The Property Perspective
From hidden gems to billion-dollar deals, this is The Property Perspective - where seasoned real estate pros reveal how they spot value others miss, and industry disruptors share the unconventional strategies reshaping real estate.
The Property Perspective
Revolutionizing Real Estate: Insights from Jocelyn Vas on Market Trends, Technology, and Industry Reform
Join us with Jocelyn Vas, the brilliant Chief Knowledge Officer at Final Offer and a seasoned realtor from the DC area. Jocelyn shares her family's inspiring journey from Hungary and how her background in psychology and mental health therapy uniquely equips her to connect with clients on a deeper level. We discuss her transition from an aspiring therapist to a real estate expert, highlighting how the lessons learned at James Madison University laid the groundwork for her career. Jocelyn's ability to combine active listening with keen curiosity offers fresh perspectives on navigating the challenges and opportunities within the real estate sector.
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00:00 - Hope (Announcement)
Ever wonder why real estate still feels like the Wild West? In this episode, host Preston Zeller sits down with Jocelyn Vas, chief Knowledge Officer at Final Offer and seasoned DC area realtor, to explore how transparency technology and a psychology-driven approach could revolutionize the real estate industry. From seven sister brokerages to Final Offer's disruptive tools, Jocelyn shares how she's shaping the future of buying and selling homes From hidden gems to billion-dollar deals. This is the Property Perspective, where seasoned real estate pros reveal how they spot value others miss and industry disruptors share the unconventional strategies reshaping real estate. Now here are your hosts.
00:41 - Preston Zeller (Host)
All right, welcome everybody. My name is Preston Zeller. I'm the Chief Growth Officer at Batch Service. I'm joined today by Jocelyn Vas right, that's how you say, your last name, right, Vas? Yeah, okay, cool. Chief Knowledge Officer at Final Offer, and I'm really looking forward to learning about your background today, Jocelyn and Final Offer, and just how on earth you got into real estate, but also a pretty forward thinking technology company in the retail real estate space for single families. So, welcome again. I'd love to just tell everyone a little bit about who you are and where you're at now. Yeah, thanks for having me, Preston. I'm Jocelyn Voss. I'm and where you're at now.
01:24 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, thanks for having me, Preston. I'm Jocelyn Vas. I'm the Chief Knowledge Officer at Final Offer. I'm a real estate agent in the Washington DC metropolitan area and West Virginia for almost 16 years now. I'm also a licensed clinical mental health therapist. I am no longer practicing, but I do have that license. So all three of those jobs fall under my cap here, as what I'm an expert at.
01:52 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, and having a background in mental health I'm sure is good for not just people but being in real estate in general.
02:01 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah.
02:02 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Cool. Well, why don't you take us back? You know, I'm actually I kind of like to start this way, or I have been of, just like you know what did your parents do for a living growing up, and also like you have any siblings. Let me start there.
02:16 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, so my dad was an immigrant from Hungary. He came over to America in 1956 when they thought another war was going to occur the Hungarian Revolution and he came over to Bethesda, Maryland my mom's family also Holocaust survivors, immigrants from Vienna, Austria and Hungary as well and so they were all in Bethesda, which is how they met and had me and my sister, who's four years older than me, and I've been born and raised in that. The region of the DMV is what we like to call it, which is not the Department of Motor Vehicles, it is the DC Maryland, Virginia area, which I've caught myself a million times saying, but it's really rare to be from here and live here still. So that is very unique about me. My dad was a teacher and then an accountant, and my mother was a teacher in public school for over 30 years and I went to school grad undergraduate school at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. After I graduated there, I moved back to the area where I almost immediately became a real estate agent.
03:34
It was 2008. And it was right when everything was. You know, all the people had a hard time getting jobs, and so I was living in an apartment and luckily had some savings to do so and my landlord. I had these like creepy neighbors that I wanted to just get away from. So I said, hey, can I move? Can I break my lease? And he said, if you rent out your place, I'll let you move into one of my other places that I have down the street. I said okay, and I did it really quickly. And he said, hey, I just bought a building. Can you help me with this? And I said, sure, Didn't have a job. So it sounded like a good idea. And so he said, go get your real estate license. You need to do that in order to work for me and let's get moving.
04:19
So started off at a little mom and pop shop with seven sisters who owned this brokerage I was the youngest person by a landslide that they had hired. They were super against bringing on young people, but I learned a ton of what I know today from just old school people doing old school ways in our business.
04:44 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Seven sisters owned this one brokerage.
04:48 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yes, they are all not alive anymore, which is very sad, but, yeah, they all work together. Lots of drama, but I was totally out of it because I was, you know, 22 years old and just there for the ride being like what's a contract? What does this mean?
05:02 - Preston Zeller (Host)
So who was the guy in the mix of all this?
05:06 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Oh the guy. Well, he's not a great guy, to be honest, but he's a builder in Virginia, but he owned a lot of properties. As much as he was not a great guy, I'm grateful there's always that silver lining. I am grateful that he forced me into the business. My first deals were through him and they were million dollar deals each and I had no idea what I was doing, so got lucky with that.
05:33 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Were you in? Well, actually, I'm curious. So you said Hungarian, right? Yeah, so I mean you know, I actually grew up in a um uh went to high school, particularly in Southern California, where there are a lot of uh, first generation different Asian countries, um middle Eastern countries. So it was interesting going into their homes Cause it was often like it was like you were going somewhere there. Right, culture is still very like preserved Um, was that like your house? Or were your parents trying to kind of like distance themselves Like what was that like your house? Or were your parents trying to kind of like distance themselves? Like what was that like growing up?
