Work Hard, Play Hard, and Give Back - A Real Estate Podcast

S1E9 - The Power of Video: Luis Cardenas Elevates Real Estate Marketing

• Coldwell Banker American Homes • Season 1 • Episode 9

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In Episode 9 of "Work Hard, Play Hard, and Give Back," host Mike Litzner sits down with top agent Luis Cardenas from our Hicksville office. Luis shares his inspiring journey from immigrating to the United States from Venezuela at age 13 to becoming a successful real estate agent and U.S. citizen. He discusses how his family motivateshim to excel and how he balances traditional and digital marketing, including unique video marketing strategies that help him stand out in the competitive real estate market. 

Luis delves into his commitment to giving back, both through mentoring other agents in video marketing and his involvement with his church community. He also talks about investingin real estate, sharing his experiences buying investment properties and building a retirement plan. Tune in to hear Luis'sinsights on building a brand, the importance of passion in both work and family life, and don't miss his humorous take on Venezuelan arepas in our "Drop the Mic" segment!

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Mike Litzner:

Hi and welcome to the Work Hard, play Hard and Give Back a real estate podcast. I'm Mike Litzner, broker owner of Coldwell Banker American Homes, and I'm here today with our guest, Louis Cardenas, one of our top agents at Coldwell Banker American Homes Hicksville location. Welcome to the show, louis, thank you. Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate it. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. So we are here at the studio at the Franklin Square office and I just want to remind our guests, before we get started, to like subscribe and stick around for the drop the mic question at the end. It's always a lot of fun.

Luis Cardenas:

So Louis.

Mike Litzner:

I want to jump into some good questions here and share with the audience some of your background. You know as a dynamic agent who I see out there marketing and really engaged in the business of real estate. Where do you find your motivation? What drives you and pushes you to be at the top of your game every day?

Luis Cardenas:

So I think it's family we were talking about before, about being father of two little girls and having a wife and, I think, more of a provider. I think it's just setting the standards and I know they're looking up to me for everything they do, especially because they're growing up and they're so young. So I want to set the standard of. You know, you got to work hard and you got to. You got to push. I saw something a couple days ago that um resonated with me. It's kind of in relation to they just came to my mind. Yeah, um, it was. It was workout related.

Luis Cardenas:

The guy was saying how most people think that they need motivation in order to work out, to get things started Right, and so he said it doesn't work that way. Motivation doesn't work that way. He was talking about most people need motivation to take actions and then see results, and the reason he resonated is because he broke it down the other way. He said you first take action and then you see results, and that creates motivation to take more action and then it becomes a snowball, right, right. So I got started. They motivate me to kind of get my butt out and put myself in awkward situations, you know because that's all we have to do right.

Luis Cardenas:

we're unemployed every morning and we have to go out and and go go hunt and that's the motivation to make sure that they see somebody who earned it. Yeah.

Mike Litzner:

Well, it's a big role being dad, but it's probably one of your favorite ones.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, for sure, yeah, yeah 100%.

Mike Litzner:

So you mastered really both traditional and digital marketing. What made me take notice is some of your unique marketing. I'm kind of curious where do you find your ideas? How do you balance the traditional marketing methods with, maybe, a social media and digital presence?

Luis Cardenas:

So I think the digital part or video part of it. It's all content 's. All I mean, I think our lives together is. It's a piece of content and you, just I choose to showcase some of it in front of a camera.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, that then goes into social media today I'm doing a little bit something a little bit different. I noticed that a lot of realtors put this and social media um in the last couple days and they just posted the front of the, the newspaper, but they never really went on detail about. What does the article say about the market?

Luis Cardenas:

Some of the subjects that I talk about in my more virtual marketing are still real estate things that I may have mailed before or may have done a more traditional postcard. That same information just makes it to video, where now it's not the postcard speaking but it's me speaking. The content If your property possesses any of the following traits, this could be the perfect year to sell. If it's located on a main road in poor condition, it lacks a backyard, it has a poor layout, it's too close to a commercial building, it has above average taxes, it's missing certificates of occupancy, why sell now? Well, traditionally, buyers paid less for these properties because they seem less desirable. I always try to chase somebody, somebody that's better than me. It's cool to be number one, right?

Luis Cardenas:

And it's cool to get that award.

Luis Cardenas:

I feel like that's that's awesome, but I feel myself better on a second place not because of anything more than I always want to be chasing somebody that's better than me. I feel like that gains me more momentum, and so I'm always looking at people that are doing more things out of the box than I am, that are doing newer things, that are doing things in different markets the way that I started selling Levittown houses in video when they were 350,000, it was because I was looking at people selling real estate in Hollywood that were $5 million and how they were doing video and I tried to translate that into our neighborhoods and into our areas and that kind of made a difference and that's how.

Luis Cardenas:

So looking outside of my network, looking outside of Looking at what other people are doing and try to not copy them but bring them into my circle.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, some ideas of what you're seeing. You've had some really unique videos. What's your favorite one?

Luis Cardenas:

I have, you know, I still I don't know how, because you know, the funny thing is, those videos are always. That's why you have to do everything Right and not think too much about what you have to do, because the ones that you think are going to be a hit yeah, like, oh, my God, I delivered that so well. That was amazing. This is going to be the one that's going to get me to stardom and those tank Right, right, but the ones ones you think I'm just gonna do it because this is sort of an idea that I had those are the ones that get recognized. So I did one once that people still talk about. This was years ago, during covid. I actually presented an offer to a listing agent who does video right and um, in order.

