Networking Unleashed: Building Profitable Connections. An Interview with Henry L. Kaplan and Michael A Forman

📍

Hello and welcome to Networking Unleashed Building Profitable Connections, the show where we uncover how powerful relationships shape, powerful results. I'm your host, Michael Foreman, and today's episode is extra special because my guest isn't just a business leader, he's also one of my very best friends, someone I've known since middle school.

Over the years, he's built a career guided by one simple daily activity, a passion for always giving that extra 1% and the ability to navigate the calls no one wants to get, but that inevitably come in business and in life. His journey is a reminder that the same principles that build lasting friendships also build lasting networks.

We'll talk about how passion, consistency, and relationships carry you through the highs and lows of business and why your network is often the greatest investment you'll ever make. This one is personal and powerful, so let's dive in. I'd like to welcome Henry Kaplan, and as I said in the beginning, this is special for me because he's one of my very best friends, and I've known him since middle school, maybe even a year or two beforehand, but I'm really, I don't know, but we have so much history, so much that went on.

But he has made a career out of the real estate market. So I'd like to introduce Henry and let him tell you about his background. Henry, welcome to the podcast. Good morning, Mike. Michael. So before I start I calculated this morning to the best of my ability, and we are celebrating plus or minus 50 years as friends, which is, to me, it's one of the most special things.

Just for that reason alone. I couldn't wait to come see you today and. Just spend an hour with you because we don't live in the same state anymore, and the phone's great, but it's even better to see you in person. So I really do treasure the opportunity. Thank you so much. Henry l Kaplan I am the presently the sales manager for one of the largest Century 21 franchises in South Florida.

And I have about 150 agents that are affiliated with my office, but I consult with most of the agents in the company as well. So it's a, about 300 plus agents. It's a wonderful career and didn't all start that way. A little bit about me. I think, it's funny, we had a session recently and a group session in the office and somebody came up with a question how, what, at what point did you know what you wanted to be or what was the first thing you wanted to be when you grew up?

And so I. I didn't do it. I waited for my turn and everybody was like, I want to be a pilot. I wanted to be a fireman, I wanted to be a nurse, a doctor, a lawyer, and everybody joked about it. And nobody in the room ended up being that person except for me. And I thought to myself, now I, that was, it wasn't the very first thing that I wanted to be like in kindergarten.

I'm talking about as, let's just say eight or nine or 10 years old a little bit more immature. And so I decided that I wanted to be in real estate, and there's always an impetus, is that the right word to, to why that happened. And it has to do with a piece of mail that came, I was always looking for mail.

As a kid, I wanted a piece of mail and I never got mail. And I would be the one to retrieve the mail most of the time. And I always look, and it was never for me until one day. The mail said HLK Henry l Kaplan Realty. And I'm thinking finally a piece of mail from me. I don't know what this realty thing is, or realty.

I didn't know. So I went to my dad, I think this is for me, he's no, son. That's your grandfather's company. And I'm sorry. Yeah. Realty Company that he owned, but he's passed. And I manage the assets for him. And I said, what is realty? What are assets? And I started asking a lot of questions and he told me, we have a little apartment building that I manage for the family, and that's the grandfather's company name.

He was Harry l Kaplan Henry l Kaplan. And and as the more he talked about it, the more I thought to myself, wow, wouldn't it be cool, not just have some type of connection with a man I never knew, but something my father knew something about. He was a CPA by trade. And and so I I kept it in the back of my mind.

Although I did have other careers prior to real estate, paper delivery Boy and lawn cutting lawns for many years throughout college, high school and college. And then right out of college I actually, in one of my elective classes I took the real estate course for New York and and I passed.

I was in the college mode. It was easy. And then I started as a realtor. And and I, my career has been quite amazing, and I'm not gonna spend the next whatever, but I'll give you like maybe a three minute of things that I've done. So I started off just as a realtor and literally a week into training, we merged with a big company.

My company we called Wert Realtors. And Weikert was a great foundation for training and understanding the business and keeping it simple. And so from Wert, I like I said, I just graduated, so I really wanted to get involved in the business. And I started, like back then, most people don't realize this, but we didn't even have the multiple listing books, or not even, we had recipe cards in Rockland County, New York for every house.

And I had to carry a metal recipe card bin with me until it hit the frame of the door of the office one day. And 700 cards flew out. And I thought to myself, they just installed something in the corner that they tell me it's a computer and nobody used it, like for a month. So I decided is that's it.

I'm not gonna reorganize this thing. I'm gonna figure it out. So I logged in with dos to the multiple, listening to a coupler with a OL. And and I figured out the computer when other people wouldn't do that. And a couple guys came along at my age, we used to go to home for dinner. We all lived at home, 20 something years old, and we did the master last shift after dinner, go back to the office till 1 12, 1 o'clock in the morning learning real estate, looking up your properties online.

And I learned to actually the company I said to the company, I could do this. I could print these sheets out and and, provide this to all the agents in our six offices. In my mid twenties, ERT hired me as like a, I didn't call me a director, but they said, you're gonna be the guy that prints these out on spreadsheets, will give, gave me copy machine the size of a small car.

And I delivered these sheets to all six offices, and that was the very beginning of printed MLS data, 19 84, 19 85. And then books came along. So I anti I became antiquated, which I was totally fine with. And my career just navigated through real estate agent to, I guess the technology guy. And I realized I love technology, meaning I, it saved me so much time I didn't have to carry around.

And and everybody loved that the industry kept moving forward. And long story short a few years later I became a broker, real estate broker in New York. I owned my own company till I sold it to Century 21, the largest franchisee in New York 1991. I ran a rental division for years for them.

And then I ended up in corporate headquarters for Century 21 Corporate. It was a wonderful ride. And and then I started a franchise orientation department, traveled the country meeting new franchisees and lo and behold, four, four bosses later in, in corporate America had decided actually, I, I got a boss that said, Mr.

Kaplan, I'm, call me Henry. No she was a West Point graduate, Mike. And and I, she said I'm gonna teach you how to, to march. And the only thing that came to mind was, but I've been doing serpentine the whole, my whole life. You know what I mean? Was that an, was that animal house? Oh, wow. So she didn't like that answer.

She didn't like that answer. And it was either her or me. She found a technicality to bring me to hr. My the president of the company was the guy who hired me. So he came in through the meeting and and I knew that it was like my time was up at corporate headquarters and and so I decided to.

Transition and basically I tried a brand outside of Century 21 which I won't mention 2005. It wasn't the right fit because one of my responsibilities was I had to babysit a guy that drank too much. That, that wasn't always a good thing. And that was the end for that.