06:07 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, unfortunately. Well, they're Jewish and Hungarian and there's a lot of anti-Semitism in Hungary still today, unfortunately. So a lot of my family who's still there also tends to distance themselves from being Jewish because of that, just to try to assimilate and fit in. And so what I would say is you know, we grew up with not a lot, which is why I have that fire in my belly today, so I'm super grateful for that. Hopefully, my kids feel the same way, even though I spoil them, because I am just wanting them to have more than what I had. But no, you know, we, we, they bought a foreclosure home in an area of Bethesda which was very wealthy for the time, and, um, we were not wealthy, and so that was very noticeable to me, to my sister, um, our home, right, but they wanted us to have a better life and thought that by doing that, it would be putting us in an area where there's better schools and, you know, more money.
07:10 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, right, oh, that's, I mean, super commendable. Anyone kind of restarting is in fact two of our founders. They're Bulgarian, Bulgarian, and so they, their parents, came over here as well and you know they have a you know kind of similar type restart story for their family. But going into college is that where you were developing more of the kind of psychology background, exactly.
07:39 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
So I I had gotten into a couple schools, but I got into a program for psychology only at James Madison University, where I was with a cohort that was super heavily focused on psychology. And so, as I was approaching my last year of college, I realized, oh, you have to go to grad school to be a therapist. No, thank you, I'm done with school Not happening.
08:01
And so definitely put that aside for many, many years and decided to go into something that was a bit easier and quicker, even though the market was terrible for jobs when I graduated college.
08:14 - Preston Zeller (Host)
What I mean? I guess there's maybe an obvious answer to this, but what were maybe like the biggest one or two things that you picked up from the you know, four years of studying there, that's a good question.
08:26 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Well, I'll never forget this one study that I did myself, where I stood in an elevator for multiple days and dropped a ton of papers on the floor as people would come in on the elevator.
08:39
And I had a timer counting to see how long it took someone to help me, if someone even helped me. And so it was this huge study I did and what really blew my mind. It has a lot to do with the bystander effect. I like murder, mystery, documentary, crazy ridiculous TV and stuff, and you just think sometimes, is anyone going to help? Are they going to think that someone else is going to help? And so that was one of the biggest things, because I tried to be. You know, I'm an outgoing introvert, if that makes sense. And so when I see people that need help, whether it's, you know, through real estate or just on the side of the road, I try to just go and help, because you can't assume that everyone is helping out when you're all at the same place. And so that was one of the biggest things. That was my favorite part to study.
09:30 - Preston Zeller (Host)
How long did it take people to help?
09:32 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I mean, you would be surprised how often people didn't help me at all.
09:36 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Just it kind of ignored that there was a stack of papers on the ground.
09:40 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, now, mind you, these are mostly college kids that you know they feel like hungover, who knows? But ultimately didn't get much help, which I found really interesting, right, because they thought, oh, someone else will help her, I don't need to, let me just get off this elevator as quickly as possible.
09:56 - Preston Zeller (Host)
That reminds me real quick Because I had a similar, like sociology type experiment. It wasn't dropping papers, though. It was going to an elevator and face the opposite way everyone else is, which is usually towards the wall.
10:11 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
To look like a weirdo or what?
10:13 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Just to see how people reacted, I'm like I don't know, that's what I was paying for we have too much in common if we both have elevators.
10:20 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
That we remember, right? I know I'm like I haven't thought about that in so long.
10:23 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I'm like I guess elevators that we remember right I know I haven't thought about that in so long. I'm like I guess elevators are a strange incubator for psychology experiments. You said there were a couple of things. Was there one other one that kind of came to mind from college?
10:37 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Oh, you know, I mean I was really into, you know, psychodynamic theory, which is just understanding childhood and how it impacts you today.
10:47
And I think it had a lot to do with my childhood, of course, where, you know, I didn't have a lot growing up in an area where everyone had a lot, or my parents had to work all the time and couldn't come to my sport events or I had to shop at consignment stores or whatever it was, but how that impacts me today, right, and who I became. And so I just realized that my brain was always like looking at that when I'm talking to people and trying to understand them. But one of the biggest things is just being an active listener. I think that I learned that through school. I learned it but it was innate in me that I like to ask questions about people, I like to hear more and it makes them feel good and I don't mean to do it just for that reason, but I'm curious and I think being curious is one of the most important things in general across the board in life.
11:38 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, it's amazing how many adults, too, are terrible at active listening. It's kind of shocking sometimes.
11:47 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Probably something to do with their childhood.
11:49 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Maybe. Well, you know you saying that's interesting. I grew up in a way, too, where I was always a very introspective person. I was writing a lot of music and writing poem or poetry or lyrics or whatever it was. So I get that. I mean, it sounds like you always just kind of want to understand in some ways, like why you tick the way you do.
12:12 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, it's also like I don't enjoy reading, which I know is terrible to say out loud, but it's true. But where I've learned everything in my life is from talking to people. It's my favorite way of learning, it's where I get energy, it's where I can understand different perspectives. You know, I'm always trying to understand everyone's perspective, in particular in conflict.
12:36 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, and I'm just kind of curious real quick is your, is your sister similar or like totally?
12:40 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
opposite as that, yeah, nothing alike. Of course Nothing alike.
