like, fair, I mean, my 15th year I'm still a baby compared to you guys. But still, you know, I it was like, and I think it was like 2008 I kind of I I picked the wrong mentor. And that that was one of the mistakes that I learned early on is, you know, surrounding yourself with the right people. But I picked the wrong mentor. And you know, one of the things that this guy had said was, well, you know, I don't I don't do open houses anymore. I don't have to do open houses. I don't, I don't need to do open houses, I'm just not going to do them anymore. And I'm like, Yeah, I don't have to do open houses, either. And it's like, hold on a second. I don't know anybody in this city. Like, how the hell am I gonna build a business if I'm not doing open houses? Right? That's got to be one of my lead pillars, like I you know, so you know, it was it was just that that whole thing? It was like the, my hell yes, was very different. Because I was like, hell yes. I don't have to do I'm not gonna I'm just not gonna do open houses. Right? It wasn't the power of No, it wasn't it my hell yes, was just something very, very different. And I agree with you in terms of making those mistakes. That was one of the mistakes that I made early on, and you don't you don't earn the right to have that power of No, I think when you're early in the business, you got to do anything and everything that you possibly can, in order to make sure that you're going to be able to get past that that rate of attrition, which is typically about 18 to 24 months. So if you can move through that and actually make money and you're still in the business after five years, maybe then you've actually earned earned that power of No, and that ability to basically be able to say, hell yes.

Todd Foster: 26:16

I have a question about the 24/7, then. So if you are hungry, and you haven't earned the hell yet, how do you balance or imbalance or have no balance? Or keeping I guess yourself consistent to not working 24/7 Not being a southern loving? Because you, at least in the beginning, unless I'm wrong, and my perception is wrong. Everything we hear in the beginning, we will be saying hell yes to most of those things.

Sean Carpenter: 26:42

Yeah, a quote that I share with a lot of new agents is live your life and let real estate happen in the cracks. I think we see a lot of people who tried to live real estate and fit their life in the cracks. And that doesn't really work for me. And I think it doesn't work for most people, people who try and live real estate for their life in the cracks usually end up failing at both. But when you're super active in your kids school, or your church or local charities, or you hanging out your local country club a lot are right, where do you get your business from? From your kids schools, and your churches and your charities and your country club and things like that. So I think learning that that you don't need to be you will be a real estate agent 24/7. But you don't have to be I don't have to talk about real estate. Every time I'm in front of somebody, I just need to be ready to talk about real estate. When I'm in front of somebody. Right? There's a there's that fine line between being pushy and desperate, and being knowledgeable and helpful. My friend Jim Stevenson said, it used to be find me sell me now it's no me help me. And when we can make that paradigm shift, you guys, I think that is powerful, that it's about, you know, sales is not about doing something to somebody, it's about doing something for somebody and listening for opportunities. And so I think it's once again is a lot of at bats. It's a lot of hitting range balls, you know, and anyone, I don't care how good you are on the on the golf course. Anyone can hit a range ball and hit the driving range. But when you're on the first tee, and you got to get it around the corner and the pond and the bunkers are over there. It takes a different level of skill. But you better be at the driving range a lot. You better be, you know, doing a lot of batting practice before you become Tony gwinner or something like that. Right? Tony Gwynn, like Kelley, you said, you know, I don't do open houses. You know, I mean, can you imagine someone like mentoring underneath, you know, a great baseball player like Mike Trout or Tony Gwynn, you know, back in the day. And, you know, I mean, Tony Gwynn could look at that and say like, I don't swing it curveballs. That doesn't mean he doesn't swing it curveballs. He doesn't swing it bad curveballs. He doesn't mean it curveballs when he wasn't expecting a curveball. Right. And so it's all about I don't do open houses because I don't have to. But I did when I know when I was younger.

Todd Foster: 28:51

Speaking of curveballs, a curveball could be a mistake for us in life. Could you tell us one of your biggest mistakes you ever made and how you overcame it?