And I came back to Century 21 and I've stayed ever since. And, the jobs I've had with corporate were wonderful because they moved me to Florida obviously before I left and I got to be with my family, which was really important. President said, why are you doing that? Why are you leaving?

I said, because I wanna be with family. He's that's not the right answer if you wanna move up in this company. So the only thing I could think of, I pointed at him and I said. But you were in the field before you became president, so I guess I have to be in the field to maybe make a move up like that one day too.

And he is okay, that's the right answer. I'll let you and they're gonna chew you up and spit you at in Florida. So long story short, they didn't, and oh, so I had a divide and conquer because there was some hostilities for lack of service that, that our franchisees were getting. And and so one by one I chipped away and I have some long-term relationships from the time I came to Florida over 25 years ago.

And and then I navigated like prior to COVID, actually, let me think. Not COVID way big prior to that, it was it was back in 20 years ago, so let's just say, 2005, right? And the market was okay, it was moving along. But one of my local franchisees, I was working in a really small Century 21 office near home.

And I was, he was one of my best friends because I was consulting with him and 95 other customers brokers with I don't know, maybe 1400 realtors total. And he said I'm ready. I'm ready for you to come join me. And I was like, wow. Now like right now, he said, yeah, now. So I had to quit of course gave proper notice.

And I came to the office of about today and it's been an amazing ride. It, it took all those years of being a sales person, a broker customer service rep for the national franchise all the way down to the office level. And and, and then 2008 hit and our market fell apart.

And long story short that's pretty much when I came along and we just rebuilt from the ground up. And it's a place where I am done. I am, I'm never not done working. I'm not done managing, but I'm not moving. I know I'm where I'm supposed to be today. That's unbelievable.

And, all I can think about, all I kept on thinking about was HLK Realty. And that was, I think your first on your own real estate company. It was my grandfather's name. I took it and I put it on science. Absolutely. And I remember myself being in an office and your mom came into me and said, go talk to Henry about something that happened.

And I, that that's what I remember. You remember that office was my dad's CPA office. And I cleaned, I know I cleaned out the storage room to, to have my little desk and a chair to probably sit there with you. It's great. It's great. Okay. All right. Let's dive right into the questions.

You ready? Go for it. Hammer away. Okay. You and I go all the way back to middle school. How has that early friendship shaped the way you approach relationships and networking in your business career? It would, that relationship started before we met. Alright. And the really unique thing about, I think it probably came it, it started with my dad and my mom, a loving family and whatnot.

And dad was a serial entrepreneur. Had his own CPA practice and he specialized in the funeral home industry. And, he'd say, Hey, Henry, this is a great business. I'm like, really, dad? He goes, yeah, they're dying to get in. They're dying to get in. Aha. But that's what he would tell me. And then finally I started laughing as a, as a older kid, I thought I was, oh, that's silly dad.

But and he was always hoping maybe I would do that and actually interviewed as a sideline to one of his best friends and clients, but it just wasn't for me. But the relationships, the families, the my siblings, the closeness. And when you're a family of three or four, kids like, you better communicate.

You're not going to eat, you're not gonna, you're not gonna, you're not gonna survive. And then, and I can remember as far back as kindergarten, right? So what was I, six years old? Something like that. And and I remember one by one making really not just talking peripherally to, to kids, but being excited to be beyond my siblings to learn, and talk and create friendships with these children, these, and it was just I, one by one I, Brad Sherman big tall guy.

He ended up being like my protector, best, one of my best friends like Michael and he was always six four. I was like five, whatever. Now, back then he seemed really tall, but, and if you look at the pictures, the crazy thing is that. Stewie Green and Mike Wilkin and and Richie Isaacs.

And Meryl. And, I'm friends. What's a chance that I'm friends with half the kids in my original kindergarten class, Ricky Mella, Larry Fox. I can keep going. And I realized that's really even young. That was when we went to junior high school, met new people like Michael and our elementary school was split, but we all came back together except from Michael in high school.

Why is that, Michael? Why is that? Because I moved away. I moved from one town, one town to another town. They weren't even close to each other. I had a bike at least 13 miles. So did I biked back and forth. Yeah, exactly. Just to see you, just to see you. I biked back and forth. Yeah. So basically we came up we, most of us came back together in high school and we've been inseparable ever since.

And and not just Facebook friends, like one, one of the guys, I was part of the original group. We started a guy's thing. The guys get together. Being in New York, we always go to Atlantic City a couple times a year. And then as we adult we made the trip to Las Vegas once a year and we've had as many as, I dunno, 20, 25 guys.

I actually have a picture somewhere buried in on my credenza of the, one of the last shots we took of I would say 18 or 20 of us. And when you check in with people, especially in person every year for your whole life it's pretty amazing. And it keeps us together as a group. And the cool thing is that group's coming together Thanksgiving weekend for one of the guys' el son's wedding.

There'll be 13 of us back together again. And it's funny because. It has to do there's a side story, and I know I'm probably taking too much time, but I'm gonna keep going 'cause I need to share this. It's all right. Go. It's not just my parents that help me. All right? I have to tell you a story of I was staying over at a friend's house one night.

We just hung out with each other, whatever. And and I got up early, slept over. I got up early, just went downstairs to, I don't know, read or watching tv, and mom showed up to the kitchen and and she sat down with me and she said, I have to tell you, I'm so happy that you and this person are still friends for such a long time.

She goes, I have relationships, Henry that span 30, 40 years. And you can make a conscious decision to be friends with somebody forever. And she and jokingly, she gave me permission too. She goes, and if you don't like somebody, it's okay not to be friends with 'em as well. But she says, I see that you and Michael Foreman, because this conversation was with your mom, Sandra, Sandy Foreman really resonated deep with me.

That I can make a conscious decision never to let go. And you are one of those people. You are one of those people. You'll always be one of those people to the day we admit, to the day you were gone. And I've taken her advice plus my family's advice, obviously, and the experience I already had.

And I've applied that not just to my relationships and my family, but well beyond that, to my realtors, to my friends, my extended family, my pickleball friends, my poker friends. I'm the guy that they. They love, they trust they call me, they ask me. I wanna be that guy for everybody.

It's just my way to, to to give back. I wanna be the guy. You have taken what you've learned, okay? And you've made relationships. That is the art of networking, at least after the pandemic, right? Because before the pandemic people, most people, not you, but most people, it was mostly transactional.

After the pandemic, it became more relational relationship. But you have taken it to the nth degree. You have taken it since you were five years old. You created relationships when other people were just making friends. True. And that's what I think sets you apart from just about everybody else. Because you've made those relationships and you've worked at it to keep up those relationships because you never know where they, whether they come in, whether you can help them or they can help you or what you're doing.