12:44 - Preston Zeller (Host)
That's how it works, okay, so, yeah, going back to you getting into this seven sister agency, I can't get past that. So what happened from there? You're at that brokerage or agency and like, yeah, how does it evolve from there?
13:01 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah. So I had a couple mentors, at one in particular who's like a huge big shot realtor today and she was kind of warning me that she didn't think the brokerage was going to be around much longer. So she said you should talk to other brokerages. And that's when I had really branched out and realized, oh wow, there's so much more that can be offered to me. Not that it wasn't a great place to be, but I had been there for maybe seven or eight years and I had reached my capacity right. I had no marketing help. I didn't know how to do really anything except read a contract, write a contract, but nothing to take me to the next level. And that's when I scooted over to a more boutique for the DC area a boutique shop that's about 450 agents called Arla Real Living at Home. I went there for a year and learned quite a bit about how to market myself, how to talk about myself in a way that made me feel comfortable, because I don't like to be like work with me right. That's why I like selling homes right Is because I'm doing something that really helps people where there's a need. I don't want to sell roofs, even though everyone needs a roof. You don't need a roof. That often, right, I'd rather sell something where people really need it, and so I feel better about what I'm doing in that process.
14:26
So I went over to that company for a year and then I scooted over to Compass for a couple of years, which is where my business really took off and where I really began to network myself as an agent and learned the value of making friends with other agents. I didn't really see the value in that before. Because we're such, I was a solo agent for so long. I didn't really see the value in that before because we're such I was a solo agent for so long. I didn't see the value. Why would I talk to my competition? Why would I befriend them? But then I realized very quickly how that is so critical and important in this business, and that's really when my business took off and I was the number two agent at Compass in DC in 2021 and, I believe, 2022.
15:07 - Preston Zeller (Host)
And you know. So what kinds of like, what, what echelon of homes are you getting into at this point? I mean, was it cause DC has like a pretty mixed bag? Of like really dumpy stuff and really expensive stuff, right yeah.
15:21 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, you know, a lot of it has to do wherever I live, which I I have. I own seven homes, which sounds crazy, but I've lived in each one as a primary residence and then I moved. So my poor children have lived in way too many homes, but they're all in the DC area for the most part. But I've lived in so many different regions of DC, which it's very small, which is nice, but it can become very pocketed, so my business tend to be wherever I was and in those regions. So my average price point's about $800 to a million. But we don't have a huge luxury market here in my opinion, but I know that there is political stuff that's quite luxury style, but I'm more second, you know, second time, sometimes, first home, first time home buyers, sellers that are looking for a step up, or even older people that are looking to step down essentially all over the map, though I don't discriminate, right.
16:21 - Preston Zeller (Host)
And I'm curious too because, like I've been to DC before, I'm a West coast kid, so you know there's jealous, there's, there's, there's so much about, uh, you know, I think, just different parts of the country where you're like that feels like another country over there, right, um, even more, so right now.
16:39 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
No, I'm just kidding.
16:41 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Well, yeah, I mean just yeah, uh, but you go to like parts of the South and you know just wherever it could be very different. But so for DC, I'm kind of curious. Just, we associate it with politics, right. I mean, so you know, nation's capital, but what? Who's generally living in DC? Such a good question.
17:06 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I would say that you know there are some locals like me, people that are from here not a ton but there definitely are some that live in, like the region around DC. I live in DC proper but tons of my friends live in parts further out in Virginia and so you remember, most agents are DC, Maryland and Virginia because they're so close together. It just makes sense.
17:26 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Is that how the MLS works too, by the way? Yeah, I think it's bright, is the main one.
17:30 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Right and they extend even further. But those three markets, those three States, it's very rare that an experienced Asian agent isn't across all three.
17:41 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Okay. And so I I forget what your question was, oh no, just about people who who's like buying real estate and like I mean DC proper, let's go DC proper younger people working on the Hill, Hill staffers, government employees not really.
17:59 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I mean, maybe a lot it depends if you're a family or not not. A lot of families want to be here as much now as they used to be. We've had some crime issues that you know since COVID that have not really resolved. And then our schools. I think our schools are amazing. Some people prefer to just, you know, go over the line and get into Maryland quickly or Virginia quickly and go to those schools. So you know it's, it's very liberal, very um, maybe young families, but not forever families, cause, you know, middle and high, they're usually gone. And young people that are moving here that work for the government, or yeah, I don't know anymore because we've had we've had so many layoffs recently that I it's looking weird, it's feeling weird.
18:49
Our market is really not good, you can feel it. It's not as bad as all those viral videos saying that we have so much inventory. That's not true at all.
18:59 - Preston Zeller (Host)
All of those were fake I was gonna ask about that actually, yeah, because you, I mean that this is the thing in the news, right, I mean. So, um, either way you slice it, and whatever political view it's like, just feels tainted. So, um, yeah, what is happening in the market there?
19:15 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
yeah, I mean we in dc proper. It's horrible. I mean I have listings sitting for months in, in particular, condos. We were hopeful when the call for everyone to come back to work five days a week would bring back people wanting to buy condos in DC because they moved to Atlanta during COVID and now they need somewhere to sleep during the week when they're here five days a week or three days a week or whatever it may be. That really stopped the second that it went from. You know you got to be back at work five days a week to. We're now just doing some serious firings across the board.
19:50
And so the condo market is horrible. And then there's teeny, tiny chunks of DC that are super close to the Maryland border that are doing well, that have limited and low inventory. So we're still seeing multiple offers, and then the burbs of Virginia and Maryland are doing decent, but all condos have really been struggling across the board since COVID in the three regions.