Luis Cardenas:

You know, it was a time where people were getting 50, 60 offers right, it was you had to stand out somehow, and I said in order for me to stand out and kind of highlight my buyers, but at least get this guy to look at my offer.

Luis Cardenas:

Because, you know, realistically, if you're getting 60 offers, you're eyeing through some of them? Yes, and I wanted to make sure that at least I got the shot that the guy would pay attention to me, and I jumped in a pool full suit on yes, and I had my mother-in-law with one camera in one side, my wife in another, my daughter in another, and that's how I did it. So a lot of people still remember that one yes, exactly exactly.

Mike Litzner:

There's one I was wondering what your dry cleaner said to you when you brought that suit in afterwards. Well, that wasn't my favorite suit. That was a suit that I don't wear much because I really wanted to make sure that the chlorine, if it ruined it it was worth it. Yeah, it was worth it. I got the accepted offer. You did get the offer accepted, yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

and the guy called me and said you know, I don't know who you are, but we've got to do a deal together, so let's work it out. And we did. And then we went through that the house needed a lot of work, more work than the buyer was willing to put on, and so they ended up backing out anyway, out anyway. Wow.

Mike Litzner:

but it set a precedent for me to kind of push to push and do something out of the box, because I saw the payoff on the at the end of the day, very much so, very much so. So what's interesting is, as we're talking about video and some of your marketing ideas, um, you've actually volunteered or put yourself out there for the company which we we respect. We try to bring this culture at co-op bank american homes of of we and us and giving and sharing, and you are actually taking on the role of mentoring and teaching a class on video and marketing. What was that like?

Luis Cardenas:

I mean nerve-wracking the first time because I never, you know, speaking for an audience, and it was when we were in digital and everybody went digital and we had to do it to zoom, and that's when everybody was attending the classes and there was, you know, 200, 300 people in the class. So obviously it was very humbling to get the call and say, hey, you, you, you can teach these to put something together, um, but it's more rewarding now that the classes are smaller and people join and it's you know, 15, 20 people in a class, right, and then later on I get videos from people saying, hey, you know, I try this. Or I see dev asher starting to do her own. She attends my classes. And then she said you know, what am I doing? I should be doing what he does, right, right, so that's pretty cool. I was one of the lucky people that took your last class, that when you used to teach the soaring to success class I was the.

Luis Cardenas:

I was the last class that took that class you were, that's right so before deborah should join yeah, before she did, and then I took hers as well yeah so I saw both coin, both sides of the coin, and and I always thought, if you as a, as a broker owner, would take time to teach us right, you know who know what, am I not to do it? There's a little bit of selfish in there, because if later on I'm I'm making an offer or I'm I'm making an offer on somebody else's listing and that person happened to be on the other side of the class, yeah, that made me give me a little bit of leverage. So it's a networking thing, it's a giving back thing.

Mike Litzner:

I find that when you actually teach and share your thoughts and ideas, it actually is a learning. You start to hear your own ideas and it helps you organize those thoughts, so you feel like you almost get internal growth by giving. I think there's something to be said about karma too, like when you give good out, it comes back to you. So it's interesting. So I got a real side question here. Okay, so you were both at Deb Asher's class and mine. Now I'm sitting here and stuff and Deb's probably going to see this. Whose class was better?

Luis Cardenas:

You know, I think it's two different styles. I liked your class better because you are more of a psychological person. You break down the way that people think and how to approach that thought process and walk people to the answer that you need, because sometimes I feel like a lot of times clients don't even know what they want at first. They know they want a house or they know they want to sell, but they don't even know how that all has to develop. And sometimes you take the listing on the spot and then the listing goes live next week, but a lot of the times when you become a real estate professional to them, they call you much, much earlier than that yeah, and so you start to peel the onion little by little, and it takes a little bit of a psychological presence to know, okay, this person is here and they want to be here.

Luis Cardenas:

How do I get them there? And I think that's what I learned the most about your side of the. That side is how to run a business? Yeah, because, you come into real estate and you don't know what you're doing, and you just know that you've got to get leads and you show houses and then, before you know it, you get a paycheck.

Mike Litzner:

Right, right. I think a lot of people get in our business because they I hear I like houses, you know things like that.

Luis Cardenas:

It's like okay, yeah, or it's freedom or it's you know, you can make your own schedule.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

And to most people that means I don't have to work.

Mike Litzner:

Right and turns out. You know it's a lot of work.

Luis Cardenas:

I was at my father-in-law's 70th birthday party this Sunday yeah, the party was from 1 to 3 in Glen Cove and I have a listing in Glen Cove and I told my wife I have to run out and I went at 2 30, had an appointment to go, show that listing and come back. So making your schedule yeah, allows me to make my own schedule right.

Mike Litzner:

also, that means that I work yeah, all the time somebody calls and. I gotta run yeah, you know, I gotta run. Well it's it's. It's great that your wife recognizes.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, you know that's probably one of the most important things that I've ever heard that I was lucky, that I did before even knowing. But it was marry the right person. Yeah, that's right If they're not in it to win it with you, yeah. And she sees that it's my passion. I mean, if I win the Mega Millions tomorrow, I'll just be home more.