But it's a, it's, you don't look at it from what they can do for you. You look at what they, what you can do for them. Oh, and that is the beauty of the relationship. One more thing my mom mentioned. I have to bring this up. She said, even if you don't talk to somebody for a long time, yeah. She said you could touch base with them and pick up from where you left off.

And that's been not just Michael and I, our story together, but it's been that story with me and so many people and so many revived relationships. That, that it's exciting for me. Like to me, like finding somebody, I found a guy about seven years ago that disappeared from high school. We gone, it's 40 years already, where is he?

And I found him, with the internet and we reestablished four friends all over again and it became a real estate opportunity. So it's never about the real estate opportunity. There's something in the back of my door that says Care first, commission last. And that's what I do. And I think it's a move a little bit further than that because I believe that you went to high school with your wife.

Am I correct? That's true. So I have to give Nancy a shout out. She was in junior high school with us, so we were all friends with her back in junior high school. And and I made a huge mistake in 1981. I was she was such a mature woman. I was such a kid in junior high school. And beautiful and the body of a 25-year-old at 13.

And and so I, I was just, I not afraid, but I wasn't confident enough. So we became friends, really close friends, and for six years, between junior high school and high school till I finally asked to go to date me. And then I made the biggest mistake in my life. And I just made a story up in my head and I wasn't honest enough or mature enough to tell her I, how could it be that I bet the person I'm gonna end up marrying?

So I broke up with her. I made a little lie, I'm sorry, but my mom would say it was a little white lie. I wanted to date other women. It was never about that. It was just that her sister was getting married and I just felt my gosh, this, she's only a couple years older, am I next? And so it, I spent the next 38 years, not 38 years, but we lost touch over the years.

And long story short I got married to somebody else and have a great son, Ethan. And and it just didn't work out. And Nancy and I became friends again. Back in 2015. She moved to Florida. She likes to gamble. We played poker. I played poker as a kid. And and through her divorce and my divorce, separated by some many, some years we just reconnected and and I'm going to be celebrating our four year anniversary.

It's a beautiful story. It's a beautiful story. And me, I feel, because I was friends with both of you, and it just, it feels extra special for me, but Okay. Mention one thing about, about how we reconnected technology. Sure. Social media. In my defense, I didn't know that Facebook had a second button, a second app called Messenger.

So in 2015 I discovered it and there were messages back some year, at least. At least a year or more. And Nancy was one of those messages, Hey, I moved to Florida. I'm in Lake, I'm in Lake Worth, Florida. It seems like you might be close by. Maybe we can connect whatever talk. And so a year later I said, yeah, it's never too late.

'cause I just discovered her old message. And so we reconnected through Messenger in 2000 and and 15. So That's great. It was meant to be. That's all it was meant to be. And you two were meant to be together. Okay. So you've mentioned one simple daily activity that has guided you through your career.

What is it and how has it impacted the way you build and maintain your network? Great. So again, I think everything I know it's, I don't know if I've ever had an original idea. All right. I beg Barbara Steel everything that I know and I give credit to whoever, I can't even remember who told me because it, it is become part of my DNA.

But I did read a small real estate article in a magazine or a newsletter or something like that in the early mid, I'm sorry, mid. 1980s. And I got two really good pieces of advice. One of them I still use, but the first one that I don't use any longer in, in the formal way is I don't place ads in the newspaper any longer.

I stopped that, but that was a big part of my success as a new broker owner of a real estate company in the mid late eighties. I, I was killing it in the journal news in Rockland County Journal news newspaper with three or four, four line ads, and I took a contract and I spent probably, as much as I could and just getting that type of exposure.

And that's the main key word for me today with real estate, or I'm sorry, with business is exposure. If you don't, ex doesn't it stand Theresa Mike the more people exposed to you, the better chance you have of getting your services, your friendship. Absolutely. Yeah. Get your word out. And so I, and I say that with sellers too.

Does it extent, the reason, the more people that know about your property, the more I syndicate and set a better chance we have of getting it sold. So I apply the word exposure in everything I do, and I keep trying to uncover new areas of exposure. Now coming back to your question, the one thing that I still do, and Mike, if you had a calculator in front of you, which you don't have to because I've already figured this out this morning.

'cause I wanted to be prepared for anything you might throw at me. So just randomly 1984. So it's 2025, that's 41 years times 365 days. 14,965 days. I started in my beginning of my career with adding one person to my database or my phone, let's just say my phone. And back then it was, if you remember, it was like pagers still.

So I had to keep a. A hard copy of, I carried a Daytimer around. Nobody knows what a daytimer is, but Right. I know what a Daytimer is. Yeah. And inside that, daytimer had a little beige address book, and I jam packed that address book with names, addresses, phone numbers, and emails. And if you miss one of those actually back then, it wasn't emails, but name, mailing address, phone number, and then when cell phone came around and then emails came around I transitioned to that too.

So I am a little short and and I took your mom's advice. So tech, technically I would've had almost 15,000, but I decided to remove some people that I didn't wanna do business with it any longer. Didn't, I didn't feel that they. Were ethical or they were they were manageable. They were, they I've given my permission to do that over the years.

It was hard for me to let people go, especially if I could have made money. But I'm at the point in my career where I really want to work with people that wanna work with me and that are delightful and fun and engaging. And it's more than French and it's business, of course, but many of these people I've become friends with.

So every day for the last, let's just say 40 plus years, I've added one person to my database. Just one. And that to me and maintaining it is not easy. I'm not perfect, and I could probably delete a few thousand from my phone, but I don't. Oh, and if somebody passes. I delete that, that person as well, of course.

It's so simple, but a lot of people say I don't have that kind of time. That's why, you should start now. Don't wait one a day, one per day. It's amazing. I got back from the convention, I'm sorry for the weekend, and so I picked up a bunch of business cards. So I'm transitioning now, not just for the phone, but now I'm using LinkedIn to find them and connect with them on LinkedIn, not just my phone, because LinkedIn may not easily have their mailing address.

Because little things we do in my office is we write a personal note and I'm, that's my, one of my greatest weaknesses. But without a mailing address it's, it's not easy to do i'll tell you. And one of my secrets to success is the follow up factor. When I go in, I do a workshop with a business or a company, I always give them a series of things to do for the follow-up because I feel that the follow-up is more important than actually meeting the person.

And the main part of that follow-up a do an email that night, but the following morning you write a personal handwritten thank you note. To that person. No business, no Anything else? Just thanking them for their time. Yeah, you put your card in, you put that envelope and you mail it out and you wait about three or four days.

So that has the biggest impact on somebody. 'cause imagine being the person that you receive that. Thank you. You. It's not a bill. It's not anything else. It's just a thank you. Oh, this person met me the other night and he wants to thank me. So now this is what we send from the office, right?