20:17 - Preston Zeller (Host)
And I mean when you say condo in that context, are these like really nice condos or Some yeah?
20:25 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
All over the map.
20:27 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Okay, yeah.
20:33 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
The luxury. I mean most people since COVID, you know they want outdoor space. They don't see the value in condos. Interest rates are so high plus well, in relatively they're so high plus a condo fee, it's just hard to see the value. Um, you don't see many DC lifers, if you ask me, like people that are going to be here with kids, that are going to be here forever, which is unfortunate, but it is. It is what it is. That is what you see People tend to. You know, switch out and move out to the burbs.
21:03 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Okay, so they're moving to Maryland or Virginia at some point. Yeah, I think it's like you said, I mean dc is it's just, it's a very, very small geographic area.
21:14 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Right, it's really small in a great way, though, because when I go visit other cities, I'm like this is obnoxious, how hard it is to get around, whereas I can get to one side to the other in 30 minutes in traffic, and I'm thrilled.
21:26 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, so let's, let's go back into, and you said you were at Compass and like what year is this at Compass for you?
21:36 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Right before COVID I went to Compass. So this was before they were a publicly traded company. I was there and I was there until traded company. I was there and I was there until 2023. So it was probably three years 2020 to 2023 that I was there and I was doing really well. They had a lot of really great technology. The private, exclusive functionality, which I know is a really hot topic right now. Clear cooperation in our industry. I counted 40% of my business of doing it off market. Is that the right thing to do? Who knows right? But ultimately it was a thing and it was a thing that was very prevalent and top of mind at our offices to leverage that functionality as a whole, because the more agents that did it, the more value there was to the buyer agents, to the buyers and to the sellers and to the you know, to everyone. So I did really well there. They have really, you know, easy to use, streamlined technology.
22:38 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, and this they went, was it, were they IPO while you were there?
22:43 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah.
22:45 - Preston Zeller (Host)
And how did that change things?
22:46 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Oh, let me tell you I mean I'll this is part of why I left, which everyone makes fun of me, it's not really true, but I joke around was that when I was there before it was an IPO, we had every single piece of food or drink in the office was like infused with caffeine and I was like this is amazing right, Like you could get the best snacks in the world.
23:04
Everything had caffeine infused in it. The second we went public I couldn't find a bubbly water, and I used to do the same. I'm like I'm paying $300 a month for a resource fee and I can't even get a bubbly water. So that was like my big line that everyone like laughed about me at, but that it was annoying, you know those things matter more than people think, you know, and I mean people who are, you know, making those decisions.
23:31 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I mean it's like an easy thing to go ah, we don't need that, but you're like it makes people happy.
23:35 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, and I'm paying for something. What am I paying for? And I think compass has had its struggles right Of where. When I first was there, they started, you know we were a luxury group of agents and it turned into, you know, mass hirings, where there was less criteria, and I'm maybe I'd be told differently, but I know for a fact, you know, that they hired anyone with a heartbeat for quite a while and it was noticeable within the realm of working there and it didn't feel as special in a lot of ways that it used to be.
24:12 - Preston Zeller (Host)
That's. It's what. The way you're describing it reminds me so much of a startup that's in scale mode, sure, because you know and I've been in several of those where you just go, oh we got this really like we have a culture, and then that culture erodes so much, and part of it can be just because you start hiring people in a very different manner. Yeah, they're recruiting people. Hiring people in a very different manner, yeah, they're recruiting people. So, just because we're talking about Compass and IPO, what do you think about the Rocket Redfin news?
24:47 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
You know I'm actually I'm. There's a few things In my market in particular. Not a lot of people use Rocket Mortgage, even consumers Agents have had a bad experience or two where we've almost controlled the market in the sense of if you want to work with Rocket, you can, but we can't guarantee they'll close, we can't guarantee they won't mess up the numbers, we can't guarantee anything Right, and so I think that they're trying to control the market in a different way, like Compass right, compass announced their Compass coming soon where their agents are now not putting coming soon status on the MLSs. They're doing it on their portal and their site, which they're driving consumers to, to use and work with Compass agents and be the place where you search. I think that Redfin and uh Rocket. The goal is to be where you search, where you get mortgage title, everything in one place and it'll be way cheaper than anywhere else. But with cheaper comes cheaper quality of service, which all of us know what that can look like.
25:55 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Mm-hmm, um, do you uh, uh, because you talked about clear cooperation and some of that stuff. But have you heard of American Real Estate Association?
26:06 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, yeah.
26:07 - Preston Zeller (Host)
So Jason Haber was. We just put out a podcast with him, so that's been a pretty interesting one. Do you have any thoughts on that whole thing?
26:16 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, I think. Look, I mean I haven't even mentioned what I've done at final offer. But you know, when you I don't want to call what he's doing a disruption but when you're trying to, you know, get masses of people to do something different in an industry where they've done everything one way for quite a while, and not only that, they're their own bosses, that makes it very complicated. I don't see the value in NAR, but I don't really see the value in them. So I am sort of just neutrally not really caring or paying attention to which I'm sure a lot of agents are in that respect. Now, I believe, with clear cooperation, they're saying that you can have the choice to send it to a portal site. Is that correct?
27:03 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I don't recall, honestly, the specifics I read something about that.