Mike Litzner:

Right.

Luis Cardenas:

To be with the girls more.

Luis Cardenas:

Right home more right to be with the girls more right, but I'll still be doing real estate, because real estate is what I like doing.

Luis Cardenas:

I was one of the lucky people that, at 25, realized okay, this is what I should be doing with my life so that's how old you are when you when you started.

Mike Litzner:

I'm trying to remember when you started, but uh yeah, so it was uh, 2013.

Luis Cardenas:

I wasn't 25, but that's when it started, because I didn't get started in real estate like belly to belly, yeah, with clients, uh, in the beginning yeah, now we want to share with our audience how you started. I worked with these two brothers, who I was lucky to have as almost business mentors. I worked in an office and they encouraged me to get my license and I kept saying, yeah, yeah, I'll get it, I'll get it.

Luis Cardenas:

And you know, they kept saying, they kept pushing me and pushing me. And then one Monday I showed up to the office and he said, okay, from now on, monday, wednesday, friday you're not coming here for the next three weeks, you're going to go to this office and you're getting your license. Um, and they paid me to do it. So it was kind of like one of those things where people they saw something in me that I didn't even see yet, and um, they paid for it, they paid for the classes. They almost forced me to go and that's how I got started. But it was to do um, bpos broker price opinions. It was the time where there was a lot of distressed properties out there. Still, yeah, yeah, and um, that's how I got started walking properties and giving banks the value on their own portfolio, and then later on is when I really started doing so did you do appraisals, is that?

Mike Litzner:

what it was.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, they call it light, light appraisals, that's what they call them. That's kind of the the easiest way to understand what I used to do. Yeah, so I didn't work with clients directly. I work with banks. They were my client, okay all right, good, yeah.

Mike Litzner:

So what was the um mindset that transitioned from the appraisal side of it to the sales side?

Luis Cardenas:

of it. There was somebody at my church that knew that I had a license because in order to do these light appraisals you had to be a real estate agent, which meant you have to have a real estate license. So this person knew that I had a license and recommended me their boss to buy a house. And their boss moved from Ohio. They knew nothing about Long Island, they didn't have any family here, they knew nothing about anything. So to them Hempstead and Deer Park were just two names. But because they recommended me to their boss, I said I can't, I have to do what I have to do. So I went to my manager, Lisa, and I said to her okay, what do I, what do I need to do? I need, you know, I have this client and I've never sold a house, but I have to do this for these people, yeah. And so she said you know, well, we got to show them houses, find out where they were, and literally every single step.

Luis Cardenas:

I would go back to Lisa like I hired a gun, I was a mercenary. I would literally say, okay, point the gun this direction and shoot. And she would say, okay, I did that. Okay, well, now this is a new target. This is a new target and I sold them a house. I posted on Facebook like hey, just sold my first house. You know great experience, or whatever. They saw the post and they commented on it. We would have never known that it was your first house. You did a great job. Thank you so much for your help. Or?

Mike Litzner:

whatever right? Yeah, that's wonderful feedback, right yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

So I said to my wife I think this is cool, that I did a good job and maybe there's something in here, and I went back to doing my appraisals yeah, yeah nine months later, those people called me again and say hey, luis, we don't want to sell our place, but we want to buy another one in a different town.

Luis Cardenas:

Okay, I said, wow, I mean, you know that I'm not an expert, right, I'm just getting started. Yeah, and they were like no, you did great and we trust you to help us again. Yeah, and so when I finished that, I went back to my wife and I said okay, the BPOs were starting to come down because all the distressed properties started to resolve themselves.

Luis Cardenas:

The market started changing.

Luis Cardenas:

I went to Hadassah and I said I think this is something that I should look into, and Hadassah has always been like that person. She knows that if I put my head into it, I could have said no, I'm gonna open up a car wash and she would have been like do it If that's that you touched on.

Mike Litzner:

so your first two sales were both for the same person, right?

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah yeah.

Mike Litzner:

So you're questioning what they saw in you, and there's a saying that I've heard before that I love, because it just resonates so well. But they say people don't care what you know until they know that you care. Right, and I think that's you just hit on. They said all right, we know you're inexperienced, but we trust you Right.

Luis Cardenas:

And I think that's people. Now, I think that's kind of my brand. I'm a whole believer that that in order to succeed in this business, you have to be a brand. You're basically a walking coca-cola bottle, yes, and you could be fanta, you could be cold, you could choose whoever you want to be. Right, right, for me it's easy and people know me like I go out and people know me like oh, that's your wife. People recognize my wife because she's in my photos and my videos and my social media, my kids as well, and part of it is the honesty.

Luis Cardenas:

Part of it, I think, you go a lot farther. I tell everybody even now and I've been in business for a few years now I'm not really concerned about your transaction right now. I'm concerned about their relationship because I know we're going to be friends for a long time after here, right, and then it's this transaction that will lead to the next transaction, and this relationship will lead to the next relationship, and I don't know who else you know, so I have to do the right thing by you, and then you know, whatever you need from me will happen, because this is what I do for a living, yeah, but it will lead to more of a relationship that continues to develop.