It's got C 21. It has nothing but our logo and a handwritten note, which somebody left on my desk yesterday and she, I was away from the convention, a little convention. I didn't tell anybody where I'm going. I said, I'm taking off. So she was checking to make sure I'm okay, and she's so grateful for the relationship.

Yeah, I responded to her and a little help from our, my cousin Chad. And because I really, it is just, I didn't wanna have to I knew what I felt, but I really wanted to come out and find words. And so we pay Mike, listen to this. We pay for every one of our agents for five cards a day the card, the envelope, and the stamp to connect with somebody that they've either spoken to or have met in person.

Not for prospecting, like in the neighbors. Talk to a meth. Guess how many out of 140 agents? Guess how many agents use their maximum allocation every day? And that's $10 a day, $50 a week? One. 10, 10 agents? One, one. I was being generous when I said 10. I really thought five. Okay. But I was being generous when I said 10.

But listen, you're not telling me that something that I don't know, because people don't take the time and you don't realize the impact that you have on a personal thank you note, right? So if you can tell your agents the impact that it would have on somebody's day, not just that you send 'em a card, but the impact that they would have on somebody's whole day just for them receiving that card.

Maybe they'll send a few more and think about it. You go to the mailbox every day? I still book the mail every day. There's hardly anything in the mailbox. A card is not a handwritten card, a handwritten envelope, a handwritten card inside. Don't be using tech. I'm just going to privy this company to do it for, you know what, to me it takes, what about two minutes?

And I know time is our enemy. Time is, we have to, we can't, we have to take advantage of those little moments, like Mike said, to connect. And and I think to myself, and I know some people that do a really good job and especially one of my lenders. And he always puts a scratcher, dollar scratcher.

And you know what? People wanna talk to me all the time. Where can I spend my money? I said, stop spending money. Spend time and a little bit of money on people that know you like you and trust you. Write the note, mail it. Give them a scratcher. What if they win? Good for them. They're gonna thank you even more.

Maybe buy a property from you. Don't think of that. I call it stinking thinking from a Floyd Wickman, one of my mentors, real estate mentors. But those little things go such a low, those 1% to 1, 1, 1 contact, and 1% extra Mike every day. 1%. Absolutely. Absolutely. I can't add anything to that because that was said perfectly.

That is exactly what everybody should do, but nobody does, or just about nobody does. Okay, let me do the third question. In business, we all get that, that call that you never want to get. How important is having a strong network in helping you navigate through those moments? It happens to be a lot as the manager of a busy real estate office because the call that I never wanna get is that we put somebody's money at risk.

When you lose money on a, typically on a buyer's behalf, you slay the dragon. The dragon could be your best friend. The golden, you slay the golden goose is even a better example. You, what's the chance if you lose money for somebody, they're ever gonna come back to you. And in this day and age when that happens too, even if it's not your fault, which, I think many times we could have prevented it.

Most of the times we could have prevented it. It is that, that you'll never, what's a lead worth? What's a contact, what's a person worth? We say real estate's a contact sport. So start with context not leads. And then leads become contacts. Sorry. Contacts become leads. And that we know in real estate that.

That a solid contact. We, a great, we call a whale, a really great contact. Somebody who knows a lot of people could be worth 30, 40, $50,000 in your career. If it's something that, they, as they make recommendations, they use you personally. And then now with social media, I can't tell you how many times we get blame for something we weren't even involved in.

So can imagine what we are. So to me, the call I never wanna get is I tell my realtors I wanna know two weeks before rather than one second late. Because, in Florida our contracts are, time is of the essence, which means at 11:59 PM on any business day we can really be a default of a legal agreement.

So that's the hardest thing as a manager is to make sure people understand those timeframes and those obligations. But the second, or maybe even the first worst call you can ever get, Mike has to do with you or your family. And and so my worst call was about three years ago, three and a half years ago, when I got a call from my doctor's office and they said, Henry, something's off with your blood work.

We'd like you to see a nephrologist. And I'm like I, what kind of ist is that? And as the kidney doctor, oh, it's kidney doctor, what's up? He goes, I don't like what I see. And so I went to see a nephrologist and Dr. Silverstein, and she was a seasoned pro, and I'm waiting for her in the room.

And after, after my blood test, came back she she said, actually she got them from the other doctor. She goes, Mr. Kaplan, you have advanced kidney disease. Have you thought about a transplant yet? I'm thinking. The only thing that came outta my mind was, you got the wrong Mr. Kaplan, because I feel fine.

She goes, oh no, I got the right Mr. Kaplan. Apparently I had a combination of, it wasn't cancer, but a combination of ailments that actually ailments. They said factors that created a permanent ailment. And both my kidneys were going, oh, you can You still see me? I can see you. Okay.

Alright. Both of my kidneys were still going. They go, they were going dead. And I was really concerned. So I went out and by the way, it was like three months after I got married to Nancy. So yeah, little three between three and four years ago. And so long story short, we did a biopsy to determine that certain factors, they say I was obese.

I never felt obese, but I'm not skinny either. Meat consumption, high diabetes and high blood pressure contributed to my kidneys. And and I decided, and I thought, my God, I just got married, and if you live bio, I do expect the unexpected and you'll never be surprised. I said, okay. At first I had to go see Nancy right away.

I waited till she got home. She was like, why are you doing home? What are you, why are you home early? You usually working late? And I told her, she goes we'll work through it. We'll figure it out. This is not the end, this is. And so fast forward to July 26th of 2023 I was able to find a donor and and she didn't have a blood type match, but I went social with with YouTube and Facebook and had 13,000 views and many recommendations.

And, I said I shouldn't say recommendations. Many people offering to help me and including my two sisters. And then, and many were disqualified except for Rebecca. And Rebecca was my cousin's wife's sister. Didn't know me, didn't know, I didn't know her, but she stepped up and through an exchange program, the National Kidney Registry, nkr.org I was able to get a live donor.

She gave hers. Who gives a kidney selflessly, doesn't even know you to a stranger, a woman in California. And a month later I received one from a man in Rochester, Minnesota. Within 24 hours, it was in my body. And he gave his, because his wife needed one. When she got one, somebody else got one. It's chain reaction, but it starts with the one selfless individual.

And that was Rebecca. That's outstanding. Outstanding. And I knew, of course, I knew the whole story and you left a few parts out, but that was the gist of the story. And listen, nobody's happier than I am to see you on this podcast and to see you working. So let me give you a side story because you are right.

You do know more. I don't know if you know this side story, but there will be adversity in your life and your business. Every step of the way. I'm not a negative person. The glass is half full for me. But I've learned that when even I had nine people offering one of those people before Rebecca, even Rebecca told me early on, but I was looking for a match.