27:07 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, look, I think that you know there are what. What I think is good about everything going on right now with KW getting investment. You know all of this happening right now is that there's interest in our industry, right.
27:22 - Hope (Announcement)
Is it?
27:23 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
kind of being gobbled up in certain ways. Yes, is that to be expected? Yeah, at this point, I think we'll be seeing a lot of that. But what I do know is that there's interest in our industry. There's money in our industry that people are spending. To me, that's a good sign, so I'm happy about that.
27:41 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I, I, I feel that too, cause, um, I mean, you know we're, I think, and we're going to definitely get to final offer and the interesting things you guys are doing there. But just the um, you know, just the um, you know legacy of real estate in this country, how it's been run, uh, you got to go okay. Well, you know, is there a better way to do things right? And, um, I know we've had this conversation separately before, but the fact that there are people kind of hopefully paying more attention to it now, especially because, um, it had the industry got so jacked during, uh, covid, yeah, just for a variety of reasons.
28:27
Uh, lance lambert actually does a really good job of breaking that down. Uh, from an economic standpoint, but you know at at what point does is the industry and consumers and all that kind of stuff start to, is going to start to go. Hey, like actually embrace these things in mass.
28:45 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Right.
28:46 - Preston Zeller (Host)
And you know the, you know pioneering companies that change that is. You know, it's just fascinating to pay attention to.
28:53 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
So I totally agree with you. I mean one of the biggest issues. There's two issues that I think are enormously going to cause us a big problem as realtors and as an industry as a whole. One of those is the barrier to entry is so low and if NAR doesn't change that, like during COVID, where we had all these agents come in and then you have all these agents come out when the business does poorly, that doesn't help. And then there was some stat it was like 71% of real estate agents last year didn't sell one home. I mean, what is that right? And what's unfortunate is that all these bad actors that come into this business because it's a weekend course that they can do online. It hurts the people that actually do this for a living and sell homes and want to represent people.
29:43 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, I mean that's you know. I'm thinking back to some other conversations I've been having recently where it's like you know, you go back to NAR. One of the major ways they make money right is basically, you know, requiring, yeah, requiring people to belong to them, and I think Jason actually brought up a good point when we were talking that it's like 99% of Asians belong to NAR, whereas any other trade group it's like in the 20s would be, like, you know, an acceptable percentage. So like, and you know, I'm curious just generally in what way they're they may be trying to encourage laws in such a way to make it maybe even easier, require more people to join it because of those fees I don't know, or where they're going to try to, you know, pull it together. So I think there's a lot of conflict of interest there, maybe because of that.
30:41 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Well, yeah, and if you look at the salaries they released of everyone, maybe that's where they could pull back.
30:47 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I actually didn't see those. What were those like? Yeah?
30:50 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
A few million dollars a year, you know, do you need that much money to run this place, I mean? So there's a lot of reform that's needed, a lot of change. I think that you know last year and it was all about the lawsuit and the change in, you know, buyer agency agreement requirement not being on the MLSs anymore and I think this year is the talk of clear cooperation, and I think that you know we are totally ripe for change. I think that technology has. It's the right time for technology to step in, because I think one of the other bigger issues is just the way the industry is run as a whole when it comes to the limited to no information that consumers and agents have when it comes to offers. Limited to no information that consumers and agents have when it comes to offers. Right, and that leads me into you know why I got involved with Final Offer and I'll just give a final offer.
31:45
From what you know, it's an offer management and negotiation platform with real time offer alerts. Right, you know, today, a property is listed for sale, it goes under contract, it sells. There's no information on when offers are made, how many offers are made and if, and what those offers look like. And so when I'm representing a buyer today and it's a multiple offer situation, which I can't even validate that it is, but I'm being told that and they say to me well, what are we going to? What do we offer? Well, that cop over there, you know that's sold for a million, but it doesn't really matter, it's whatever, you know won't keep you up at night, right? I mean, you know how silly that sounds that I'm playing a guessing game when I'm working with a buyer to buy the biggest asset of their life.
32:33
I mean no wonder that there's been any. You know, and I'm a very hard working buyer agent. I about 70% of my business is buyer agents and I do about 30 million by myself a year. So I do a ton of buyers. I put a lot of work into it, I care a lot.
32:52
So when I hear people say there's no value in a buyer agent or it's going away, I get really frustrated, because the biggest issue that I see in when I'm representing a buyer is the fact of that negotiation period where I have no information and where I'm playing this game of you know how are we going to win Right? And then when my clients lose, they look at me and say, well, I would have paid more if I'd just known. Or you know why did I lose? Oh, we're not allowed to know until it closes. Or if they win and they say to me I just overpaid. Oh, my God, what happened that to me is a massive problem in our industry that everyone is ignoring and it makes no sense and that realtors that we feel so strongly connected to our power and strategy being a lack of transparency, a lack of information. I mean, what industry would you ever have as little information as possible when representing your client. I mean, that's crazy.
33:53 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Mm-hmm.
33:54 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
So I got involved with Final Offer. When I was at Compass, A couple of things happened. They launched originally in the DMV, DC, Maryland and Virginia in October 2022. And it was a Compass agent who's a founder of the company, Kevin Caulfield, out of Boston, Massachusetts, and he I was a Compass agent too and he reached out and said are you interested in learning more? And I said no, Like most real estate agents say no, I'm good with exactly the way I do everything. I don't need anything different. It's working, no worries, right.