Sean Carpenter: 28:59

Probably not leaving and going on my own sooner. Right? I think that's something everybody in our business. A lot of times people say, I don't, I can't afford a buyer's agent or I don't need a buyer's agent. And then when they get a buyer's agent, they say, I wish I would have got a buyer's agent sooner or an admin. So just probably those evolutions tired of you know, the betting on myself. And I just kept saying to myself, gosh, every single person who's successful in life took a chance on themselves, right? You know, you look at the, the Bill Gates and the Steve Jobs and, and the the wolf snacks and the guys that you know, they ended, Dave Ramsey's, they, you know, you hear all the legendary stories of how they built their business in a garage, how they, how they left and you know, came to the country penniless and succeeded and so it's that but that's so hard because if you're not just betting on yourself, you're betting yourself on your family and your name and your and your brand. And, and so that's probably one that comes to mind. But like a lot of like a lot of I joke, you know, I knew agents have flat foreheads, because they said that Because when they, when someone asks them what they say they say, that's what I should have said, like two days later, they remember what they should have said. So the answer to the question, What's my biggest mistake, I'll probably think of six of them, you know, after we hang up, but it's that reminder that, you know, I bet on yourself, and it's probably the best bet you're ever gonna make. Because you got to believe you got to kind of go all in. And guess what we have to do that every day in our business everyday in life has kind of go all in. Because if you hedge your bets, you know, you're you're almost never going to go all in.

Voiceover: 30:32

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Kelley Skar: 30:40

What are you seeing out there? Right now? You know, in the real estate space, Sean, you're you're traveling around the country? You know, you're talking to a lot of agents right now, are you seeing a I don't really want to get into markets. But I want to get into kind of what you're seeing in terms of, you know, companies and models and all that kind of stuff. And I'm curious as to what, you know, people are thinking out there, what they're saying, what they're what they're feeling, you know, there's there's definitely a shift, it seems to be happening, you know, moving towards the cloud. And, you know, started kind of with Realogy, and REMAX and, you know, these companies going public and that sort of thing. What are you seeing what's what's kind of the word on the street as as sort of speak as to, you know, what are people talking about in the real estate space right now? Where it what kind of trends are you seeing that are starting to emerge?

Sean Carpenter: 31:25

But I think some of the big ones obviously, are, you know, like I said, using the cloud, leveraging technology to become a better agent. Listen, old school still works. This is good news for anyone out there who's, you know, 50 plus age and they think all all these young whippersnappers are gonna come in and steal our business using their their Twitter's and their and their iPhones, old school still works, right? The the belly to belly handshake, eye to eye relationship still works. Does new school work? Heck, yes. There's a lot of agents and companies that are killing it on the technology side. And I think that blending guys have that old school relationship, leveraging it with technology is is going to continue to be the path forward, right? Somebody, somebody with a with a technology tool necessarily can't take my relationship away. But they could start building a better relationship through time. So I think technology is a big one, I think we're seeing clearly a shift to teams, right? And think of that what you will whether that's mega teams or big teams or partnerships, I think is maybe a better word for it. Because you don't have to be a team to be successful. I think we're seeing that a reinforced what we're seeing across not just real estate, but by a lot of businesses is there's different options out there for different people. And the menu of services. You know, Cheesecake Factory, I don't know if you have that up in Canada, Kelley. But Cheesecake Factory has a menu that's literally like 12 pages long. And Chipotle, and Chipotle has seven things on their menu. And they're both super busy. Right? And so what is the key though, is you've got to know your menu, what is your offering? Right? The, you know, I know it's kind of cliche to say, what's your unique selling proposition? But what's your story, because here's what I find, if you have a good story to tell, and other people tell it for you, then you don't have to tell it as much. Think about that. If I have a great story to tell. And other people like to tell it, then I can spend my time effort money on the people who tell my story not on telling it to strangers. So the other thing I'm seeing is people a lot of people are asking me, you know, do I feel the market slowing down right now in the States? Do I feel it's slowing down? And my answer might be yes. But here's my here's my metaphor, you guys. For the last six months, the real estate market's been going 110 miles an hour. And about a month ago, the real estate market came up over a hill and saw a cop in the middle of the road. And so the real estate market slammed on the brakes and slowed down to 90. We're still going 90 miles an hour, but it feels a little slower. Because it's not 110. But if we took ourselves from 2016 or 2018, and looked at ourselves from the outside, we'd say, Holy crap, look how fast they're going. Look at the breakneck pace of this business right now. And that's where it comes down to slowing it down having those one on one face to face conversations, those buyer counseling sessions, those listing presentations that are all based around asking questions, getting more information, listening to the answers from our customers and clients and communities, and then finding ways to answer those questions and or solve those problems and or, you know, satisfy the needs of our of our clients.