And if you're a kidney if you need a kidney, don't look for a match. Look for a healthy person. And so one of these people said, a woman, she said to me, and it's gonna sound weird, I'm not gonna stop Henry till my kidney is in your body. Now, that's a pretty darn big commitment. And I put my, my, my trust and faith and by the way Michael knows this.

I went on dialysis, peritoneal through the abdomen at home while I slept for seven months on dialysis. It wasn't a hop, skip, and a jump, getting a kidney. But I waited for the wrong person. And I guess many of you probably read who Moved my cheese was not happening. My, that cheese corner, that kidney corner was empty with this woman.

It ends up that she didn't pass the mental part of the exam. And and so she bowed out gracefully. Two people didn't of the nine. So even when you think you got this, you've got this, you don't until, I'll say until, your doctors tell you your blood test came out well. Or until you are off medications or to the best of your ability, which I'll never be off because of anti-rejection or till the deal closes and it funds and even beyond, you have to have proper insurance because people always find a way to, to try to, point a finger at you even though three fingers are pointing back at them because you never know what's gonna rear its ugly head one day.

So do the right thing even when nobody's watching. That was one of my side stories. No, it's perfect. I listen back in New York, I was in the mortgage industry, so I feel exactly what you're saying. And I can talk about this for another two hours, but let's go ahead. You talk about the extra 1% rule, how can that principle be applied to networking so people stand out and create deeper connections?

I try to give before I get, to me it's just, I don't know, something. It's definitely not been my whole career, but it's been it's been some years. And so when I meet somebody at a networking event, I, first of all I pick out usually the loaner to start with. That's just me one, I can approach anybody and say, Hey, I'm Henry.

What's your name? Hey, I'm John. So what type of work do you do? Like normally it's a business networking group and and so he starts explaining I'm an audiologist and, and so I've got a pretty busy pretty practice you this, that you, I'm trying to grow my business. I just changed locations.

And so occasionally I'm like, great, you know what? I got a hearing aid now. Oh, I say I got a Bluetooth device, which it is. So people think, I'm like I'm crazy sometimes with talking like you're talking to me. That guy Michael on the street that you would see talking? We thought he was crazy growing up.

He probably just had advanced technology, what we have now. That's all right. But seriously, so I love to meet somebody. I love to figure out. I love to get their information. And then I'll add them to a list. I always try to give two or three names. I'm like, yeah, I met this guy. He seemed really nice.

You might wanna look him up on, on, on Google and see his reviews. But I always like to try to connect people to connect because not that they owe me, but I always think that they appreciate the referral. And I'm never, I've never been a part of BNI. But I know people that have, and that's really good.

But the, there was a second thing I wanted to share with you about, about, oh yeah. So when I meet somebody who says I'm, I am an endoscopic specialist, I'm thinking, okay, so I'll let talk and then I'll be like, alright, so how would I know if the next person I'm talking to would be a good prospect for you?

I don't wanna say, can you explain that in plain English or dumb it down for me? How enough, the next person I'm gonna talk to you today or any other day would be a good prospect for you. Oh. If they ever have like knee pain or ankle, I'll go in with scopes and cameras and sometimes they don't even tell you what they really do, or either, I'm a doctor.

What type of doctor? I'm a psychologist. Oh, great. You're not mizing me. Now, are you like, I try to break the ice an icebreaker. A quick question or two. I love to just connect and don't feel obligated to especially like when I go out to some of these events I try to get away from real estate events because I, the realtor's never gonna gimme business, right?

Another realtor. But I try to move too. I say, Hey, it was so nice to meet you and and then we move on. So once you've got it, you build it. There's no reason to spend another 40 minutes and really not have the opportunity to meet more people. Absolutely right. And you touched on this just a little bit, but when you go to a networking event, you have what's called a servant's heart.

You, it's givers game, right? So if you go to a networking event and all you think about was serving other people, not, you're there to sell a widget or you have a service or something else like that, forget all that, right? You're there to make everyone else, or everybody that you come in contact with. More successful.

So my line that I teach in workshops and everything else is after you have that one or two people down and you have them talking about their business, you say, you know something, how can I make you more successful? How can I be a good referral source for you? And most of the time, if I've done my job correctly, they say, Mike, I don't even know what you do yet.

So I they tell me how I can, how they, how I can be a good referral source for them. And I make myself I'm in this area, I'm known as a super connector. Because every week, and I have been doing this for the last two, two and a half years, every week I find two people with a need and I put them together and I walk away.

Fantastic. So that's all that I do, and that's all that I do. We have something in our Johns Creek Chamber of Commerce and called having an ambassador. And once a week, myself and three or four other people, we go out around the town just saying what we can do for them. So if you do that, if you do make your life, make a habit of giving.

'cause most people think wait a second, I'm in business. I want the business. I wanna sell two or three widgets for X amount of dollars. Take that off your, take that outta your head. Take it off your shoulders and just get, because what goes around does come around Bob Berg, who's a big speaker in the networking world.

He's where I got the line from. Okay let me tell you. And he does exactly. He's a Floridian. He's a Floridian. Yes, he is. Yes he is. And he does exa I do exactly what he has been doing for 20 years. So when I speak to places, I'm speaking almost a mirror image of Bob Burke. Wow. Awesome.

I know. So true. Yeah. The thing I forgot to mention when I go to somewhere. I get, we're a big Easterseals contributor for the corporate office has been doing it for 50 years. We're doing it for 45 years. So when I get invited to an Easterseals event, because last year we donated almost 28,000, they'll comp me a table.

So I'll bring some of the top agents too, but I'll also bring some of my business partners. When I say partners, I don't mean I'm, let's just say affiliate, not a affiliate, somebody, people I trust. So I'll bring my mortgage broker with me. Sorry, my mortgage banker with me not a broker.

And so when I'm talking to the waiter, 'cause that's maybe one of the loaners out there, and I'm like, have you thought about, do you own already? 'Cause I'm in real estate. Oh, I don't know. Yeah, I have you think about buying, he goes, yeah. I say, you know what? You gotta speak to this right there at the meeting.

I'll be Sean or Rick or Shane, come over, talk to this guy. Let's get him pre-approved. He wants to buy, his lease is coming up in six months. And I meet and I bring the connection together right there and there. I don't wait. So I'll bring an inspector. Sometimes I'll bring a handyman. I'll bring my insurance guy.

I, I rotate them as and you never know who you're gonna find right then and there. So don't, not, don't wait. If you have an opportunity to even like you said Michael, you met somebody across the room wait, I just met somebody. You two need to talk. I'm sure you've done that many times.

