Transcript 

[00:00:00] Intro: This is the Texas Land Guys podcast, hosted by brothers Tim Dosch and Tom Dosch. With their partners David Marshall and Tripp Rich, they have built DMRE, the leading land brokerage in Texas. With decades of experience brokering deals between landowners and real estate developers, they take you inside the deals that move the market. 

[00:00:26] Tom Dosch: All right, welcome to the Texas Land Guys podcast. We’re going to dive right back into part two of the conversation that Tim and I were having. It’s a continuation from last week. Here it is.

[00:00:38] Ally McElheney: Okay, walk us through the worst deal that you ever lost, and what you learned about yourself and about the industry through it.

[00:00:47] Tom Dosch: This what’s coming to mind first, and it won’t probably be what you’d think I would say, but I still remember a deal that we pitched in Houston, and it was, I don’t remember a ton actually about the deal, but I’ll explain why I remember the situation. I think it was in Midtown. Maybe it was a good site, and we had sold a lot of tracks in Midtown. It was you, me, and David. You know, we did a BOV. We drove to meet with the owners. It was like two or three people, and it was one of those deals where it was like broker after broker was lined up to go in and meet with the ownership. And so we got in there, we pitched it. I thought we did a really good job, and we again like we had sold a lot in that area, so it was like, how are you not going to hire us? But I remember I’ve always felt so much conviction about this. I remember leaving and seeing who the next broker was that was getting ready to go in, and it was like, and it was like two or three other brokers was the next team, and I remember kind of like saying it out loud so they can hear. And I don’t remember exactly what I said, but it was basically like, “Oh, we’re gonna get that. Like nobody, nobody else, you know, will get this deal or something like that. And I look back and I’m like, “I was, I was so stupid. I was such an idiot, you know, just so prideful and arrogant. And then we didn’t get it. We didn’t get hired. And I just was reflecting later. I was like, “Man, my heart was in a really bad place. There was just a lot of arrogance, and so I’ve lost a lot of deals for different reasons. Sometimes the most painful reasons is because something happens in the market, so it just like blindsides you, you know. And it’s for nothing I did, but that one I really felt like it was almost like God was teaching me a lesson on that one. It was just like there was a lot of pride in the way that I responded, and so that one’s always going to be really painful because I felt like I let the team down with how I acted because you, you and David were there too. You know, we all pitched it together, and you guys never would have acted like that. And it just was a really poor character. It was a really poor choice of character by me, and so I definitely regret that.

[00:02:38] Tim Dosch: Well, it’s something that I mean, it’s hard. I mean, one thing that I think makes you really successful in this business is being really competitive, you know, and like wanting to win. But there is a dark side of that, like you’re saying. And I think at the end of the day, you know, the client makes a decision, and you know, we may not always agree with their decision, but you know, a lot of times it goes in our favor, and we think that’s logical, you know. But sometimes they don’t, they don’t pick us. But I think for me, you know, when that’s such a great question, there’s probably like there’s so many. When you do hundreds of deals, it’s like you forget about a lot of the deals. I mean, now I find myself be like, did we do that deal or do we not do that deal? And you like forget about which deals we did and what the prices were, and because it’s just been so many deals in so long. But for me, there was one that really sticks out, and I think the thing I learned about myself, we had a very competitive process. We had a lot of offers on this deal, and it was a family dynamic, which are really hard. And Tom, you could probably speak to this too. It’s the institutional clients are so much easier to work with because they’re just business. It’s business to them, and they’re not emotional. And they’re like, “Hey, we need a really good price, and we need to sell in this time frame, and we’re willing to take on this much transaction risk, and they’re just able to make decisions more kind of logically. But when you deal with the family, especially if they’ve owned it for a long time, and there’s multiple family members, there’s a lot of emotion, and there’s a lot of family history and dynamics that go into the decision, and a lot of things you just can’t see as a broker, and so I won’t get into too many of the details on this deal. But we had a very quality, you know, top shelf developer, you know, put the deal under contract, capitalize the deal. But we had some issues, infrastructure issues on the site, so there was a need to solve those, and it was a very, I think, fair solution that the developer came up with that was going to make the family whole, but the family couldn’t all agree on if that was the right decision, and so the family kept pushing, you know, for a little bit more, a little bit more, and it was really just one person in the family that kept pushing for a little bit more, and ultimately killed the deal. And so I think for me, what I learned through that was you logically it was a no-brainer. It was the most obvious. Like we crushed it. Like we got them like 15 offers. We got them the best price. I mean, this offer was like three or 4 million higher than the closest offer. It was you know this household name. It was capitalized, but I think what I learned is there’s is so hard with some people being you have to like we’ve said earlier be really honest and be willing to to confront people and it’s hard because we don’t make the decision as brokers you know we we can tell them what we think but they make the decision so we don’t really have any control and so it’s a balance of being very direct in trying to bring them back to reality because sometimes people will just live in this world that’s not real and they come up with all these ideas and scenarios and it’s like well that I understand your logic if like half those things are true but none of those things are true so like your logic doesn’t even work but what I learned is really standing up to people but doing it respectfully, which it can be really hard because some people like you don’t really respect them because of the way they are, and then like the they’re so difficult that at some point you’re like, I just don’t want to keep having this conversation because it’s just getting really really old.