Todd Foster: 34:41

If you were a fortune teller and had a crystal ball, do you see real estate the same as it is, let's say three to five years from now. In terms of we are still going 90 Or do you see us getting pulled over having a conversation career relationship with a police officer and having us go on our little way, maybe just a little slower than we were in the past,

Sean Carpenter: 35:03

I think you're gonna see both, I think you're gonna see people that are going to stay on the freeway and try and go as fast as possible and push it, push it, push it. And I see other people that says, You know what, I don't need that lifestyle, I get a little nervous, I get knocked white knuckles and I feel nervous inside, I'm gonna take some side streets. And you're gonna see some other people says, you know, I'm going to find a way to sit in the backseat and have someone else drive me. I still want to go places, I just don't want to be the one in charge. Right. And as people and maybe joining teams or or partnering up with, with organizations, I think there's probably a metaphor there if there's, there's different paths for other people. Right? The same thing, the music business, right? People say, do you think rock and roll is dead? I don't know, rock and roll is just changing. I think there's still there's hip hop, and there's country and there's alternative. And there's grunge. And there's all these different flavors. You know what my favorite presentations I do is called getting in tune with your audience what real estate rockstars can learn from real rock stars. And I love a quote by from the lake Glenn Frey from the Eagles. He said, You know, when I was younger, in the business, I used to think other bands, making good records could keep us off the charts. And then I realized that other bands, making good records can't keep me off the charts. Other people getting listings can't keep me from getting a listing. And so I think the the, the answer, Todd is, which road Do you want to take? Which route? You know, do you want to stay in the fast lane? Do you want to find a way to make a faster car? Or do you want to take the side streets and enjoy the pace more? Do you want to take a you know, a lot of different ways to get from here to California, I could take the fastest freeway, I can go on ways and I'll say here's the fastest way. Or I can say well, let's go down Route 66. And let's stop and, and enjoy the trip and see people on the way. So I guess the answer to your question, I think is there's lots of different ways that I see that the industry going it depends on who the driver is. I use lots of metaphors and analogies in my, in my teachings I cuz I just think there's, you know, I need people to Sometimes people hear it different ways.

Kelley Skar: 37:00

Well, let's let's talk about that what pulled you towards you know, you're successful in real estate yet a successful beer selling business, you moved into real estate selling, helping, you know, people buy and sell real estate. And then, you know, what, what was? What was it that pulled you towards managing and teaching and coaching and training? Like what what what I mean, clearly, you know, you're not going to be doing that sort of thing in the beer business, you know, that they probably were doing that as a pro, I'm assuming as a as a club Pro. Is that kind of where that came from Sean or where did that where did that whole thing come

Sean Carpenter: 37:36

I can tell you now where it came from back then from? I think the opportunity to become I was teaching in the beer business, I was teaching them about the products. And I was teaching them about the flavors and the pricing and things like that. But in the real estate business, having the opportunity, we had our first child. And I was given the opportunity to become an assistant manager, which meant we still I still got to sell my number one job was to sell but I got to help the manager with coaching and with with training classes and talking to recruits and things like that. And then I was given the opportunity become a branch manager, which meant I stopped selling up we were not selling managers at the time. And so I made the decision gosh, do I want to stop selling but the trade off was I got a paycheck, I got benefits. I was a new dad to have that consistent pay was a nice thing. In the two years I managed I really love the coaching and training part of it. But I hated the managing part of it, Kelley. And so I was given the opportunity from the director of education. What I learned when I became a branch manager, even though I stopped selling, ie working with buyers and sellers guess what I had to sell every day, I had to sell my agents on why they should show up for training classes. I just sell my agents on why to show up for sales means I have to sell recruits on why to get in the real estate business and why to join our company and why to join my office. So I got to sell every day I think we all get to sell every day. Right? We we sell our kids on the books they read the people to hang out with. We sell our spouse on you know why I'm going to play golf this weekend or stay out late this tonight. So I really love the coaching and training part of it. Knowing what I know now though, Kelley, it's funny. My father, as I said was a Professor of Landscape Architecture for 29 years. He was great at what he did he he was president of the American Society of Landscape Architects, which would be like us being president of the National Association realtors or or into the Canadian Association realtors, and he was at the peak of his industry. His father, my grandfather, I call him Pop. My my Pop was a traveling shoe salesman for Clark's of England and Florsheim shoes. And he was the classic you know, old salesman, the big Cadillac, the samples in his trunk. I remember I he lived in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida which is in Jacksonville on the beach, he had beachfront property and me and my two brothers would go down and stay with him like one at a time we got to go out spend a couple 10 days or two weeks with pop and swim in the ocean and play on the beach and I remember one time I was down there pop had to call on some clients him Miami. And so he said, we're gonna go down to Miami for a couple days and you're gonna see what, what your pop does for business. And he said, if you're gonna call on customers, you got to have a little suit. So he took me to the store and he bought a little salesy. I think it was seven years old, maybe eight years old, and he bought me a suit, a little clip on tie. And my job Kelley and Todd, I had to bring the samples into the stores. And I didn't realize it then. But knowing now, when we would drive to Miami, and we would stop at this diner, or this hotel, or this shoe store, he knew every employee's name. He knew every employee's spouse's name, kids names, hobbies and interests, he knew every waitress along the path, he knew every hotel clerk, he knew their names, and he was just absolutely the consummate, relationship driven salesperson. And I never wanted to do what my what my Pop did, I never wanted to be a teacher like my dad did. And here I am, after their death, and I teach people how to be salespeople, I get to honor their legacy, so to speak, in what I do every day. So the long answer Kelly is that's where it came from. It was inside me I got to, to, to live that. And now that they're both gone, I hope that they're looking down on me and say like, we're pretty proud of the fact that he gets to teach people every day how to be salespeople.