Many times. Many times. And when you said you approach that loner, that person by themselves they're probably an introvert, right? They're afraid to go out to the room. So the first thing you do is you go to that other person, and again, you're giving, right? So you're saying, Hey, what's your name?

Oh, you know something that's a really nice blazer you have on. Or, you know what? I like your shoes. And that breaks the ice immediately. You pay them a compliment. You pay them a compliment. Absolutely. Yeah. And then they start talking. Okay. So what's the biggest networking lesson you've learned from your own business journey that you wish you had known earlier?

The data most like what? Just somebody apply to real estate but applies to any business. How many people have I given my card to but never collected anything from, if you don't control the data or retrieve the data you are like waiting for frozen. That's never gonna ring. And it, and that's like a strategy for 50%, 49% of the realtors, Michael, in this country did one deal or no deals last year, 49%.

Half of our industry, more than half is failing because, some do three, two or three deals, it doesn't pay the bills. So they're waiting for something to happen. For something to happen. Some movement has to occur. And to me I really believe that you have to, you, you have to not just get the business card and not just create the relationship first or get the business card, but maybe right then and there.

You know what I just learned from this conference? I went away on Monday and Tuesday to the realtors. Association. I went because I needed to get away and sharpen my pencil, up here, sharpen my brain. And I took a LinkedIn, actually a technology class, and he focused on LinkedIn and the Nextdoor app, the one who navigates us with our neighbors.

And boy, in LinkedIn, in the first five minutes, it was worth the week. It was worth the two days I spent there because he just showed me that you just walk up to somebody and how many people have LinkedIn profiles? So many. And you just click on search in this little upper right corner where it gives your QR code and you scan each and you connect right to each other right then and there.

Now you've got them. Of course, I had a little word like, auburndale Florida, because I need to refer this person, like to this person in the future. Oh, what's their name? But you'll, as you maybe, especially with Florida Realtors, I've met people from, every, every county ev every city.

And but taking the time, and it does take time to, either if they have the scan, how many people couldn't log in during that speaker. They couldn't even log into their LinkedIn account. The two ladies to the left and right of me, it took them half the class to figure out how to do that, which was a waste of the time.

So you need to be up on the networking tool available to you at least one. The best ones I discovered today, for the first time, I have 2020 LinkedIn connections, which I had no idea. It just says 500 plus. But you know what? Get with technology even a little bit and save it appropriately so you can find them again.

Use anything you want. Bling Stone hat lady, I'll never forget that one from this weekend. Rhinestone hat lady. Yeah. And it works. It just because you have the electronic business cards, you have regular business cards, you have the LinkedIn. So there are a number of ways that you can stay connected.

And if you receive that, that physical business card. Here's a note, here's a little trick that I learned a hundred years ago and that I tell every workshop, every client that I coach, take that business card, write down the date. What, when the date. Let's say you're in an event, the date of the event.

Write down the name of the event, and then something you talked about. So you have all that information on the back of the card so that in two weeks you're gonna look at that card and say, I don't know who this is. Yeah. You turn it over and say it's true. That's who it is. But if you follow up, I, again, I have a whole follow up sequence if you use the sequence.

You'll remember it right away. It's funny you say follow up in the office, although the boss doesn't like it, we say, f you follow up. If you don't follow up, you're not gonna get anywhere with it, and Mike, you're right, 'cause the office gave me one of one of my cards and I used it over the weekend.

Just put it under the phone and it gives you the link and you download my contact. I don't know how they did it. It's not magic, it's technology. But every one of our realtors gets one. So in case they're out, they could just walk up, to somebody talking, Hey, here's my information. But again, as mu as important as to get information, if you're not getting information, I don't wanna have a card on me right now.

What am Write on the back of your card. Or some agents, keep little pads. We give these teeny little pads that fit in a purse or a back pocket. It just re recycle paper. And people, and you know what people they take them with them and they, do you have a pen for your pocketbook? Yeah, I have a pen.

Okay, good. I, it's such the basics, but you know what? I can't tell you how many people say, oh one guy, he was so proud, he gave 20 business cards out a day, every day. He was like the worst producer ever. He was busy giving cards out. I have to tell you, and this is a little note, you can tell all of your agents, it's not as important.

You say how big is your network? My network is X amount of thousands of people. Okay. How many people, how many networks are you in? Yeah. It's a mindset shift. Exactly. And you have to think about, wait a second, I can reach out to anybody. No. How many people can reach out to you?

Exactly, and that's where you have to think about it. I had a gentleman real quick. I had a gentleman that joined my office and he was like, in the interview, he says, I have a list. I said, okay. And he says it's a hundred thousand names. And I said, okay. And he says, so what's it worth to the company?

I said to the company, I said, what? We don't work your list. You don't understand Henry. These are, every person was such and such a group. And there's nuggets in there. I said, you need to be the gold miner. I told him, you need to get through that list and bring it down to 200 plus or minus people that know you like you, trust you enough to either, you still recommend you.

He was like a list is, I agree, A list is nothing unless you would do something with it. And I told him, and you know what? He soon thereafter quit. He's you don't see, you don't see my value. I said, oh no, you don't see your value and you don't want to do the work that it requires to bring it down to equality, not quantity.

Absolutely. Absolutely. And what you said, know you, like you and trust you, then they'll do business with you. And that list everybody knew you because you were on the list or whatever, but then you have to narrow it down a little bit to you, like you that narrowed your list down, trust you.

Now you what brought that list from a hundred thousand down to 200, and that's the list that you need. So you're right, he's gotta be the person to be the gold miner and to break that list down to 200, and then that's something you can work with. But after, but until then, it's not worth really worth anything.

Yeah. Passion seems to be a driving force in your success. How can professionals use their passion as a tool to attract the right connections? So passion is, first of all, you have to be in a, in a. Position you have to be in, in a in a career that you could be passionate about. Because, one thing my dad taught me, he said, look, son, always do your best.

And I added never give up. And also you need to like what you do and you need to feel, you bring value to people's lives. And I know that passion, people always don't find their passion in what to do, Michael. You do. I do. We know what we're passionate about. And if I tell people every day and mostly what I'm interviewing new realtors, I'm not the recruiter.

We have a director of career development that does that for me. But I bring, I come in to the interview and I, to meet them and I'll say, look, I don't know what I wanna be when I grow up, but I'm still having a lot of fun after 41 years. So I still have time to think about that. And everybody laughs.

But you know what I'm doing what I was meant to do. I know that. I've never, I, I did waiver six months, Mike, first six months of my career, I waved on, on, on that because my first three deals in contract, once you have a real estate contract, statistically more than half the time you're gonna close my first three deals in contract fell apart.