But I think our job as brokers is as long as we’re being hired to constantly be bringing people back to reality until the point that maybe we get fired because we just keep bringing them back to reality, and that’s fine. Because I’d rather be fired for doing what I think is best for them than just being like, “Fine, I’m just going to go along with this because this is what you want. But you’re just everybody’s wasting their time because of this, and so I think that’s that’s something that is there’s probably there’s so many examples I could give of different deals that some of them worked out kind of against all odds, and then some of them didn’t. But a lot of times it’s been because of difficult people that were trying to get what they really wanted, but weren’t they weren’t sure what they wanted, and they didn’t fully understand the situation. And so I think what I’m learning more and more is just you know being willing to just be very honest and then try to keep it as respectful as I can.

[00:06:45] Tom Dosch: Trey and I talk a lot about both sellers and buyers. Do they actually listen to what we’re saying?

[00:06:51] Tim Dosch: Yeah

[00:06:52] Tom Dosch: Because those are the kind of people we want to work with, and the reason that we want to work with people that listen to what we’re saying is they’re hiring us to be an advisor. Like that’s actually why you hire us is to be an advisor, and so if you’re going to hire an advisor and then not listen to anything they say, it’s not going to work out well. It’s just not going to be a good relationship, and so there’s a lot of developers where we’ll tell them this is the situation with the site. This is what you should do, and you know you got to think it’s like we’re in there with just an enormous amount of reps on these deals. You know, and and not to say developers aren’t, but we just are doing so many more because we’re working with so many more developers, and so we’re seeing the field differently too. Like we’re actually seeing what their competitors are offering, and so we know, we like we know because we have data on you know hundreds and hundreds of deals, like what market is, and so when a developer won’t listen to us, it’s really frustrating, and so we’ve had these cases where we’re missing out on deals because developer doesn’t listen, and it’s a tough conversation. And if it can’t change, then we just aren’t going to work with that developer. And it kind of goes with the sellers too. Like I try to be really honest, just like you, and be like, I am trying to help you as a seller. This is what I think is best. This is why you hired me. And obviously, you’re working together. I’m not trying to tell them what they have to do, but I’m giving them my opinion because that’s why they hired me. And I think, like you said, we have a responsibility to do that. What would be bad is if we just didn’t say anything and we knew that what they’re asking for, they’re never going to get, and they’re actually going to lose the buyer that they have, and those things. But I was going to say, you and I could also list off. I mean, so many deals that didn’t close the day of closing.

[00:08:27] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:08:28] Tom Dosch: Yeah, which is crazy because people don’t understand that about the business. Just imagine you’re two years into a deal and you get to the day of closing and it falls out. It doesn’t come back. Like it never comes back. You didn’t make $1, and so to your point earlier about you didn’t work very hard, you made a big fee. There’s a lot of deals that we just never made anything on, and so there’s no joke. There’s several of those. I remember a couple years ago, Trey had like three of those in one year, where it got to the week of closing, and the buyers like lost their equity or something happened, and they didn’t close the week of closing after just like these long deals, and then we’ve both had,  I can think of three right now where we were several million hard money and pursuits into deals, and they didn’t close.

[00:09:11] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:09:11] Tom Dosch: You know, with clients, one was in the West Houston when that oil downturn happened. We were one and a half million in hard earnest money, and that deal never came back. Another one when the interest rate hike went was in Fort Worth. We were three and a half million into a deal with a client. That deal never came back, and then we just had one not long ago here in kind of North Dallas, and it was you know I think 1.5 million in hard earnest money plus plans, and that deal we’re hoping comes back, but it hasn’t come back, and those are pretty painful, but I think we also just know that’s like part of the business. So I think at this point in our careers, it’s probably more frustrating when it’s either like my example is something I did that I felt like had a negative impact, and then your example is more there was a way that that deal could have happened.

[00:09:58] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:09:58] Tom Dosch: Like that deal should have happened. Other deals that are falling out-they’re not happening because of the market. The deal you’re talking about should have happened. It wasn’t a market issue.

[00:10:06] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:10:06] Tom Dosch: We can’t. You know, market issues happen. Nobody can control that, but we can control what we can control, and so that’s pretty frustrating when that happens.

[00:10:13] Tim Dosch: And I think the flip side that is, like, I know both of us have had so many times for the deal that never should have made because the buyer is being crazy, or the seller is being crazy, or they’re both being crazy, or the market was messed up, and the deal still happened. And it’s weird. I mean, that’s I think what’s kind of hard about this business. Even going back to Fred Caldwell’s moment, what you say no to, there are definitely times where you need to have discernment and say no. But then there’s been times where my inclination has been to say no. I think David has always been more open-minded, and he’s been like, you know what, we need to try this, and it’s worked, and we’ve made a lot of money off it. And so that’s what’s kind of hard about the business is a lot of times the deals that you would expect to be layups that should work don’t work for one reason or another, and then the deals that are like, man, there’s no way this is ever going to happen. You know, those are deals that actually close, there’s crazy deals we’ve closed in our career, like all in the floodplain, like you know the worst sites you could imagine, bad sub markets, and trading for way over market, like all these things that you would just never you’d be like, that’s not going to happen, and then it happens, and so it definitely it’s it’s pretty pretty interesting.

[00:11:19] Tom Dosch: Well, there’s definitely value there to having partners that we trust.

[00:11:22] Tim Dosch: Yeah

[00:11:22] Tom Dosch: Better just have a different personality, different strengths, different way of looking at things, and a ton of experience.

[00:11:28] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:11:29] Tom Dosch: I know you. You’re like me. I love to run into Trey’s office. He comes into mind. You’ll go into David’s. We love collaborating around the offices with each other. There’s a ton of value in that, and it helps a lot of times.