Todd Foster: 41:19

Please tell me you still drive in 1973 Caddy around.

Sean Carpenter: 41:24

I don't man, I every time I see a big Cadillac, man, I think of my Pop and I just think like that big boat of a car. You know, I mean, you know, you picture your seven year old kid, and you're sitting in the backseat, and you literally felt like you were seven feet away from the driver, you know, it was, but you know, he, he was just, I mean, he was old school, old school, right. And it was a, you know, handshake and, and I told you, I was gonna get this for you. And I'm gonna call my company, and we're gonna get that for you. And then my, you know, my dad, you know, like I said, I never like kind of paid attention to what he did. But the day of his funeral, when my brother's elected me to give the eulogy. And I stood up on that altar at the church. And you know, when you're, when you're in the funeral party, or the front row, you know, and you don't want to see everybody filling in the church, when I stood up and walked up and looked out on the congregation, and every single seat was taken in the church was lined in the back of the church with his students from over the years that had come back to kind of pay respects to him. Kind of cool. And you think, like, think how many professors you'd go back to, to their town to honor and at the receiving line after after the funeral, you know, shaking the hands of the students, and they said, you know, what, your dad was the hardest son of a bitch, I ever had a teacher, but he made me the great landscape architect I am today. And that's why I drove through the night to be at his funeral, you know, and so that's kind of cool. That's kind of that legacy that you know, that a lot of people talk about, like, at the end of the day, that's, you know, your resume is gonna be what it is, all of our resumes will be done, you know, how much money we made in our jobs and what we did, but the the relationships and the legacies is, is kind of what I really liked about what we do.

Todd Foster: 43:06

What would your legacy be, you're off, people at your funeral. They're telling the truth about how great you are not lying about how great you were? What type of legacy you're looking to leave Yeah, on this world. Once you're gone?

Sean Carpenter: 43:18

Well, you know, it's it, you know, my my philosophy, my slogan, you know, build relationships, solve problems and have fun, I think that could be my tombstone, right? He built relationships, he he solved problems, and he showed us all had fun. It probably that it probably be that, you know, I Kelley you know, you and I have talked for years, you know go back to our days with Mike McCluer and the things you know, we did that, you know, when is the when people meet me in person Todd at an event like the Michigan Realtors event and they say ma'am, Sean, I've been following you for years on social and you're the same person in, in human in real life as you are online. You're the same person offline as your online I think that's a cool thing. So when you know that can be part of my legacy is that I was genuine. You know, he, he was a smartass. Through and Through. He was a loyal person through and through. He was a sports watching beer drinking. Laughing person, right? I mean, I That's my target audience guys, it's beer, drinking sports fans with a good sense of humor. I mean, I'll work with you. If you're a wine drinking non sports watching person that doesn't laugh. We're just not gonna have near as much fun as a beer drinking sports fan with a good sense of humor. And here's the key. You know what beer drinking in sports fans with a good sense of humor hang out with other beer drinking sports fans with a good sense of humor is it's finding that ideal client, you know in what you do so, the answer to that is I want people to toe to say he built relationships. He saw problems and he had fun.