Mike Litzner:

And that's what one deal turns into another deal and realistically that's a pipeline, right? Yeah, well, I, I think people think we're sales people and that we're we're trying to sell them stuff and in the reality, you know, we talked about our teaching point and our teaching point has always been you get paid a lot of money to help people.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, so if you help people instead of selling them first of they're so much more appreciative, you don't need to sell them real estate. Because real estate is such a great investment they need a roof over their heads. It's just a valuable asset to own, so people want to own it. So it's not really about selling them something. It's about helping them make the right choice. It's a big investment navigating it through, so agents that are successful who get that part of it change their focus. They're the ones that become the great ones.

Mike Litzner:

Because again word of mouth starts to spread when you treat them with care.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, I remember something you said probably one of the few things that I remember specifically that you said in your class, and it was because everybody's nervous in the beginning, right Once I get the lead and I'm in front of that listing appointment, what do I say? How do I know that I'm not going to say the wrong thing and screw it up? Yeah, and you said they don't know what you don't know. Yeah, and that kind of opened up for me the whole thing. Right, because I'm like okay, so just really need to know where to go get the answer and care that I wanna do the right thing for them and then eventually it will happen. And that's kind of. I've carried the business that way ever since. You know, do the right thing and then everything is flowing.

Mike Litzner:

I know some agents like they get this mindset like I don't wanna be in front of a person and be embarrassed, I don't know an answer. So it's like they spend their whole career getting prepared, right, but at a certain point it's like you know you got to step in the batter's box if you want to get ahead and there's something so powerful about telling your client?

Luis Cardenas:

you know that's a great question. I don't know, but I know where to get the answer. Let me get back to you in two minutes and then you shift the dynamic into I don't know and I'm on the lower side to I don't know everything. I mean, I don't think people expect you to know everything. You go to a doctor and a surgeon doesn't tell you right away what they you know. They do tests and then they say we're gonna call you back. So the same way we're, I don't think we're expected to know everything that they used to know. Because off the top of your head, off the top of your head, because a transaction is the same one every single time.

Luis Cardenas:

That's something that I cover on my um, on my buyers consultation. I say I, I show them the steps of the sale and I go. But there's humans on this side of the transaction and there's humans on that side of the transaction and your situation and their situation are going to be completely different depending on what kind of house we get. Yeah, so because it's humans, the transaction, the steps are all the same, but it may take six months and then sometimes three months. There may be things that change throughout. So every time it's going to be different and we just have to figure out how to get to the other side. Right, exactly, yeah, Exactly.

Luis Cardenas:

Yep.

Mike Litzner:

So I want to pivot a little bit, because I know you have a kind of unique path, not only into real estate but even to the United States. So it's. Am I correct? Is that in the last, was it two years ago? About a year and a half ago, you were actually officially a citizen?

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, I think it's going to be two years, I actually get to vote for the first time in this election, okay, so, yeah, I mean it's very exciting, so where did you grow up? I grew up in Venezuela. Okay, when I came here, we were rare. You didn't hear about Venezuelans too much. There was another guy in my school that just happened to be in the school, and then us.

Luis Cardenas:

How old?

Luis Cardenas:

were you. When you came to the United States, I was 13. Okay, I was 13 when I came. My father grew up here and then he went back to Venezuela. When I came, my father grew up here and then he went back to Venezuela, I mean, and then he did you know, adult life over there. And then when things got ugly over there, he kind of foresaw what was gonna happen and came here first, yeah, yeah. And then I came a year later with my mom and my sister, okay, Venezuela.

Mike Litzner:

they speak Spanish correct? Yeah, they do, all right. So were you bilingual? You taught two different languages?

Luis Cardenas:

No, so because over there I didn't, but because I had almost a head start that I knew I was coming. My mom kind of got us into a little bit of English classes so we wouldn't come here called Turkey. But I remember on the flight here I remember the guy was asking us in English it was an American Airlines flight and on the way here he was asking what I wanted to drink. And I had taken classes and I was so nervous that I had no idea what he was saying. All I kept saying was orange juice. So I don't know if you know, luckily he had it.

Luis Cardenas:

You know that's kind of like I learned that, but I didn't. I came here and I think the system here had enough tools where we came that we just learned and, as you can tell, I'm very chatty. I think that's what I'm supposed to be doing, just talking to people. And I couldn't help myself, and I had to learn to be able to express myself.

Luis Cardenas:

I felt like those five, six months in the beginning when you're just getting your wits about you with the language. I was bottled up ready to burst because I couldn't speak. I'm a very social person. I like being in social situations, yeah, yeah. So I think that propelled me to befriend other people and kind of learn.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, so, outside of the language, what were the biggest challenges as a teenager coming over?

Luis Cardenas:

I think, just assimilating into the culture. Kids in school are pretty cruel and you don't want to be on the thick end of that. Yeah, yeah. So just try to assimilate quickly. That was probably the hardest part.

Luis Cardenas:

My story was a little bit different. So when I came, my father brought us and then six months later he died. Okay, so he had lung cancer soon after we came, okay, and he wasn't sick for very long. It was only two months from the moment he was diagnosed to the moment he passed. Yeah, so couple the newness of being in a new country with the fact that you lose your father. It kind of sets you, you know, it suburbs you up, I guess, in the moment.