34:31
And I then sat down with them when I had a listing that had been sitting on the market for about four months that wasn't getting any traction, and I was seeing my client's anxiety about, like, we need a new agent, right, Because she's not doing everything she possibly can, which is also an issue in our industry, where it's very easy to point the blame and point the finger at your real estate agent, because you're the deliverer of the messages, the deliverer of, hey, we have to lower the price. Well, what's going on? Well, we've had no offers. We've had no showings right. Imagine that seller being a part of the process so they can see in real time they have no offers and no showings? Right, there's a difference psychologically. So sat down with them, ended up trying out the platform because it was really early days, of course, and I just wanted to not lose the listing. So I tried anything and I was able to take a listing that had been sitting on the market for a while and I got two people to then come in and bid the property back up and I thought, okay, this is cool.
35:30
And the psychology brain in mind said let me talk to these people and see why did you just do this? After sitting on the market for a while, You've known about the property. Why now and a lot of it had to do with believing an offer was real, because these clients had been burned before the buyer agent said they just don't trust the process. They don't understand why they don't get to know what the other offers are. And they got to know the other offers when I did the deal that I did, where I started a timer and everyone got to see what they needed to do to make a higher offer and they had more choice. There's also some FOMO and seeing market validation right. So the one buyer who came up right here now this other buyer says, oh, if they think it's worth this, I think it's worth this and a little bit more.
36:16
And so I was able to get a better outcome for my clients, which only got me more involved in the product. But one of the first funniest things I said to them was I was at Compass at the time. I said do me a favor, Can you guys build this technology that Compass has so that I can go to another brokerage? They said no, but then more recently they built it, which is the ability to save a search for automation for your clients that leverages those private, exclusive listings into the search automatically. The final offer has built that recently. That's being pushed out across the country Because of what's going on with clear cooperation until there's more information.
37:01 - Preston Zeller (Host)
This is. You know it is what it is. So can you just do a brief on clear cooperation for anyone listening?
37:08 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I'll do my best. I mean, the way I interpret it it's that you know, if we all, as real estate agents, can put our properties into the MLS, it gives everyone the same access to information, and so there are certain MLSs, like Bright MLS and other MLSs, that have certain requirements that are different across each state and jurisdiction on what that looks like right, and so it's all about giving the same information to everyone so that it doesn't hurt any consumer and it doesn't hurt any agent from having access to all of the information. Yeah, I think I said that right. That's how I've interpreted it.
37:49 - Preston Zeller (Host)
That sounds right to me. So your chief knowledge officer. It's a unique title, I know I love it.
37:56 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
It's almost as title I know I love it.
37:58 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Almost as obscure as I feel like mine is sometimes.
38:01 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Your chief growth officer right. Yeah, I like that one, that's a good one.
38:05 - Preston Zeller (Host)
It's good. It's just like what it entails. Like what does it actually mean? Sometimes it's weird. So what do you do in your role then? That's a good question.
38:12 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
So I feel like I'm a translator right. I talk to development, tell them what me and all the other agents need as a whole and what. I think my psychology background comes in really handy here because I am, I speak the speak. I've done enough business to understand the industry inside and out. I've had enough bad experiences to know the industry inside and out and I also know what it's like to be a struggling agent and I know what it's like to be a successful agent and I know from being at one of the best tech brokerages out there what they have. And I know what a lot of other brokerages have because I've seen the insides of them. And I know what agents need to grow their business Because, like I said, I took my business from you know 10 million to 42 million in a few months from using certain technology, or I attribute it to that of how I was communicating with my clients or potential clients is translation of what is the need and what people understand right.
39:16
We can't get adoption as a tool if we are not making this so simple and easy to use, with as few clicks as possible and with just basic language of how we speak. So that's a lot of what I do and I help train our staff to understand as we're growing. I help train you know new offices and I sell to brokers and agents around the country in Canada.
39:37 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Nice, yeah, yeah, and I, I, I think it's interesting in that, like a lot of you know, traditional I don't know C-suite titles. Um, you know, they aren't always the thing you need necessarily because of, like this right, you have a technology solution that's catering to a trade group that's millions of people, and it in an industry that has not changed dramatically in the past hundred years. So, um, yeah, you can't just like, uh, run it way.
40:15 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I don't think no, and I think you know what I'm good at is just understanding the masses. And, like I said earlier, every single realtor is their own boss. We have brokers, but we don't have to listen to them, right? Basic, hey, use this tool, no, thanks. You know, I it's very easy just to say no. It's so transient, you can switch brokerages in a day, not even a day.
40:38
And so it's more about from that understanding of what do we need, how can I explain to agents how this can help them grow their business and how you can really put the consumer first, right? I mean, what consumer and what agent really wouldn't want to know, when an offer is made on a property that they're interested in, to get a text message alert that an offer was made right? And so I think the biggest issue with technology in the real estate space is that people think it's a ploy to try to get rid of them. After we've seen Zillow, you know, take the leads on our own listings and sell them to our competitors, right? So I think that part in general is why and where agents put their foot down, of being unwilling to change, and so, as consumers become more aware of what they need and, in the process.
41:30
Right when a consumer is buying or selling a home, they're super anxious and super out of control feeling and frustrated, and what we do is we bring a lot of clarity to the consumer in that process and trust. It helps build trust that their agent's doing everything possible to sell their home, that their buyer agent can actually guide them with information in real time. So I think that our industry should always put the consumer first, but doesn't. I think that the fear is that a lack of transparency is the best skill to get the best outcome for a seller, which to me just also sounds crazy. I mean, I think, if you really take a step back and think about what it is, we're saying that my superpower is a lack of transparency. It sounds insane.