Todd Foster: 44:41

With the career you have now you are definitely doing that. Do you see yourself doing that long term or do you see yourself holy cow Sean it's time to hit the brakes and slow down and just enjoy life at a leisurely pace.

Sean Carpenter: 44:53

For the time being? I think I'm on a pretty good road. I work hard. I work a lot hours. I mean, I you know, I sell real estate 50 plus times, you know, a year, I just got off a 11. City. Let's see 12 City 11 State five week tour kind of, you know, where I was just event to event people like, are you ever home and I go, Yeah, I got to go home and change my luggage and get new clothes and things like that. But at but my family and I made that decision, Todd to jump back into sales and leave a corporate America and leave a paycheck and leave benefits. I asked my wife and kids hey, do you think that I could do this? Do you think would you guys support this? And like, that's what you love to do? Heck, yeah, do it. That doesn't help that they're, they're all grown. But you know, my son is a sophomore in college, my daughter's graduated. And, you know, they know, this is what I like to do. And so I don't see any reason why I couldn't continue to do this. Keep telling a good story, helping other people learn how to tell their stories. There's something special guys about being a teacher at heart. And when your students, whether that's a classroom student or or professional, taking your classes or attending your classes, you know, send you that note, text message of a message on social media that says like, Hey, I still do that thing you taught me to do or I still build the relationships and solve problems and have fun. And that's kind of a neat thing. So I guess no, I'll keep doing it until I until nobody wants to listen, I guess. It may be it may be at different levels. It may not be speaking around the country. But you look at some of the great speakers of our generation. You look at the Lou Holtz is and the Zig Ziglar 's. And, you know, they kind of were telling stories and and encouraging people till the day they died.

Todd Foster: 46:34

I'm guessing that if my wife would have sat down and sat down and said, Hey, you were gone 26 nights of October, and that was pre COVID. And after COVID I believe my family would be saying, Why aren't you gone 26 nights a month?

Sean Carpenter: 46:48

Yeah, yeah. It's neat. And it's fun. And it's you know, but it's, it's not for everybody. I mean, my wife traveled with me to. I spoke at the Georgia realtor conference, which was in Destin, Florida. And obviously we were I was booked four or five months ahead and she said, Oh, I'll go on that trip with you. Because she's really done traveling much when I go and so she thought Destin, Florida, I'll go sit by the pool. Well, it so happened that that conference was at the tail end of hurricane Ida, so it was raining and cold. And you know, the flights home were a little bit delayed. And she thought, man chasing planes and living in hotel rooms is just not for me. But I love it, man. It's the it's the stories I get to meet. I've spent, I did some math the other day guys, I've in the last 10 years of my life. Two and a half years of that of those 10 years have been in the Marriott property. In a Marriot Hotel. They're, they're my they're my family on the road. Right? But I try and get to know the, the, you know, the stories of the people, you know, that work the hotels and the bars and the restaurants and the airports and, and things like that. And if I can use those stories in my blogs, you know, I call it being blog worthy. If I can catch somebody being what I deem his blog worthy writing a blog about them telling their story to my audience, so that my audience can learn about some little thing that a shuttle bus driver or hostess or a waitstaff did, because I think if we all do that, if Kelley and Todd and me and Alyssa, if we watch for other people in our communities doing something worth talking about, then we start doing things we're talking about ourselves, we start saying what's that thing that's just a little bit better than the next. And I think I can do that for a long time.

Todd Foster: 48:26

You've proven that when you feel important, and you just feel good when you're doing business with someone such as Marriott. And they make you feel special, right? They give you a an upgraded status card, you are a member who can walk in and get a room if needed. There's many things to it. Yet. That's how business is. Any person out there running a business, either in real estate or a pizza shop or any small business need to understand that you must make everyone feels special because of not Hilton, Holiday Inn's right around the corner.