Luis Cardenas:

And I was lucky to have a great mom. Yeah, she went to work. She asked us in the hospital that he's not gonna make it, basically. So he had a clear conversation with us and said you, we have the chance to go back to venezuela to our family, or we, or we can stay, yeah, and if we stay it's gonna be tough, right. And she said and we, my sister and I, looked at each other like we want to stay, yeah, and she worked hard and you know I never went without. I started working early. That kind of showed me a little bit of a work ethic. Yeah, because I had to get a job at a deli when I was you know 14 sucking bottles and making sandwiches and then being in charge of the deli for a little bit yeah, so you know you grow up and it teaches your responsibility yeah, yeah so just I think assimilating is probably the hardest thing for a kid at that age.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, then again you know, girls, friends, high school, what's not to love? Right, right, right exactly, so it's a new experience and you just you know it's just pushed yes.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, Now I know there was a ceremony for your citizenship.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, how citizenship.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, how is that? That's got to be pretty rewarding, yeah, so you know you cry a little bit.

Luis Cardenas:

I'm a little bit sentimental guy and I you know it's an incredible experience because you just don't get a citizenship. They do a background check and they do a lot of stuff to make sure that you're not. You know they're not gonna accept somebody into the country. That's not supposed to be here. So there's a. There's a lot of stuff that you have to do, but then there's a test and when you go to an interview and they give you 50 questions and you have to learn a lot of stuff that I probably didn't even remember from high school, yeah, but basically, once you go to the interview and they ask you five of those 50 questions and then you pass, and then they say, ok, you passed. You know you're going to get some paperwork in the mail, yeah. And then you go to the swearing and once you pull up to the chair where they have all the paperwork for you, there is stuff about registering to vote and other things about the United States and there's a little flag on top of it. Yeah, oh, very cool.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, it was really awesome.

Luis Cardenas:

I had to do it by myself. My family wasn't there, because it was those times where people were spread out and all that yeah. But it was incredible, it was great and you, you know, just don't take it for granted, man. I came here because of a political situation in my country and now I get to make the difference and shape, maybe not our immediate future, but definitely for my kids.

Mike Litzner:

With that experience, how would you advise someone else who's walking that path now? What advice would you, you know, advise someone else who's who's walking that path now, you know what? What advice would you share with them?

Luis Cardenas:

so it's. It's. That's a hard question, because you know so. Obviously, once you become an american and once you've assimilated into the culture, you understand. I understand the, the good and the and the and the bad of the country, and I still think this is the greatest country on earth. Just like every human and every country, they aren't perfect. There are things that we still need to work out and I think it's ever going to be perfect. But it's very easy for me to say, yeah, I'm an American now I got in so close the door behind me. So there is a little bit of a situation there where you have to be understanding and you have to be empathetic about other people's situation. Sure, more than the humanitarian part of it, I think there's a safety situation. It can't be a free-for-all. There has to be a system and the system makes things go smoother. Right, you know there has to be money put into the system so that it works.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, but I think you, you, right now, there isn't a system, so it just has to happen.

Luis Cardenas:

No, it doesn't happen that way right, yeah, like, how lucky are we and how good our country works, that, even with the influx of people that we have, we still get to do what we get to do. Yes, and and most of us are not really impacted directly by all of this right, right, especially here in long island, we don't really see it. We're not in the southern states or in other areas where you have a hotel full of migrants, right, we don't see that here in Long Island, exactly, but it's still part of our country and it still needs to be resolved.

Mike Litzner:

So you've got a busy career and you're a family man with a wife, two daughters. How do you manage to juggle it all?

Luis Cardenas:

I think it goes back to passion. It doesn't feel like work and I don't like to say that, especially to my clients Like, oh, I don't feel like I'm working today. Well, you're selling my house and I expect you to do a good job, but I think the word is I don't feel like I'm laboring. I'm lucky I get to work with my brain and not with my hands, even though sometimes you have to move furniture for an old lady because you have to get the house ready to sell.

Luis Cardenas:

So sometimes we have to do that Because I don't feel like I'm working every day. I get to do what I really like to do every day. If you call me right now and you listen to my voicemail, my voicemail says if I'm not answering your call, I'm either with a client or taking care of my family. That's what I like to do. I'm lucky that I don't have to get up at five o'clock in the morning and do something that I don't want to do. So even though I was at my father-in-law's having fun with my family and I had to leave there to go do something real estate related, it wasn't like I was kicking and screaming all the way to the listing appointment.

Luis Cardenas:

I still like to go show properties. I still like to chase. I still like to chase yeah, because you never know what's on the other side of that conversation. If I showed up to that showing and then that person said to me I'd love to rent your unit, but I also, the reason why I'm moving is because I got to sell my place loose would you take a look at my place? I mean, that's like that's the conversation that everybody wants to hear, and I've had those.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

So, because I'm so passionate about real estate and I'm so passionate about my family, whether I'm doing one of those two, I'm happy and I think that's where I'm at.

Mike Litzner:

So what's one thing you do with your family that actually helps you recharge for real estate? You need the downtime.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah.

Mike Litzner:

What's your passion with your family?

Luis Cardenas:

the girls are old enough now that they're independent enough that they can come along and and be part of it. You know, I feel like we don't give them an ipad and sit over there. Right, we're gonna do, we're gonna do, they're, they're part of it. They hang out and they, they carry themselves. Well, yeah, right now, specifically right now, the thing that we do to recharge is we go to HomeGoods.