42:19 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, not trustful.
42:21 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Not trustful. I mean, did we not just have a huge lawsuit around the transparency issues? And so final offer really is we built like the Porsche of everything you can imagine. I call it like the Porsche the highest level of everything, where you can fully negotiate with your own brain and your own versatility of how you do business through our system. And we're just taking it down a notch with every you know next development push to make it just more easier to adapt and use and to see value in how you can grow your business from just talking to consumer about something they care about.
43:00 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I don't. I think. Let me back up. You're not in all 50 states yet, right, but you're expanding.
43:05 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, we're expanding. We are in gosh. I think we're about to be in like 15 states and provinces in Canada.
43:13 - Preston Zeller (Host)
That's right. Our goal is to be in like 15 states and provinces in Canada. That's right. Our goal is to be in every state by the end of 2025.
43:22 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I mean, what's the ultimate sort of vision for final offer? You know it all started with Kevin Caulfield just being sick of losing the leads on his own listings and being like, how can I drive leads back to my listings? And that's how it started, and that there was no information during the offer process, right? And so I think the ultimate goal is to be the way that real estate agents do business right. Give information at people's fingertips, give them that exciting. You know, those neighbors get to watch now when their neighbor's house gets an offer, not just it's active and goes under contract, they get all the information in real time.
43:55
I think that we are disrupting an industry that is resistant. But I think that the consumer if the consumer bought and sold homes more, they would have demanded this a long time ago. But because it's a process they're a part of for twice in their lifetime, they're miserable, they're pissed, it makes no sense, they find it ridiculous and then they move on when it's over. And that's why I don't think we've seen the change that we really need in our industry. And that's really what I think Final Offer is building here is that ability to take the agent relationship and the consumer relationship and only elevate it and make it better by infusing technology into how business is done, and to be a one-stop shop for realtors.
44:41 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, it's an interesting point of just people when they have to sell or buy, right, but it's. It's like, okay, I'll suffer through this for two, three months, whatever it is, and then I'll be done with it and just move on with my life, versus I think. You know it's a good point that it's not a frequent thing. But you know, I don't know, people move. Obviously during COVID they did, but I think people just move in general more than they did, you know.
45:10
I agree general more than they did. You know, I agree. I mean think about, you know I've done. I love looking at like my own personal um ancestry stuff and I mean like old ancestry, not just you know, 50 years ago, and just seeing where people are going to move. You think about if I wanted to cross the Atlantic, you know, 100 years ago I was like all I'm going to be on a boat for months.
45:34
And then I'm going to have to go get a wagon or wherever you know I'm going, or I guess a hundred years ago they had cars. But you know what I'm saying? It's just the effort to move was like a monumental task and I know in my own life, I've, within like a couple of weeks, with a family gone. All right, I guess we're moving.
45:56 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yep.
45:57 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Across states, yep, and you know. So maybe when our real estate economy, which is a whole other topic, Right. Can get sorted out to be more balanced.
46:09 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah.
46:10 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Maybe we'll see that more again.
46:11 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I think so, more balanced. Maybe we'll see that more again. I think so. I mean, I think that people see the value in owning homes and creating a portfolio that's different than the stock market, of how to make money and build generational wealth. I think what else is interesting is that before consumers had access to the listings that are on the MLS, beforehand the MLS listings only the real estate agents had access to, and the second that that went public to Zillow, redfin and all those places real estate agents were terrified that all of our control would go away.
46:46
Right Again, it goes back to the hoarding of information is the way that you can control and show your value, which to me just sounds crazy if you really think about it. But this is what the masses feel and think. But what actually ended up happening was that there was more buyer agency used after that information got to consumers' fingertips than before, and I think a lot of that has to do with just people seeing opportunities and being excited about home ownership and looking online and being like, oh, I could buy a home or this is what a mortgage calculator would say it would be. That's cheaper than my rent. I should do this. Let me reach out to an agent to guide me in this process that I'll never do again. We do our taxes every single year. I don't do my taxes. I don't want to learn how to do my taxes I never will so I hire someone. Right? It's the same concept.
47:38 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, yeah. What are your so outside of final offer? Like, what are I don't know your personal goals, for maybe you know the foreseeable future, you know.
47:49 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, you know I have a real estate team. It's me and we're six women on a real estate team in the DC Maryland area and I love it and I'm having a lot of fun with that. So I really want to grow that, not to be more people, but just grow and mentor the people that are newer on my team. I want to really show the world how I'm marketing with final offer to the consumer, to do something totally different and grow my business that way, which I have been right. I mean, instead of being like just listed, just sold here are my stats for the year I'm like, hey, follow along for real-time offer alerts, right. I mean I've always been big on.
48:31
I really want to be valuable or I don't want to sell. If I'm not valuable, I don't want to help. I'll help with my information, but I want to actually be valuable in this process or it's not comfortable for me and I think the most important thing is to differentiate myself from the other agents in the market, because we're so flooded with real estate agents that you know there's just everybody's doing the same thing and I think that I have a big opportunity and agents that are final offer agents have a really big opportunity to actually grow their business. Yeah, my biggest goals, I think, keep my kids happy and healthy.
49:08 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, of course there is that, there's that. I was going to ask how many agents do you really think we need in the US?