Sean Carpenter: 49:00

Seth Seth Godin years ago in you know, probably 96, I want to say he said there's four kinds of people in the world. There's prospects, there's customers, there's former customers, and there's loyal customers. What are we trying to get right? And then he, he says writes a lot of books. And so later on, he said, you know, the key to success in sales is turn strangers into friends, and then turn friends into customers, if you can figure out a way to do that. But then Seth is a smart guy. He keeps thinking and what I love about what he says now he says that still works, turn strangers into friends turn friends into customers. But then the most important thing we need to do time Kelley is turn those customers into salespeople. Get those customers to talk on a podcast about the Marriott get those customers to talk about, you know, Coors Light or Southwest Airlines. Get those customers to tell your story. And so that's yes, you're right. It's about creating that loyal customer. Because for the most part everyone is listening to this Every person in the world is a prospect until they become a customer and then hopefully to become a loyal customer. And not just a former customer. And in real estate, like we have the opportunity to get that repeat referral business because you're right, Todd, every city I go to that has a Marriott probably has a Hilton property, or Holiday Inn, or something cheaper, or something a little further away. Every place that has coke has Pepsi, for the most part, like convenience stores and things like that. So what's gonna make someone reaching that cooler and grab a loyal drink? When when the window when you order a Diet Coke, and the waitress says we have Pepsi? Is that okay? Do you say No, thanks, I have a water. Right? How do you create that person in your business? That is a true card carrying member.

Todd Foster: 50:45

And I think it's important to remember that although we desire to have perfection in life, not everything's perfect. I mean, I've had many issues on the road with hotel chains. And and the thing is, we'll go back because they either took care of it, or we know it was mistake and probably won't happen again. Or they somehow made us feel special and important by saying, okay, Sean, here to here, Todd, here, Kelley, here's what we'll do for your next visit. And so it shows you that you don't have to have perfection in business, as long as you have the relationship, and they are raving fans who are talking about you for free, which is basically you're getting free advertising. It's okay to make mistakes, just don't make them over and over and over again.

Sean Carpenter: 51:28

Sure. And that's that's where the loyalty comes in. Right? That's where the, that incident that went wrong was an isolated incident. It was outside of this person who's behind the desks control it was. But if every time I go in, no matter who's back there, that's when you start making changes, right? I mean, we've all we've all had restaurants that we like to frequent. And one time we go and the food wasn't as good, the fries were cold, the service wasn't good. And you don't say all the whole place sucks. You back a second time and a third time, the fourth time the fries are cold, the service sucks. He starts saying like, damn, they're slipping. And then he stopped going. But the isolated incident. And that's a good lesson for us as salespeople is we can have a day where it wasn't as good as it was before. And we should know that we should be able to self monitor that. But how do we handle it? How do we make it up? How do we, you know, how do we earn that trust of our of our customers? I love talking about trust, because in our business in real estate, I mean, whether you're new agent or experienced agent trust is I think, the key tool in our toolbox. And there's three C's that lead to trust, right? There's there's comp competence. Are you good at what you do? Do you know your shit, right? I mean, people trust you, if you know your product, you know, your service, you know, the second C is confidence. When people listen to you, can they hear your confidence? Can they see your confidence? I think people can feel confidence. And the third C, which I think is the is the epitome of trust. And that's consistency. Can I consistently deliver competence with confidence? Can I consistently show up connect, and that's where I'll trust the brand. If their overall consistency is good, if they have one glitch, but then it's consistently repaired or fixed or apologized for, then then then we can do that. So the the newest people listening to this and the most experienced people, if you focus on those three C's of trust, in whatever it is you do whatever service you provide, or product you have or company run, if you can be competent, right? That's a function of, of action, right? If you can, or, you know, if you can be at the function of ability, if you can be confident, that's a function of attitude. And if you can be consistent, that's a function of action. Man, you're going to be you're going to be trusted today, tomorrow next week. And if you can earn people's trust, they'll tell other people about you.

Todd Foster: 53:43

Could there be a 4th C, that could be communication.

Sean Carpenter: 53:46

Sure. Let's add that one in there. I think yes, somehow, once again, telling the story of how you're confident, competent, and consistent. And sometimes that story can be told, or it could be, you know, in print, and video, it could be on your social channels, it could be word of mouth. super powerful.

Kelley Skar: 54:05

Alright, so Sean, you mentioned, you know, making people blog worthy, or finding people that are blog worthy, or experiences that are blog worthy. Maybe you can just let us know where your blog is, and how long you've had it in, you know, the type of content that that you're posting up there.