So I went to my dad, I was, living at home in the basement or whatever, and I said, dad I don't know if real estate's for me. He goes, son, you just started. You need to add, you need to keep learning. You need you need, you need to get out there.

You need to follow what your bosses tell you and apply what you're learning. And and he said, don't, I'm not gonna, you're not gonna stop. And he didn't say, I'm not gonna, he goes, don't stop. And I just took that was, that became my driving force. That, when things go sideways, when it seems like it's half full, things happen for a reason and sometimes we can't figure out why.

Don't even look back. Try to figure out why. Just strive forward, continue to do your best, work harder than everybody else. There's so many things that, that are, that guide me that I've learned over the years but the biggest challenge I see is people jumping around from career to career and looking for, and some people never find what they're looking for.

And it's not always about the money. As a matter of fact, I've had opportunity to make more money from other op, other opportunities that have come since I, I'm here almost 20 years at this office. And there's, I don't, I think there's a price, but I guarantee you it's gonna be seven digits.

So nobody's offered that yet. It's so true. It's so true. And a lot of what you just said, I learned from the military about keeping it forward, keeping straight, keeping consistent, never give up, all that kind of stuff. And it's just it's true. I have to put my own spin on it, and I have to feel it inside.

I can't just hear somebody telling me. I have to feel it from the inside. And when I found my passion, now I found this back in New York when I was doing mortgages and everything, I felt that I was the person out there talking and explaining during the first time home buyer seminars and things like that with the realtors.

I was doing all that. So back then, I found the passion. I worked through different career paths before that, before I, where I am now. I now is where I found my passion. But I was, 60 years old before I was actually able to take it and run with it. So I know what you're talking about.

I hear you. Okay. So networking often comes down to consistency. I just spoke about that. How do you keep showing up and staying top of mind in relationships, even when life gets busy? Okay, so some basic things, right? And I can't remember who told me this. It was a woman basketball coach for a college team.

I apologize, but it was a long time ago. So I just took, some, I always try to take one thing away or two things. She gave me a few things. All right. First of all, make your bed every day. Make your bed every day. Nothing worse than coming home to a messy bed, right? Nancy and I make it. She makes it, we make it together.

This morning, we made the bed together. We're out. We are out. We're up 5 45. We're outta bed by six. The bed is made. We're having breakfast. She's on the road by seven o'clock. And so I'm in the office by 7 0 5 'cause I live. 1.7 miles as a crow flies to the office. And so you gotta get up. I tell everybody, you gotta dress up and you gotta show up.

Today I thought I'd walk the mall to see if I can meet people. You know what? It's, that's not, I have strategies, sessions with my agents goals and strategies. I do, everyone gets a one-on-one once a year, and then we could tweak it during the year. But it's not just getting up, dressing up, showing up, but doing productive activities.

So the biggest joke with Nancy and I is, we're so busy on weekends with our grandson and Ethan and Nancy's mom and our friends and, with pickleball and poker that I go to work Monday morning just to relax. Seriously. I'm like the only guy that thinks that way. They're like, really?

I'm like, yes. I, Monday morning to me is, and I know it's gonna get busy, so I don't even have to schedule something. I typically will. I have appointments, of course, this, I, I block this out. Oh, I time block and I'm really good at time blocking. Again, Floyd Wickman a wonderful master trainer for realtors.

And I don't have two schedules. I'm one person. All right, so I color code my time blocking. And and the only bad thing about time blocking is you need to leave time for the unexpected. If you like me, I have an open door policy, except I never put a note on my door unless I'm doing a recording.

Like today I have an open door policy. Nothing going on here, but the work. And so people could just knock and come in and I leave my door open most of the time anyway. But the unexpected, the people like, oh, you got a minute? Like yesterday, oh, I just did it early this morning. A guy hands me after our sales meeting a packet, and he said, Hey, could you got some time I'd like you to go over my, my my packet for me as a realtor, and they, the services I'm gonna offer.

I'm like, yeah. I look it's 11 pages. I said, no, that's I don't have time to do that. 'cause I already had somebody waiting for me. But make a time with me in the meantime, give it to me. And so early this morning, because I, like I said, it was here at 7 0 5 or so I edit. I said to him, it's gonna be red or blue pen.

You're fine. He goes, yeah, man, whatever pen you like, all right, no problem. I said, don't think I'm grading you all i'm just gonna give you my opinion. So apparently he used chat CPT because it had a lot of great points, but he hadn't made a change yet. And so I, I suggested. I love using the who, what, where, when, why, how I want you to, if you have to, you just don't state something without giving like a feature, without showing them or telling them what the benefit is and asking questions or telling them, telling people why.

I didn't rip it apart, but I spent a lot of ink, maybe 15 minutes running through it. So I give him, it's gonna be a multiple draft situation, but it's like being there for people even when you don't even have the time sometimes. And I just, I guess I haven't transitioned to Calendly like you have.

I'm afraid of people book booking up my whole day because it's an open door policy. And so I and I, and the only thing, unequal is taking equal unequal people, treating unequal people equally. Meaning that if I've got like a top producer in my office that needs a minute and I look and I realize it's not gonna be a minute I'm gonna give them an hour.

If I have somebody that's been with me for a while and that consistently doesn't show up, or doesn't, do our training or doesn't come to me with questions, doesn't light up the production board and they need, say, they say, Hey, I need an hour. I'm like tell me what's going on. And then they'll tell me, yeah, I just need to know how to get started.

They're not getting an hour from me. All right? They're getting less time from me because I need them. It needs to be a two-way commun not only communication, but action plan. All right? So we'll have the conversation, 15, 20 minutes max, and they'll walk away with an activity. And I expect them to, that they chose not me.

That they chose. So come back to me, Hey, let's reschedule a next appointment as soon as you're done. They, people try to book me in advance a week or two in advance for something that we don't even know what the topic is yet. They don't get that with me. Do you do what you've gotta do and come back and let's debrief, let's tweak.

And it's gotta be that, you have to know who your customer is. And for me, my internal customer, my realtors are, and my staff are really my customers. And and I put myself at the bottom of the pyramid. I'm the support system. Do you know do you know oh my God, Limonis Marcus Limonis, the prophet on tv.

His prophet, he fixes this fixes, but he was the guest speaker and he was literally six feet at the convention this week. He was six feet from my aisle, and he said he, Jora Mountain, every one of you should draw a mountain. And right now and then place yourself on the mountain.

Where do you see yourself in your career on that mountain, Michael? Where do you see yourself in your career on the mountain? Where do I see myself? If you drew a mountain right now, if I drew a mountain right now I see myself about halfway up. That's good. That's Marcus that he was standing like 10 feet away.