[00:11:40] Tim Dosch: I think there’s something to be said when you’ve done hundreds of deals. You know that’s people can’t really understand. Like there’s so much knowledge of just being in the business for decades and seeing all kinds of deals and seeing the good deals and the bad deals and so many different kinds of people and different use types. Like there’s just there’s all these things that you just start to kind of get a gut feeling about things. You know, and you walk into a situation like I just kind of know what’s going to happen here, just because I’ve seen this so many different times. And if someone hasn’t had that level of experience, they may be able to think through it logically, or like this is what should happen. But a lot of times they’re wrong, just because they haven’t had the experience that we’ve had.

[00:12:18] Ally McElheney: Okay, speaking to somebody who’s just starting out in their brokerage career. So, if someone is just licensed and has zero deals under their belt, what should they actually be doing in their first 90 days to be set up for success?

[00:12:33] Tim Dosch: I would say, man, probably the you know probably depends on what kind of brokerage you’re doing and what your team structure is. But I think one of the biggest things to do is get out there and start calling people. You know, which I know in our business, like the front door to our business is cold calling. You know, a lot of our young guys start out cold calling landowners, talking to them, learning to get on the phone. You know, there’s a lot of experience that comes through that, and it just takes a lot of reps. And so I think whatever way you can get as many reps as possible, and know you’re going to make a ton of mistakes, and know that you may feel like you’re not making a lot of progress in that first 90 days. I’ve always felt like there are certain like big markers of progression for a broker who’s really working hard, and I think 90 days is a pretty big marker. If you get in and really work hard, what your expectation should be is not that I did five deals or got five deals are in contract in nine days, but that I got a better feel for the business from day one to day 90, and a lot of that is just talking to people, you know, having lots of conversations and working really, really hard. Like Tom was saying, when he started out getting in at 5:30, staying late, like you, you cannot shortchange that. You can’t just be rolling in at 8:30 or nine and making five calls and talking to people and kind of you have to work hard and so I think I would just say work hard. You’re not going to be very strategic because you have no idea you’re doing, and that’s okay. Like you’re not going to be working on the right things. You’re going to work on all the wrong things, but get out there and just work on things because that that repetition and that you know being in meetings with people, making mistakes, putting yourself out there-that’s how you learn. And I think it’s, I would say it’s cold calling. It’s trying to hopefully, if you’re fortunate enough to be around people that are quality people that have experience, you know, trying to ask them questions, learn from them, go to meetings with them, get to work on deals with them. I would be thinking much more from an apprentice standpoint of how can I work with someone who has experience versus you know I’m going to go start from nothing and go you know if you’re going to go to some high split shop and have no experience and try and go make it that’s going to be really hard to do it that way. The way we try and structure it is you know come in get a salary cold call you know get to talk to real clients get to be around other brokers, work as a team, learn from people. That’s a lot more doable. You can still do it, you know, the old like the Marcus Amelia Chap way. It’s just it’s really really tough. But I would say it’s going to be rolling your sleeves up and doing the hardest things that you can do, which is get in front of people and talking to them.

[00:14:57] Tom Dosch: Yeah, I agree with that, Tim. I think that’s good advice. It is a little bit hard not knowing what the structure is like for the young person getting in the business because I think we because we do everything as teams, it’s a little bit different. You know, we try not to just yeah used to be like you hand them a phone book and just start making calls, and we don’t we try not to do do it that way because the nice thing for us is we we don’t structure it to where we have to do it that way, and so we really want the we want the young people to learn to start to learn the business, so that there’s like a little bit of reputational risk if they’re out there calling with no idea what they’re doing, you know, for the company. And so I think though, just in general, what I would say, which is very similar to what you said, but just be willing to work really hard, be willing to put in the hours, be willing to grind, and also like if just be willing to do whatever’s needed of you for at that whatever that shop is. Because I think most shops, whether it’s going to be more of a you know make it yourself or work on a team, like if it’s a make it yourself, be willing to like help people that you’re not going to benefit from, just to learn out. Like if if one of the senior people will let you go to a meeting or join a client deal, knowing you’re not going to get any part of that deal, even if you add value, that’s going to be really valuable for you to be able to learn because you have to find a way to learn.

[00:16:16] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:16:16] Tom Dosch: It doesn’t just come naturally in this business where you have no experience and then you’re able to just put it all together, and that’s where I was so blessed working with you guys because when I started out, it was just a lot of time with you and David, and so it was time like going to meetings, being in meetings at the office. It was time going on site drives together. If I hadn’t had that, and it was just like Tom in a cubicle, with like no idea what I was doing, I never would have made it. I don’t think it really matters like how talented you are if you don’t have somebody that’s helping you learn the business. I think the big mistake is would just be like, what can I get out of this in the first 90 days? Shouldn’t be even the first year. I mean, obviously you have to survive, but I think the goal needs to be like, what can I learn? That’s so much more important. This is a business where you’re building for the long term. It is a marathon, so it’s just building blocks and progression. And so 90 days at a time, just make progression, and you’re gonna look back and you’re gonna be in a lot better place. But don’t be focused on like you know getting rich quick or just these like shortcuts because I don’t there’s not like consistent shortcuts in this business.