49:22 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I mean, I think if you have just you know a lot less but the good ones, I mean I will say, though, you know, when I've done 10 deals a month that I'm managing, you know it's a process right Like it's a lot to follow, and in our states we not only write the contract but we follow the contract. There's no lawyer involved, nothing like that, and so we really have more steps and things to know and do, and there's so many nuances and there's so many emotions and there's a lot of high anxiety, and so I see value. But I really think, you know, when they say the top 10% are the people that do business, I think that's all we need.
50:06 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, well, it's interesting. We have a feature in Batch Leads where you can basically go filter agents nationwide on like how many transactions they've done, volume of transactions, all that kind of stuff, and it filters out a lot of people like very quickly.
50:22 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Well, I think that's important for consumers to know right. Like just because someone's good at social media and they're funny on it, it doesn't mean they know what they're doing right and they're getting business from that and they're funny on it. It doesn't mean they know what they're doing right and they're getting business from that. And to me, you hire us to guide you through a process that maybe is extremely complicated, but we're also not divulging to you all that complicated stuff because we want you to feel good during the process. You know a lot of people do sold in three days and then people are like, oh, that was easy, I could be a real estate agent. It's like you have no idea what happened to get it there and why that happened and how it happened. And I think agents don't do a good job of marketing how hard we work and how hard of a business it is. That's why I'm like people think buyer agents don't do anything. That is the biggest joke I've ever heard in my life. I do plenty.
51:11 - Preston Zeller (Host)
It's harder than selling to me.
51:13 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
I agree, yeah, I agree there's a lot more to it and it's it's just. It can be a lot more complicated. And so, yeah, I think we have, um, we, we could really slim down again. It goes back to just, you know, changing the barrier to entry, I think, would solve all of this. I think it would get a lot of people out of the industry that don't want to pay the fees, that aren't selling homes, and, you know, it'd be less about volume of agents and more about quality of agents to help really, you know, elevate the business again.
51:48 - Preston Zeller (Host)
How do you make the barrier to entry harder for real estate?
51:53 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
It probably costs like $10,000 to become a real estate agent.
51:57 - Preston Zeller (Host)
So just more skin in the game.
51:59 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
More skin in the game, definitely. I mean because anyone can take a test and do these online things where they click a button and don't pay attention all day. I mean that part's kind of a joke to me, but I mean again when you go back to what we're doing, like we don't have attorneys here and there are lots of things that can go wrong all the time and so we're responsible for educating our clients on what those things can be and you don't know that without experience. So I I think I mean I'd pay $10,000 today to be a real estate agent If that was the barrier to entry, probably paid 20,000.
52:37 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, that's, you know, it's interesting thought Cause you know you think about if, like, you're getting into a franchise or something, right, I mean it's so expensive, um, and so I mean, yes, there's franchises that are cheaper. My, my, my wife, there's a tea place in Texasxas. It's really popular. She's like, oh, we should open up this tea place.
52:56
I'm like, hey, no, I'm not getting into tea but, it was like you had to have like 400 grand liquid capital and then 1.5 million that worth them and so you go okay, well, how many people can do that? Um, and you know they, they're doing that for you know good reasons. They don't want and just anyone to think they can jump into that business. So, but I am curious let's say it was 10, 20 grand, whatever it was right, the ecosystem that supports that new person, right? Let's just say, today it was like hey, take the same testing but then drop 10 grand. You'd have to have some kind of system and in theory, that is a version of the NAR or whatever it is. That's like then maybe supports you a little better.
53:41 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
NAR doesn't. Nar doesn't support no.
53:44 - Preston Zeller (Host)
I know, I know that's. I think that's part of the problem is it's like it's so free market that there's nothing really organized to get you into that space. Maybe some state will come along and say, hey, this is how we're doing it now. I don't know.
54:02 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Yeah, I mean, I think brokerage models are up for a big shakeup as well. Obviously, I think that they're struggling to make ends meet. Their splits are only getting worse for them because they have to compete with other brokerages. They have to spend all this money on technology to compete with other brokerages. I think it's, you know, a matter of time that that looks a lot different as well.
54:30 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, yeah, I mean compass is, I, I think, an outlier, um for sure, exp, but like these traditional ones, like they're not, you're not. They're not tech companies for the most part, and an actual tech company is going to be able to innovate like way quicker.
54:50 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
Right, a hundred percent Right. And I'll tell you it's funny I mean any like technology person, cause now I'm in this space of, like you know, technology, which is super weird, cause I'm terrible with technology. Like today, I was at a meeting and they were like you have to learn how to do social media and I was like I refuse, I don't get it, I don't want to get it, I'm over it. Like please don't ask me to do this. But I you know any technology person's like Compass isn't a technology company, right? Like to them, it's a joke too, right?
55:19
So, you know, I think it's about really partnering with technology that's there to preserve the real estate agent and make us look better. There's a lot out there that is growing, will grow, where they're just trying to replace us. I mean, look at what Redfin and Rocket are doing. Like that is likely going to turn into oh, you don't have to pay any real estate commission, you know compensation in order to work with one of our you know agents, right, and then what you know? So they're discounting the industry, and that's why we really need to partner as real estate agents, as an industry, with something like Final Offer where we can make sure the consumer sees our value, that they know we're doing more for them, that they're a part of the process, but they still need that expert.
56:06 - Preston Zeller (Host)
Yeah, well, this has been a great enlightening conversation. I really appreciate you coming on.
56:14 - Jocelyn Vas (Guest)
This was so fun. I hope to do it again.
56:17 - Hope (Announcement)
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