Luis Cardenas:

Because, we just bought a house Right, right and it seems like any time that we go to HomeGoods, Target or whatever, yeah, To me, obviously to me it doesn't matter what we do, as long as we do it together.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

As long as we're hanging out together, we could be in the car driving around. We just had a four-day long weekend, yeah, long weekend, yeah, and I was dropping them off to school this morning and I'm like man, I'm gonna miss you today because we spent, you know, a better part of four days together. Yeah, um, and we did a bunch of stuff. We did the girl. The girls like shopping. They don't, they don't love shopping, they don't get the shopping thing yet. Um, but they like hanging out. We're very light-hearted, we like to hang out, we like to have a good time. We got to eat. We maybe we get a little ice cream in between.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, so everything with ice cream is better, I guess, for them, but as long as we're together, I think we're just having a good time, okay, so yeah, that's great, that's great.

Mike Litzner:

So with all the work and energy you put in to both, I guess, family and work, um, how do you make time for yourself?

Luis Cardenas:

I get up at 6, 40 or 5 40 depending on what the schedule is in the morning, and I hit the gym okay, that's my thing.

Luis Cardenas:

I used to and I found some relationship in between going to the gym and the motorcycle thing, because it's the time where you can't really have your phone on you, right, and we live by our phone. Our business runs by our cell phones. Yeah, so, going to the gym, I like classes, like guided classes, where you just show up at a certain time, you're there for an hour, you take the class and then it's over because it's scheduled and it allows me to do it, yeah, in a way that where I can't say, oh, you know what, I'll go later, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, and before you, you know you don't go. Yes, exactly, um, so that that's me time. Yeah, I feel like it's gonna help me. It helps me mentally, it helps me get my day started earlier. It's also adult time. There's this different circle of friends there that show up every day for the same purpose yeah, getting up in the morning, going to the gym is being my.

Luis Cardenas:

I haven't been doing it for too long, I think it's only been like four or five years, so I didn't grow up that way. My father wasn't, you know, health not, or my mother was it but I found that that space and businesses come from it. Right, because they come there. You become their realtor, yes, the group, yeah. And then who doesn't want to do it? There's something sexy about real estate that everybody wants to know. How's the market? I saw the video. You posted this and that and just you become the guy for that, just as much as the accountant is the accountant for the group, right, right. So, yeah, the gym is my thing, and when it's warm out, I grab harley and I and I go out for a little bit.

Mike Litzner:

So, all right yeah, that's, you're a harley guy yep yep, all right, very cool.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, that's the only thing that I was allowed to get because, uh, if I got something faster than that, I probably wouldn't have been allowed to get it so with the idea that it was a harley, that it was slow, yeah I was able to get a motorcycle.

Mike Litzner:

Well, you gotta be careful yes yes. Tell me a story about that, what it's like on the road, driving, getting hit in the teeth with bugs, the go-to comment when I tell people that I ride a motorcycle is oh, please be careful.

Luis Cardenas:

It's so dangerous out there and it is. But my most dangerous moment in the bike was not from another driver, it was from I was riding and I got stung by a wasp. That's terrible.

Luis Cardenas:

I wasn't going that fast, I was on a regular road, but I felt and I knew it was a wasp not because I saw it, because you don't really see anything coming at you, right, I just felt this sting. And when you're riding a motorcycle, if I got hit by a wasp right now, or I saw it on me, I would probably freak out and run away and be able to get rid of it. Right, the thing about this happening on a harley is that you're holding on for your life so you don't fall off, and you know that something's in your shirt crawling around. So obviously I feel this thing. The reason why I knew it was a wasp is because once I pulled over and I kind of looked to see what it was, I saw this thing that, uh, that, uh, that a wasp would leave.

Mike Litzner:

He got you good, huh, he got me good.

Luis Cardenas:

Every time I ride. Now I just wear a shirt. I buckle my top button so nothing climbs in through here anymore.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, there you go. That's how I think he got in. Yeah, you learned that lesson in the hard work right.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's not something you can learn in a defensive driving course.

Mike Litzner:

Exactly, we talk a lot about giving you know, so we work hard, play hard. We give back Any specific charities or community organizations that were near and dear for you.

Luis Cardenas:

Not necessarily other than the Heart of American Homes, which I gladly every check that we get. We give back a little bit, yeah, so that's awesome because I know it goes to a good cause. Yeah, and I love that. Yeah, but I grew up in church that's kind of where my community is and for a long time before I got into real estate like really busy I played drums. That's kind of one of my attributes, I guess, and I played drums for about 15 years every Sunday in my church and so, even though I don't get to do it every Sunday now, I did it this past Sunday, okay. So whenever there's somebody that's sick or they need to make arrangements and they need somebody, they ask me and that's how I give back a little bit of my time. Oh, awesome. So this Sunday I got to do it and the month I have another time that they need me again and I get to do that. All right great.

Mike Litzner:

So what's your jam basically?

Luis Cardenas:

They have an electric drum set, so that's a little bit different. It's a smaller church.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

But I love doing that. It's something that I don't get to do often now, and when I get to do it, it's super rewarding. Yeah, leading a group of people into worship, it's kind of a powerful thing. Yes, it's very humbling. And it's another thing that I get to do that it's not I'm not, I'm me. I'm not dad or I'm not somebody's realtor, I'm not a husband, I'm just me, yeah, and I get to enjoy that. So it's a really cool thing to do Very much.