[00:17:25] Tim Dosch: Well, we’ve talked to a lot of young guys who are like you know I could do two or three deals a year and if I was at a high split shop I would make good money I could do two or three deals a year and then just go play golf and kind of fish or hunt or just kind of chill out you know and that’s just such a distorted view of our business. I mean, I think if you’re going to make it in our business, you have to do hundreds of deals. If you think about that, I have to do 100. I can’t get lucky. I have to do hundreds of deals. I have to have a process. I have to get good at something. I have to have maybe a niche, or I have to have a knowledge base. I have to be respected. I can’t just do a couple deals. I mean, doing a couple of deals every year normally means you worked really hard every single day to do a couple deals every year because a lot of your deals are gonna. You may put 15 deals under contract and three of them close, you know. And so I think that kind of a mindset of like, you know, you might get lucky sometimes, but you will not build a career being lucky. That does not happen. You have got to build a career by being good, and being good. I mean, just think about like an athlete. You could be a natural athlete. You will get beat all the time if you don’t work hard and train yourself and discipline yourself. There are people that are very elite because there’s a lot of money that can be made in this business, and people are going to be competitive, and everybody’s going to be trying to take the deal. And so you have to work for that. You’re not going to get lucky.

[00:18:40] Tom Dosch: I think growth is so important. I think that to your point, Tim, if you, we’ve definitely seen that. I’ve seen it on the developer side too. You know, it’s like I’m going to go and try to just do my own thing, and some guys are able to do that, but it’s so hard to go do your own thing on the developer side. And so we also have a lot of friends that they tried it and then they decided like I’m not going to do that. Like I’m going to go back and work at another company, it just makes sense. I think you have to be careful because you might find this success doing your own thing in brokerage, but where are you in five years, and where would you have been.

[00:19:11] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:19:12] Tom Dosch: If you hadn’t taken that mindset of like I’m going to try to just do enough because if I just do enough, it’s enough. But then in five years, where are you like from a growth, from a personal growth standpoint, and where would you be had you said like I’m going to be in the game all in, I’m going to be like really trying to excel and be the best that I can be and work with others that challenge me, and I think we’ve just seen that proven time and time again. I mean, I think that’s why we have a ton of competitors in the business, but a lot of the big shops, you know, they do really well because a lot of those guys stay there a long time. They stay there and they stay in those roles and they keep working. You know, name a guy at a JLL or CBRE, they could leave and they could try to do their own thing.

[00:19:55] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:19:55] Tom Dosch: Because they’ve been successful. But I think if they do that, there’s. Big chance that they start missing out on a lot of what’s helped them be successful at those big shops, and just the the the part of like sticking it out, having endurance, being able to get through difficult markets, building a track record where people are like, oh yeah, the JLO guy, it’s it’s so and so, you know, it’s not like it’s changing every three years, and so I think

[00:20:18] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:20:19] Tom Dosch: I think there’s a lot of value in that. I think you say see the same thing in sports when you have guys like trying to go from team to team or coaches that like can never the Lane Kiffins that can never seem to stay at a place very long. It’s like just where do you want to be in your career? What kind of a person do you want to be? I think that would be something I’d be thinking about when I’m starting out is  just don’t have these expectations in your first 90 days, like you said, that you’re going to be like closing deals or putting deals under contract again, unless it’s like you’re doing leasing or something where that’s feasible. In our business, you’re probably not closing your first land deal maybe until like year two.

[00:20:53] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:20:53] Tom Dosch: it just it’s just the way the business is.

[00:20:55] Tim Dosch: Well, the arc of your career, especially in our business, you start out just working as hard as you can to get business, you know, fighting to get in the door, fighting to get, you know, for someone to give you the opportunity to work work for them, whether it’s as a buyer or as a seller, and that’s really hard. I mean, I remember in the beginning, people be like, “How old are you? You know, like how many deals have you done? You know, like have you ever done this kind of deal before? Like, no, I haven’t. I’m trying to get started, and it’s pretty brutal, but if you have the right kind of character and you put your time and work hard, what happens in kind of the arc of your career? You get to a point everybody starts coming to you, giving you business, and that’s the best business to get. You’re not fighting for it. You’re not competing with a ton of people. People start saying, “You know what? I trust you. I’ve known you for a long time. I know you’re going to be honest with me. I know you do a good job. Like I want you to go market this property, or I want you to help me buy. I’m looking for this much land in this area. Can you help me buy that? And they want to work with you by their choice, not because you outcompete everybody for it. Because they’re like, I know you. I know that you’re in your company that you’re a good person to work with. And I think for a young person out there, that’s what you want to get to because that’s where you actually make real money long term. In the you know call it the back half of your career or the back 75% of your career, you’re building towards that where you have that kind of reputation. And there’s a lot of guys who never get there. You know they’re always a guy who’s scrounging around and kind of has that reputation of you’re not really sure about him. Can you trust him? Can you not trust him? And you do not want to be that guy. And it’s not hard to get that that reputation, but it’s really hard to to let go of that reputation.

[00:22:30] Tom Dosch: I’ve got a question for you, Tim. So you’re 25 years experience in real estate. So like on a perfect day for you now, what is like a the day that you you would want a day to look like within land brokerage. What gives you energy life? What do you love to do within land brokerage?