Sean Carpenter: 54:21

Yeah, so I love the blog has given me opportunities to kind of document my journey. And it's, you know, people don't blog it's for me, it's a place that I can keep my thoughts and find an audience. I blog at carpscorner.net, you can get there by seancarpenter.com as well, but carpscorner.net and I've been blogging there for I think I started blogging in about 2002 or 2003. And so I've got over 1100 blog posts now written and you know, guys, people that don't blog people don't do videos, people don't do podcasts. You become a better writer when you I start writing. I'm a much better writer than I was when I started. But my audience is real estate agents, brokers, managers, mortgage people, anyone who's in sales, anyone who wants to learn about building relationships, solving problems and having fun and, and by using that as my sort of my target audience. A lot of my blogs aren't about real estate. It's about being a dad, it's about it's about traveling. It's about, you know, lessons I've learned. Of the 1100 Plus blog posts. I bet if I went through and looked at them, guys, though, only about 100, probably less than 100 have been truly about one person, a blog where the story, a story worth telling. And I think of those, let's just say I've done I'll just get 7574 of them were about someone doing some awesome. And I think only one time have I gone the negative route, and said this was a bad, bad experience. And I told the story, almost as a lesson to say, but then I changed I didn't like that I said, I changed. I said, I'd rather tell good stories about that. And so it's fun. For me, the consistency has been powerful. I started years ago guys writing what I call the Monday morning match. It was designed as a post that was gonna be a story, a quote, a video, something to inspire your week to kind of slide that fuel under your week and get get you started Monday morning match. And by doing that, it forces me on Sunday nights to make sure that I write a blog post that shows up in your mailboxes on Monday morning. And that consistency, I've missed one Monday and I think nine years. So that's been a great exercise to kind of tell my story. And it allows me to find new readers, people that hear me speak and they want to continue to hear my story. They can follow my blog, sometimes people follow my blog, because their manager or their Board of Realtors shared a post, they saw it on social and it's gotten me business because when people say we've been following your blog, we want you to come speak at our our conference and things like that. So it's just cool for me to kind of have my you know, I haven't written a book. I don't have a physical book that I could hold up and show you. But I have 1100 chapters of a book, if I just go through and pull out my, my greatest hits. In fact, I've thought about doing that, you know, getting maybe some of my best blogs and calling it a book of matches, right and pulling out my best Monday morning matches and pulling out just my blog worthy individual stories. And I love it. It's just some fun for me like you guys enjoy. And you'll love doing the podcast. And it's years from now when I'm dead and gone. It'll be it'll be out there. My friend says blogged and better listing on Google.

Kelley Skar: 57:36

Yeah, part of your part of your legacy. So if I'm, if I'm the, you know, director of an association looking to hire you to speak, where do I find you?

Sean Carpenter: 57:44

Yeah, you can go to seancarpenter.com, or carpscorner.net. And there's kind of an About Me page. I love talking to obviously real estate audiences, I've had a chance to speak to some non real estate organizations, which is fun, cuz I think the message of building relationships and solving problems and having fun goes across borders, I speak to some local high schools and talk about leadership and goal setting. So they can reach out to me, you can always you know, I'm super active on social. Because I don't think there's any better way to build relationships, solve problems, and have fun to an audience further and faster and freer than I can on Facebook and Instagram and my favorite channel, Twitter at Sean Carp on Twitter and Instagram. I love the fast paced variety of the stream on Twitter. You know, Twitter's that cocktail party that rolls by really quickly. Instagram is the slide show in your in your living room, and Facebook's at backyard barbecue, where the stories are different, but finding out social connect me on my blog, follow my blog. And you know, if there if you got a real estate event or an audience that as small as a leadership team, or a top agent event or a kickoff event, I am already starting to book into 2022. So it's it's a something I just love getting in front of an audience. As we talked about Todd, in the green room, you know, sharing that passion and look, Zoom was great. It allowed us to get in front of people and help tell a story and entertain and engage and educate people but there's nothing better than that. That energy you get from a live studio audience. You know, you see that with a Garth Brooks or a Bruce Springsteen or any band that, you know, they feed off their their audience no play longer if their audiences giving them the energy they they need back.

Todd Foster: 59:29

I would like to go back to that one Monday that you missed. I mean, you had a streak there. And it's been nine years and you missed that one Monday. And what I love about that is that first of all, you remember that Monday, and more than likely you also had the guilt of not doing something that you'd commited yourself to doing in business, I believe also people should have that guilt. They should be in such a pattern that they're doing things that when they skip a day or miss a day, because life gets in the way. You still Think about that day. So can we go back to Monday that you did miss? Exactly. Why did you miss that Monday?