Mike Litzner:

Very cool, very cool. Obviously, as you volunteer to be part of our training program, you actually are helping, yeah, and donating your time and expertise to other agents, so that's got to be rewarding in its own way, yeah for sure.

Luis Cardenas:

It's a video class, right? So I'm training people how to come out of their shell and yeah, and and explain to them why in the logical way, but also show them through my journey how I was able to do it. If I was able to do it, why wouldn't anybody else? We all have the same skill set. Basically, you just have to show up and be in front of the camera and be, vulnerable enough to put yourself out there and not seek perfection.

Luis Cardenas:

I remember I played around with video for six months and after a while I said how long am I going to do this for? And so when you try to get people to make that leap, and then you see them do that later on and they say hey, luis, I did my first video. I got my listing because of a video I put out or you know and within the company, which is really awesome. It feeds me back to continue to do what I like to do. It goes back to the why Sometimes you put out so much information out there on an hour and a half class and you hope that something hits home and then three months later, somebody tells you that they were successful because it's something that I told them to do. So that's very, very rewarding.

Mike Litzner:

You recently bought your current home, but that was actually your second home purchase correct yeah. About a year or so, or a year and a half, you actually bought your first house.

Luis Cardenas:

Yeah. So what was that experience like? That was an investment house, right, man, everything that I bought, yes, so everything that I bought so far has been like miracle after miracle. And so the reason I I'm not going to take too long, I, and so the reason I I'm not going to take too long, I'm going to try to shorten this story as much as I can, okay, but just to show you the kind of situations that we're getting to real estate. So the reason I came across that listing or that property Right, I was selling a studio in Queens. Okay, it was a very difficult place to sell because it was in a building that was not very nice, but it was priced well, I, for 160 000, that's what you can get right, right, and then so this older gentleman would walk to the showings.

Luis Cardenas:

He would only come to look at the place at the open house, and it had maybe six open houses when I was selling that place. Yeah, he showed up maybe three times. Okay, with a backpack on, turns out he would come in look at it. He's like I'm really interested, I, I really like it. He came back the next weekend again and I would say you know, do you want me to show it? I can show it to you privately. We don't have to wait until the open house. No, no, no, when you're there, I'm coming. Good, anyway, finally he decides to make an offer.

Luis Cardenas:

We put interesting, because how is this guy going to be able to afford this place if he doesn't drive? I mean, yeah, there's got to be a reason, right, right, turns out, um, he came to the office. He wouldn't let me pick him up. He, he took public transportation to the office and we sat down because we had to. It was a co-op and we had to explain to the co-op that he could afford the place, right. So he came with a like four or five different pieces of paper.

Luis Cardenas:

You know, I had to sit there and and figure out, like a financial advisor, why this guy was able to afford, you know, with social security and an annuity, and this turns out the guy was worth a million dollars. Okay, he had a quarter, a quarter million dollars here on this annuity. He had a hundred thousand here in the bank. He had this and this and that and then he had a property that was paid off, right, okay. So I asked him the property, what are you going to do once you're going to sell that? I would love to get the opportunity to sell that once you move Right. You know, trying to pitch myself in that job right, yeah, you're there.

Luis Cardenas:

And he said to me well, if you know any investors, you know I would love to sell the right thing by him. And I wasn't listening. He kept telling me he didn't want to deal with anybody. That's why he didn't want to. He wanted to do something, a certain way, and I said to him well, but an investor is not going to pay you top dollar for your place, and if it's a nice place, you know, let's open it up, let's put it out there in the market so that you can get as much money for it as possible. Just trying to do the right thing, yeah, and I don't want to do that. You know this, this, this, this, this, and that I don't want to, just an investor.

Luis Cardenas:

And then, in passing, I said maybe I'll buy it from you and because I'd helped them out, yeah, and. And so he told me, after some time talking and figuring out how we're going to get him the place, he told me that he had gone to other apartments. My apartment wasn't the one that he necessarily wanted, but because I gave him time of day and I took the time to figure out how he could afford it, a lot of people kept dismissing him when I said to him I would love to, maybe I'll buy it, because I was starting to think about becoming an investor. He said you would and I said yeah, yeah, I mean I'd love to abide as a rental property, right, I went to look at the place, I saw it and I knew it was worth. You know, whatever it was worth right and I did the numbers and the offer that I could make and was a lot lower than what I thought it was worth right and I avoided him for two months.

Mike Litzner:

Wow, to the point you were afraid to make an offer. I was afraid to make an offer.

Luis Cardenas:

I want to insult him I yeah, so, and because I knew the situation, he was in and I kind of wanted, you know, I wanted to get him, whatever he was.

Luis Cardenas:

You know he was due, right. And uh, he finally called me and put me in the corner and said lewis, um, you either gonna buy the place and make me an offer or we got to sell it, right? And I said look, I've been in borneo for a little while. This is my offer. And he said for you, fine, you can have it for that much. Wow.