[00:22:46] Tim Dosch: I think what I really like, I do like meeting with people and helping them. You know, and it’s I think it is fun. Like I’ve really over the years, I’ve graduated, I’ve gravitated more to the listing side. I still do buy a rep, but I really do enjoy some of our good buy rep clients because they become really good friends, and so it’s fun to meet with them and talk about deals. But the listing side is pretty cool because a lot of times you deal with people that really do need help, and they have these goals. They want to maximize their property. They have all these anxieties and stresses about it. They don’t want to make mistakes, and you know when you have the people that are willing to understand the value that we can add and they trust us. Those are really fun meetings because you feel like you’re really helping them, and then you get to succeed together. You know, we go out and we market a property, get a lot of offers, we work through it with them. It’s an emotional kind of struggle. Do we pick this group? Do we pick this group? You know, look at transaction risk, look at timing, look at price. You know, we try to explain everything to him. That’s a really fun process to go through, and you get you know I would say fairly I don’t want to say like super deep relationships, but you get to know people really well through that. You’re working with people through a big emotional you know thing in their life. You know I mean it’s one of the you know I want to say one of the biggest decisions their life. A lot of times it’s a fairly big decision in their life, and you get to know them over a year, maybe two years sometimes, and you get to see the highs and the lows, and that’s really cool, you know. So I think having a day where there’s multiple meetings like that, and we’re getting to experience that. I think I’ve also I’ve really enjoyed Ascent and getting to work on the investment side, getting to think more like a principal, or not think more like one be to be a principal to go buy these sites, to go sell them, to go you know talk to developers. Not from the standpoint of how do I help you buy a site, but you know maybe I’m going to sell you our site or I’m going to JVR site with you, and it’s just a different dynamic, which has been fun. It’s kind of weird for us being we’re on so many different sides of the table, like we’re sometimes we’re the seller because we own the property, sometimes we’re the buyer because we’re buying the property or representing someone who’s the buyer or the seller, and so you end up in all these different discussions, and it makes it keeps things really interesting. And I think when you think of a long career over many decades, doing the same thing can get kind of boring, and so it’s fun to have new ways to be stretched. I mean, for us raising $100 million and buying all these sites all cash, that’s a challenge. I mean, that’s hard, especially in the market. The last four years, it’s been a challenging time to raise money. That’s just a new thing to go do and to go learn and to go to go get good at.

[00:25:18] Tom Dosch: Yeah, I can relate to a lot of that. When I was thinking that question, I think my answer would be probably sitting down and actually doing like a pitch to hire DMRE is one of my favorite things to do. I really enjoy, and a lot of times it’s because I legitimately believe like we can really help this person. Like this is exactly what we do. We’ve we’ve decided we’re going to just specialize. We’re going to be very narrowly focused in land, and so the odds are, if you own land in Texas, like probably the best people to hire to do that a lot of times. And so, I really love those meetings, and I because I what I love about those meetings is trying to turn it back on the person that’s interviewing us and just find out like what’s their motivation, like what are they really trying to accomplish? Because I know they go into these meetings with distrust if they’ve never met us or if they have no familiarity with the process of hiring a broker, so they have no idea who they should trust and they don’t really know the questions to ask. Obviously, they’re focused on like, well, what’s the price and when can it close, but they don’t understand the amount of complexity that goes into these deals, and so explaining that, finding out what they’re trying to accomplish, finding out the inner dynamics, like you’ve said, of is it a family? We’ve represented so many families. You know, is it like a, is it a really large company? Is it a bank? Is it a REIT? Is it another developer? I’ve had a lot of fun getting to represent a lot of our developer clients on selling tracks that they own because, like a lot of them, we already know them so well, and so I know going into it what we’re trying to accomplish, and I know that they’re going to understand the ins and outs of the business. It’s great working with the developer when they’ll say something like, “You know, I’m a developer, so I understand.

[00:26:57] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:26:57] Tom Dosch: We don’t get that from sellers that that aren’t in the business because they don’t understand, they’re like, this buyer needs 60 days to get zoning. Like they should just be able to put up money. And it’s like, well, without zoning, this is you know nothing’s going to happen here. You know, so just like simple things like that. But I really love that, and it’s funny. Trey and I were we were doing business planning at the end of last year, and we were always talking about how can each of us add more to the partnership and the team, and he was like, “Yeah, Tom, I just feel like you just like it seems like your favorite thing to do is just get into meetings and convince people to hire DMRE. He’s like, “You just, he’s like, you just seem like you love that. Now it was kind of nice to have somebody else actually say it because I hadn’t really thought about it. Like I knew that I get a lot of joy from doing it. I really look forward to it because you know, like yesterday, I had a one that we did with a really big institution in town, and like you kind of get excited for those.

[00:27:52] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:27:52] Tom Dosch: You know, it’s like you’re almost getting ready to go play a game. You know, you have a big game and you’re gonna go, and you know that they’re gonna be like ready to grill you with questions and anymore, like we’ve kind of heard all the questions. It’s just fun. It’s just fun to go to those. It’s fun to be honest. I told them, you know, that group yesterday. I was like, I have a ton of respect for who they are, and if they don’t find us to be the best brokerage, we totally get it. Like I have no problem with that. I honestly just want to help them make the best decision they can, and I told them what I thought that was, and that it’s just fun to be able to do that and try to advise people. Buyer rep can be really fun, like slamming a high rise deal in Uptown or doing being a part of some really cool project. But I think to your point, you don’t. A lot of times, you don’t get to know both parties quite the same, and you a lot of times, like it’s just hard because you don’t you don’t know the seller at all in those situations, and if they have a broker, you may never even meet them.

[00:28:47] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:28:47] Tom Dosch: And so it’s just a different it’s just different, and it’s it’s fun on the listing side that we get to we really get to interact with both parties because because a lot of times a lot of these developers are coming and they don’t have a broker representing them and they’re buying buying sites, and so you’re getting to talk directly to the decision makers on both sides, and so it makes it, I think, just a little bit more of a better process overall.