Sean Carpenter: 1:00:06

I gotta think back. But I think that Sunday night, I just nothing was in my head. I couldn't get anything out. And I thought, You know what? It's okay to skip one. I'm human. No one's gonna care. No one's gonna miss it. And then that Monday afternoon, I got about six or seven messages from people saying, Hey, Did I did I get taken off your list today? You know, and it was one of those things that if you do something that people will miss it. If they don't get it, then it's something worth doing. And I also just felt like I missed it. I felt like, you know, I, but here's the thing. I just started another streak. Right? I just started again. I remember a story Jerry Seinfeld, the great comedian. He was talking about writing jokes. And how do you write so many jokes as a comedian says your job as a comedian is just to write jokes every day, if you can write one good joke a day. So he just put a wall calendar up, he put a red X every day, he wrote a joke. And a day, he didn't write a joke. There was no x. And so we had to start another streak. He had to start no straight can so it's one more phone call. It's one more podcast. It's one more joke. It it's like to share the story of trigger tree, right? Remember, when you went trick or treating, you know, on Halloween night, and that first time you went out without your parents with you, you and your buddies are gonna go out and we're going to crush the town, you are going to fill your pumpkin that you're going to fill your pillowcase with so much candy that you are going to go out literally until they kicked you out. Right and you went to a door lights were on you rang the bell? And nobody answered the door. What do you do as a kid? You went to the next house? Because you were out to get candy. He didn't sit on the porch and think oh my god, I must be wearing the wrong costume. Oh, my God, I must have rung the doorbell the wrong way. Oh my god, I must be at the wrong time. You just said screw it. Let's go the next house because that's where the candy was. But for some reason, guys, we become adults. And when someone says no to us when someone says no thanks not interested, it's not for me. We think it's about us. We think it's about the company. We're aware that the product we have or the the way we set it instead of No, it's just about them and their needs right now. And I got to keep knocking on doors. So go to the next house, the next house, the next house, that's where the candy is. And that's where I think that that I didn't write the blog that day. So I wrote the blog the next week. Now I tried to do one on Thursdays I called my 30 for Thursday, it's 30 words or less in a blog post. And I gotta tell you, man, right in 30 words is so much harder than writing 300 words. Because you got to find the exact right words. And I can tell you many times in my head, I just want to write and I write in like the 36. How can I go through and say the same thing with six less words. And man, you become a better writer when you write something that's 30 words, and not 300. So that's called my 30 for Thursday, and it's just more of an exercise for me. missed a couple more of those because sometimes I just can't get it out. But the Monday mornings I haven't missed. Like I said, if I went back and looked it's gotta be five years that I haven't missed a Monday.

Voiceover: 1:03:11

The lightning round.

Kelley Skar: 1:03:13

Alright, so we've got this little little thing that we do with I think probably most of our guests. It's just a lightning round rapid fire questions. The idea, Sean is, you know, just kind of off the top of your head and, you know, we'll go from there. Sounds good. Okay, here we go. Summer or winter?

Sean Carpenter: 1:03:30

Summer.

Kelley Skar: 1:03:32

Cuz you're a golfer, right?

Sean Carpenter: 1:03:34

Yep.

Kelley Skar: 1:03:35

Okay, when are you at your most productive?

Sean Carpenter: 1:03:38

Early in the morning? Get up and do my four H club every morning. Yep.

Kelley Skar: 1:03:41

There you go. Who is your inspiration and a quick why?

Sean Carpenter: 1:03:46

Probably my dad and my pop that I talked about earlier. And just once again, the lessons that they taught me and as you become more mature, you realize that the lessons that they teach you when they're gone are probably more impactful than the lessons they taught you and they were here.

Kelley Skar: 1:04:00

Awesome. When you were in school, what was your worst subject?

Sean Carpenter: 1:04:04

School.

Kelley Skar: 1:04:08

That's a good answer like that. What's your favorite cake flavor?

Sean Carpenter: 1:04:13

Chocolate.

Kelley Skar: 1:04:13

All right, last one. What scares you?

Sean Carpenter: 1:04:16

Snakes. Snakes and heights. So my worst fear would be cleaning my gutters and finding a snake in my gutters that would be the worst.

Todd Foster: 1:04:25

Likewise for me.

Kelley Skar: 1:04:27

That's awesome.

Voiceover: 1:04:29

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