Luis Cardenas:

And then in that moment I said I should have offered 25 000 less, but I got a pretty good deal on it and that was my first, um, my, that was my first experience buying a property. I didn't buy anything this year because I've got my own, but we have. You know, it's something that brian says all the time, brian carp. So you know, we have basically the keys to the kingdom. We know how to create wealth. Yeah, and I've been encouraged by you and tom to push to find it and figure out a way. Yes and um, in my family, my wife and I've joked around that we have a 20-year plan. It's, you know, one a year for 20 years.

Mike Litzner:

That's how I plan to retire, yeah, yeah.

Luis Cardenas:

So my first year was last year, when we come up with the family motto one a year for 20 years and I plan on getting at least one rental property a year, great plan Until I turn 55 and then it's a fantastic you know, fantastic uh.

Mike Litzner:

Retirement plan, yeah, real estate you know it's wealth building yeah, it's a tremendous opportunity.

Luis Cardenas:

So, and I think everybody, everybody should I tell everybody that wants to sell their place are you sure you don't want to keep it and rent it? And for most people they're, they're not landlords most. You have to have a certain personality and you have to have a certain yeah, a thick skin to deal with the things that could go wrong when you own property, right, um, and when you have to deal with the things that could go wrong when you own property and when you have to deal with tenants. But everybody, I think, should have at least one that they can pass on to their kids, because it's not something you have to labor for.

Luis Cardenas:

We live in a country. It goes back to America and our economic system, whatever you have to say about it. If you tell me that I could put in the grant $1,000 today and 20 years from now it's going to be twenty thousand dollars, why wouldn't I do that, right? Well, the same thing happens with real estate, exactly, and you can leverage money that you don't have right to get a payoff, that's, you know, 10x, 20 years from now, exactly, whatever that is all right.

Mike Litzner:

Well, audience is listening. If you need investment properties, yeah, you should have one. Yes, yeah, lewis is here and uh, he's got his own personal experience in managing it and can give you advice. So it's time for the drop the mic question excited for this one all right. So yeah, obviously you're originally from venezuela. Can you survive without a repas? Am I saying that right?

Luis Cardenas:

uh, yeah, yeah can I survive without them? Uh, I don't think I can I'm I'm not a huge arepa eater like I don't. I don't, you know, crave them, but my wife makes the most. My wife is american.

Luis Cardenas:

She was born here yeah her father is from guatemala and her mother is brazilian, so not venezuelan at all, right, um, and she's learned how to make them. My daughters asked for them. Can you tell our audience what an arrepa is? Sure, so it's a, it's a cornmeal. Um, closest thing I could say it would be like a tortilla, but it's thick. Yeah, you know, it's your tortilla. You imagine it would be very thin? Yeah, this would be, let's say, four times that, okay, and it has a. It's a different taste than, uh, than a tortilla, but it's the same core meal idea, right, and you slice it in the middle like a sandwich, okay, and you can put chicken and you can put steak. It's basically a vessel right for anything that you love to eat. So in the morning we have it with scrambled eggs and cheese, right, and then at night you can have them with steak and, uh, you and cheese. So it's better than a sandwich.

Luis Cardenas:

It's healthy actually because it's not fried or anything it's baked. So yeah, it's one of those Venezuelan goodness that you really need to try to have at least once in your life.

Mike Litzner:

There you go. I actually have never tried it, oh yeah, and I'm going to lean on you. You've got to try to have at least once in your life. There you go.

Luis Cardenas:

I actually have never tried it.

Mike Litzner:

Oh yeah, and I'm going to lean on you. You've got to introduce me to it.

Luis Cardenas:

I'm going to take you to the place, all right.

Mike Litzner:

We've got a place for that. So what else is something from your home country that we don't really have here that you miss?

Luis Cardenas:

That I miss. I miss my family. I don't have that here, but the weather yeah, the weather is the weather in the city where I'm from. It's like the.

Luis Cardenas:

Caracas, okay, yeah, it's the capital city of Venezuela. Okay, and because I came here so young I didn't realize how good it was, I mean, I didn't have. You know, you have sort of perspective, right. If you live always in New york, you think this is what weather is like, right, right, um. But if you live in three different places, but what I've heard that's closest to the weather over there is kind of like san diego, it's like perfect temperature yeah um, over there they don't have seasons, they have two seasons it's a rainy season and the dry season.

Luis Cardenas:

So for some part of the year it rains more than the other. Okay, but it's like dry, crisp, warm, you know weather, that you go out and you don't sweat.

Mike Litzner:

Yeah, but you still feel warm. It's pretty close to the equator, right?

Luis Cardenas:

Yes, yes, it's right above the equator.

Mike Litzner:

So where are?

Luis Cardenas:

the ocean that's right above it. It's the Caribbean Ocean, okay. So where are the ocean that's right above it? It's the Caribbean Ocean, okay. So if you've ever gone to Aruba, you can see from the most southern part of Aruba you can see Venezuela, okay. So if you know the Aruban weather, that's the weather over there.

Mike Litzner:

That's the Caracas Yep. Very good, Very good. Well, Luis, I really appreciate you sharing yourself your expertise today with our audience. If someone wants an investment property or to sell a house, how do they reach you?

Luis Cardenas:

Probably Instagram Social media is the easiest place At. Listed by Lewis, that's me or 516-881-0126. That's the easiest way to find me Awesome.

Mike Litzner:

All right, excellent, excellent. Thank you again for taking the time to be part of our show today.

Luis Cardenas:

Thank you for having me.