[00:29:10] Tim Dosch: No, absolutely. And when you were saying that, I was thinking, you know, I think the reason you like that is not because you’re you’re thinking, you know, dollar signs like if I go get this deal, this is a big fee, or you know, this is good for reputation, or whatever. You know, the Donald Miller framework, I think, has really helped us a lot. And he talks about, you know, the customer is a hero, and then we’re the guide. We get to help them. You know, we get to help them make the best decision. You know, that for them to the outcome that they want, and to prevent the outcome that they don’t want. You know, and so when you go into that situation thinking that way, you’re actually this is an opportunity to help someone. This is opportunity to sort of turn the lights on because we know this so well, and be like, I can answer your actual anxieties and concerns and your desires. I have the answers for that because I’ve done this so much. I can be a guide for you, I can really help you, and I think when you approach a pitch that way, it takes all the pressure off because it’s like, is this person going to let me help them and let me guide them? Are they not? And if they don’t want me to help them guide them, or they’re not, you whatever, then it’s fine. I mean, then I don’t get to do what I want to do anyway. So it’s like this isn’t about a fee for me. It isn’t about just like notching another deal because we’ve already done enough of that, you know, and it’s so rewarding when you do feel, you know, those times where you get to represent someone and you feel like it’s a great outcome. And I know there’s been times where, like, man, we just feel like we just perfectly, like, you know, you perfectly top the market, you get the best buyer, the best, you know. Sometimes we just go perfectly, and that’s just one of the best feelings. It’s almost like a golf shot, where it’s like, you know, you just hit the perfect shot, and you’re just like, man, that’s just that’s what kind of keeps me coming back because I want to feel that again, you know.

[00:30:48] Tom Dosch: Yeah, and you’re right. The numbers stop to kind of mean anything because the numbers are so high now that they don’t really mean anything. Because I’ll tell people, you know, yeah, 800 transactions and 6 billion in land sold and 400 multifamily land sites. Those are like crazy numbers. I mean, 400 multifamily land sites is crazy, but it’s so crazy that nobody can even comprehend it. It wouldn’t really matter if it was 200, or 800. It’s like it’s just gotten to the point where it’s they’re really big numbers. But I think for us, it’s more it’s awesome to see a client be successful, and then it’s neat to see our cities transform.

[00:31:22] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:31:22] Tom Dosch: To really believe. I think we’ve always believed that if we didn’t take the client to that site, it probably never would have happened. And that’s a that’s pretty. It’s all. I know we’re not Tramo Crow and we’re not Hines. You know, we’re not actually like the developers doing this awesome project. But in a small way, we kind of feel like we were a big part of it because if we hadn’t put them on that site, they may have never they may have never gone to it. So that’s a part of the business that’s pretty amazing.

[00:31:46] Tim Dosch: There’s been a lot of times where it was really our idea to break up a site a certain way, or even to design a deal a certain way. You know, whether it was ways oriented, or I remember there was a deal where I talked to the developer about an idea to connect a site with a walkway to Whole Foods, and he was like, hadn’t even thought about that. I mean, when you’ve seen so many deals, like sometimes our developer clients, you know, they’ve done a lot too, but they don’t see as much as we do because we’re seeing all the developers do all these deals. And I mean, a good developer may have done 20 deals, but they haven’t done 400. And so sometimes we’ll have these ideas that really change the way a site you know gets built, or you know how it gets broken up, and then getting to see that you know actually get built that way, and you know, 10 years down the road, people are talking about, oh, it’s really cool the way they designed that, the way they did that, and you’re like, man, that’s that was something I that was my idea, you know. So it’s kind that those kind of things are fun, you know.

[00:32:38] Tom Dosch: Well, Ally, do we have time for one more question?

[00:32:40] Ally McElheney: Yeah, let’s do it. Okay, if you had to pick one habit, not a strategy, just like a daily habit that compounds over the 20 years that you guys have seen in your careers, what would you tell somebody who’s just starting now they need to do?

[00:32:54] Tom Dosch: That’s a good one. I was actually my mind initially was going less towards business, and maybe it’s just because I think that like where you are as a person is probably even more important than because it impacts really how you show up in your business. And so my mind initially was going towards, I think for me from the very beginning, my faith has been super important to me. And so it’s like a daily time where I’m grounding myself. And so that’s you know that’s looked like different things over the years. Before I had kids, I was a little bit easier to have quiet times and and be able to control your quiet times. And so I get up and pray and you know read the Bible and I still do that, but I just don’t have the time that I necessarily did before. And so that’s been a really important part of my day, just to every day be thankful, recognize who I am, who God is, and then the other one is just like has always been exercising. Like getting starting for me, starting the day with exercise is super important. Gives me energy, helps me be focused, helps me feel more confident throughout the day. Those two things as like daily habits are very important. Just like kind of simplistically, but really important, and I’m done with that by 7o’clock every day. You know, seven in the morning, and then it’s, and then I’ve got the rest of the day.

[00:34:07] Tim Dosch: I agree with that, Tom. It’s hard to get into the actual business advice if that piece isn’t figured out. And I think when we talk about like a marathon, you know, if your mind and your body are breaking down because you’re not being healthy, you know, you’re not going to be able in it for the long term, or you’re not going to be successful for the long term. And I think this is a very stressful business. It’s hard in a lot of ways, and so the temptation to use alcohol to calm yourself down or to numb yourself, you know, to relax. I need to relax. It’s been a stressful day. I need to have a glass of wine or three glasses of wine or whatever. You know, it’s so common in our business. You know, our happy hours all the time, and and the need to, you know, I didn’t sleep well because I had that alcohol. So now I gotta, you know, have you know three cold brews in the morning, or you know, be on some stimulant or something because I gotta get through the day and I gotta be amped up, and you can just start to burn yourself out. And so I think you’re right. From a spiritual standpoint, we are going to make bad decisions. We are going to need to be convicted at times. All of us are like that, and whether it’s in our relationships, you know, work relationships with clients, whatever. I mean, there’s been times where I’ve been very convicted. Hey, I need to apologize to that person. I’m not thinking the right way about this, whatever it is. And I think that that spiritual time is where that happens. You get convicted. You get grounded. You you get thinking about how to treat other people right, how to love other people, but then also just the bandwidth, you know, the physical bandwidth, you know, taking care of your body, getting enough sleep, you know, and which is going to be challenging in different seasons with young kids and just you know whatever it is, illness, things that happen in your life, but getting you know exercise, just that that consistency and taking care of your body, it’s amazing how few people do that. It’s pretty rare, and you know people are just they’re so unhealthy. You know, and I think it’s maybe never been harder to be healthy because a lot of our food is you know processed food. People are having quick meals. They’re in a hurry. You know, they’re not eating eating good quality food. They’re not sleeping well. They’re maybe watching too much TV at night. You know, there’s all these things that sort of work against them, and then it’s just that it’s like those little percentage points. It’s like I’m just 10% off, I’m just 15% off, I’m just 20% off, and that really starts to add up over time. You know, and when you actually start taking care of your body. You’re you’re getting the good sleep. You’re working out. You’re eating healthy. You know, being hydrated, and you can get to 100%. You’re like, man, this feels amazing. I can’t believe I I feel like awake. I feel my mind sharp, and I think especially I’m in my mid 40s now. A lot of people blame it on age. You’re like, oh, I’m just too. I’m old, and I’m just. It’s like, man, so much of it is like what you’re doing to your body. You know, you can feel good at 50 if you take care of yourself. And we see, you know, some of our friends in the business who do take care of themselves. You know, who do like remember we had Matt Trozzo on? I think he’s in his early 50s, and he’s in incredible shape. He’s working out, you know, and he’s not that he has no issues, but I mean, he’s operating like someone who’s in his 30s because he’s taking care of himself, and so I don’t think the age needs to be the excuse for why you can’t perform. But you may just need to be more diligent about taking care of yourself so you can perform.

[00:37:10] Tom Dosch: Well, we’re getting to that age now, Tim. Where like you and David and I were sharing a LinkedIn over the weekend of you know somebody we know in the business that just passed away.

[00:37:19] Tim Dosch: Yeah.

[00:37:20] Tom Dosch: And I think if you, it’s just so important. I think the questions obviously about healthy habits, good habits. What do you do in your in business, business habits? But if you can be very well rounded as a person, and you’re taking care of your spiritual and your physical to start, and obviously, like you said, sleep sleep is also proving to be like very important. But if you’re doing that, there’s going to be a great cumulative value to that, and because this is a marathon, you’re automatically going to have such a higher probability to be successful. Unfortunately, the person that’s not taking care of themselves, like we’re starting to see it catch up to people now. Just that we’ve now been in the business this long, and so whether that’s poor health, broken relationships, not being able to keep a job, like whatever that is, I think it’s just an encouragement to people to try to start making those day by day good decisions now because it’s going to be a positive thing cumulatively, but the reverse happens too. Like if you’re just kind of like, well, I’m only doing it today, and I know it’s I shouldn’t be doing this, you know, or I’m making this shortcut, or you know that can happen too by just like you know I’m not telling the truth on this one deal, this one time, and that’s kind of where it always starts. And so I think just it is cumulative either way. And we were texting last night about something, and you were saying, you know, it’s not going to get better because we had a close friend that something really sad just happened, and it’s like you know, it’s not going to just get better. Yeah, unfortunately, the it’s probably going to get a lot worse just because of decisions that are being made. So there’s obviously though encouragement in that too, and I think, like you said, our faith grounds us in that. There’s conviction, and then there’s also hope. We have a lot of hope in our faith, and I think that we also, in a business that’s stressful and difficult, if I couldn’t rely on the fact that God’s got a bigger plan and He provides, it would definitely be just like crushing to go through some of what we’ve gone through in the business.

[00:39:05] Tim Dosch: Yeah, I think you bring up a good point. I think the part I left out, which is maybe the most important part, is your relationships. You know, your marriage, if you’re married, your kids. You know, if you have kids, like those are so important. And we see a lot of people, especially I feel like men in our business who will take that for granted, you know, and just it’s like my spouse is going to be there, and I’m just going to work hard, and I’m going to go travel and do whatever I want, and it’s not always going to be that way. And we see, you know, that the impact of a marriage blowing up or you know issues with your kids can really, really be hard on you. I mean, just even just physically can be hard on you. The stress and just you know that can take you out. At that point, the business doesn’t even matter because you’re dealing with things that are are a lot bigger than that. You know, I think for both of us, our marriages have been really important to us. You know, our wives and a lot of it has been you know being consistent with trying to have a date night, trying to travel together, trying to have you know just having. Coffee together in the morning when we’re doing our Chris and I do a quiet time together every day, and you know just these little things that you do, and and I make a ton of mistakes, you know, and so it’s like I’m not saying I’m great at that, but I think it’s something that you’re always working towards and you’re trying. And I remember, you know, yesterday I was trying to get to my son’s game, football game, and I had a call that you know I felt like it was an important call, but probably was kind of a wasted call. And if it had gone long, I could have missed him throwing that touchdown pass. You know, and I was thinking about that afterwards. I was like, you know, I mean, there’s so many things that seem so urgent in our business. Like, I got to get with this guy because this is so important, this deal, and whatever. And it’s like, then you miss that with your kid, and you don’t get that back. You know, and is that really going to even be something that you remember? So I think that the relational part, you know, being there for your kids, being there for your spouse, you know, working on those relationships, putting time inside-it’s going to be a sacrifice. It’s going to be a choice sometimes, but that’s you know that’s a choice you need to make for sure.

[00:40:58] Tom Dosch: Well, and then I think if you apply that to business, you could apply everything you just said to business. Then, yeah. So, how do you treat people? Again, we’re going to make mistakes, but how are you treating people? How are you looking at other people? And are you showing up in a way where you’ve done all this work to have a good foundation? And now you’re going to you care about other people. You know, you want to encourage them. You want to try to help them have a good foundation. You want to try to help them accomplish what they want to accomplish. I mean, we’re in a service business and brokerage, so your business, if you’re a broker, is really to go and figure out what your client’s trying to accomplish. If they’re a seller, what’s their motivation? How can you help them? They’re people. If they’re a developer, they’re people. We’ve talked a lot of times about a lot of our developers, and we spent a lot of time, you know, bringing up Donald Miller again, like going through his process of okay, if we’re trying to be the guide, what is our developer client actually really trying to accomplish? And a lot of times, what it is is they’re just trying to prove that they are doing well in their job, and we’re trying to help them take the next step. So sometimes we’re working with a head person, but if we’re not, a lot of times we’re working with maybe like a an acquisitions person or a vice president, and if we can help them be successful, they actually might be like running a company in 10 years, and these are steps towards that journey. And so, a lot of times, that’s how we’re looking at it: is we’re actually thinking of them as a person as much as they’re part of this bigger company, and we’re thinking, can we help them find the success they’re looking to find not just can we make a fee. Can we actually help them? Because if we can help them build in their career and take that kind of view of like, you know, in every story there is a mentor. There’s somebody that comes alongside. There’s this guide that’s there that helps the person on their path. That’s who we want to be. And that’s if you can look at life that way. I think if I think if a simple habit is try to look at people as people in the midst of a very transactional business, that would be just a really good reminder that I remind myself every day too. Because a lot of times you’re just going from call to call to call, problem to problem to problem to problem, and you kind of forget the people behind the problems and the calls, and you’re just thinking about the problems.

[00:42:59] Tim Dosch: Well, a lot of our repeat business. When you think about some of the developers and the buyers we’ve had, you know we’ve almost every single year of our company, and even going back when we were at ARA and Newmark before DMRE, we’ve closed a deal with some of these people every single year, you know, which is pretty crazy. And that that doesn’t happen if you see people as transactional, or you just see people as like, how do we just get this deal done? And you know, kind of go the next one. It’s you have to see people as people and care about them and care about what their needs are. And there’s going to be some give and take. There’s going to be times where you know they help us and they we’ve had clients do some really incredible things for us, giving us bonuses and you know catching us up on deals and all kinds of stuff. And then we’ve had times where we’ve really helped them, you know, and helped them get stuff done, or told them, hey, like I think you should drop this deal because it’s not a good deal for you. Let’s go get the next one, and maybe we don’t get paid with them this year. Maybe it’s we have to wait till next year, you know. But I think, you know, that’s how you have clients that become friends that you do transactions with. That you know some of these companies. Now we’ve done 30 or 40 transactions with the same company, you know, and that’s that. Going back to what we’ve almost the theme of this podcast is or this episode is thinking about this as a marathon, as a long term thing, not just how do I get this deal done. And so many brokers are just so short sighted. It’s like how do I get this one kill? And it’s like you’re gonna. If you want to live a long time, you have to have a lot of kills, you know.

[00:44:25] Tom Dosch: Yeah. Well, Tim, this was fun. I think Ally, thank you for the questions. I’ve just enjoyed getting to hear your perspective, Tim, and getting to reminisce on some stories.

[00:44:33] Tim Dosch: Oh yeah, it’s been great.

[00:44:34] Ally McElheney: Yeah, it’s awesome being on here, y’all.

[00:44:36] Tim Dosch: Yeah,

[00:44:37] Ally McElheney: That’s encouraging.

[00:44:37] Tim Dosch: Thanks, Ally.

[00:44:38] Ally McElheney: For sure.

[00:44:39] Tom Dosch: I was thinking if we could, if Donald Miller’s listening  or Matt Rotan, those would be great to have on. So we will.

[00:44:45] Tim Dosch: We’ll get Rotan on for sure. He’s got to sit in this chair since the room’s named after him.

[00:44:50] Tom Dosch: That’s right. We’ll definitely do that. And then yeah, Donald Miller would definitely be. He would be pretty cool to get on the podcast. So I don’t know. We’ll have to we’ll have to see if our producer can help make that happen.

[00:44:59] Tim Dosch: He’s incredible, sure.

[00:45:02] Tom Dosch: Well, thank you to our audience for listening. Definitely check us out on YouTube, Texas Land Guys, and subscribe to us there. You can see all of our content. We have short clips on YouTube, and we also have the full length videos. We record these podcast episodes, and then we also have an active LinkedIn account where we post quite a bit of content, so follow us there, and we will see you next week.

[00:45:24] Tim Dosch: All right, thanks, Tom.

[00:45:27] Outro: Thank you for listening to our podcast today. If you have questions about land you own in Texas, send us an email at texaslandguys@dmre.com, and follow us on LinkedIn to stay updated.