It's Marcus Lamos. Yep. Yeah I felt I was coasted. Coasted to the top. And and as Marcus met realtors he started explaining some things and he said who's at the bottom mountain? And people came for the bottom, he come up to the stage, come up to the stage, and it was really interesting.

And the best thing about what he talked about was that some people at the bottom of the mountain maybe need to change careers, if they're not prepared to keep moving. This woman was at 20 years of the business, a realtor, Mike, on stage with 2000 people to say, I'm thinking about becoming a mortgage lender, a broker thinking about it.

She's at the bottom of the real estate mountain. So the idea for her, him was he moved on from her. If she's there and she thinks she's there, not everybody can be held, you have to be true to yourself. It wasn't her passion. She feels like she's being taken advantage by customers.

She may be in the wrong business at this point in her career, rightly. And I have to be starting now at the bottom. My job is now, I learned I'm not at the top anymore. For me, my job is to hang out at the bottom. And push those people up to the top with their, with my guidance and my help and my leadership and my coaching.

Now, once they're stuck. Once they're stuck and they don't wanna take my advice any longer or they're taking other people's advice that, and then they said, what did they say? Or how did, oh, and I said, you just spoke to a guy that has never done a deal in my office and he gave you advice.

I'm like, you should be talking to me, not the guy next to you. You just don't know. I hope that answered your question, but I feel like it's appropriate to what we're talking about today. It is. And when you said, where am I on the mountain? I pictured myself because I reach down the mountain because I'm helping other people succeed.

I'm helping them come up to your level. Your level. And I'm also reaching up because I have a mentor and things because I need to get further in my. What I do. Yeah. So I feel I'm right in the middle because I'm a mentor to others, but I need a mentor to get further ahead. So that's why I put myself directly. No, I love managing the mountain. That's my job. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, good. So can you share a time when networking directly led to a breakthrough opportunity, or saved you from a major setback? Let's talk about, let's not talk about setbacks.

'cause I'm gonna think the positive. Yeah. Let me tell you a quick story that happened over the last 14 months. One of my best friends in-laws, I met them at a wedding, and it ends up that the wife went to round Paul High School and graduated, actually, sorry, Kaia with us. I don't remember her name, but I should.

But I asked her about you and she didn't remember you. And we had big class. We had big classes. So her name is Cindy. And it's funny 'cause I felt bad because I didn't really remember her. But she was the same. I wish remember her last name? Yeah, i'm gonna find, I'm gonna, I'm gonna figure it out and let you get back to you on that.

Basically she, she's a long-term spouse. I do 20 something years with Larry. And Larry started talking to me and he said, yeah I'm a, I own a lumber business and in this place in New York and this, that, and he says, I'm in contract to sell it. I'm retiring after 30 years of being employed and owning and running it, then owning it, and now I'm gonna be selling the business and the land.

And it was more than $10 million. And I was like, wow, if there's anything I could do to help you, yeah, you could. He says, I wanna relocate my staff my mother and a child, her child to Florida. And I think I owe that to them. And I was like, yeah, I can help him in any way, any which way you like.

So he was thinking about maybe a small business. And I kept following up from the, that perspective, thinking that, he would think of Mount Me when it came to the buying opportunity. For whatever reason, and people pivot sometimes they never tell you he ended up going and spending this amount of money with a commercial broker.

'cause I've been known for residential and I've done some commercial in my life. But so he had spent 9 million on commercial properties of the 11 million that he ended up selling a property for. And he had to do it on a 10 31 exchange 'cause he wanted to defer the taxes. And then I heard from my buddy, yeah, Larry closed on $11 million in real estate.

And I was like, wow. I'm, I'm surprised I didn't get the call. Long story short I get a call from Larry about seven or eight months after he closed on the property. Oh. And $2 million was left over. So the commercial realtor sold him a residential house in my marketplace. And so Larry calls me, Hey Henry.

So and so says you're really a good guy and I, you can help me with a rental. And I'm thinking. F you, Larry. Now I'm thinking follow up. No, I thought all these things in my head and my answer was, of course, what do you need? And I went to the property and it was 2.1. I think he paid one almost 2 million and it needed some work.

And he's what do you mean? And I went through the property with him, very detailed. And I got a guy I went in my hand meant to come out for a couple weeks and doing what he had to do, and we finally got it rented and he hated being a residential landlord. Just hated it. He really granted buying it, there's timeframes involved.

So long story short, he he said, I wanna get out of I, now that we have it rented, soon as the lease comes up, would you list it for me for sale? Yes, Larry, of course. And so the first I had of the market, nine showings at a full price offer, 2.1 million, and we closed about. And by the way, I'd never did a million dollar deal in my career in 41 years till there you go.

Till, what about, closed four weeks ago? Yeah. Then he says, Hey, what about helping me with a 10 31 exchange to buy a commercial property, and now we're closing that commercial property for multimillions also. You know what? Sometimes you just, like you said, you put yourself out there, bite your tongue occasionally, people make decisions and make yourself available that I got the call.

That's when you get the call one day. That's the really good call. You're like, that's really good. Step up. Whatever it takes. Don't think about, yeah, but what about the 300,000 you lost and that you know what stop. You can't fix what happened in the past. You gotta start today and what's gonna happen tomorrow.

And that's all I focused on. And it's been a banner year for me. Yeah, you don't know what the other person is going through and you don't know what made him decide to go with this other person, but you kept your head about it and the guy just said, look, I have a rental or this and that, and it's small potatoes, but you did it to such a degree that he said, oh, he must really know what he's talking about.

Let me give him something else. And that led into something even bigger. You have to really take what's given to you, but think about what the other person is going through and just take it and just, you never know 'cause you don't know what you don't know. The big fish.

He's, he was the one of the big fish. He knew more than me and he knew it. And I, and I admitted, Hey, I'm gonna need to look into that. You know what I mean? So I had to brush up pretty quickly, but he never held that against me. So if you ever think there's a, somebody you really wanna do business with and maybe you have a personal relationship with, become a resource for, just become a resource for them.

Absolutely. Eventually, they either offer or you can say, don't be afraid to, don't be afraid to try me. I'm like, I'm gonna give them, I always tell people, if you recommend me, they're gonna get friends and family. They're gonna get friends and family, white glove treatment. I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you're gonna make you proud of the service I provide to them.

Okay, good. Alright. So what advice do you have for people who struggle with networking because they feel it's forced or uncomfortable? So I was one of those people for a long time. And so one of my director of career development, Connie, she said, come on, let's go out to one of those networking events.

And and we had a little game. We said she said, let's just, actually both of us came up with it. Let's go opposite directions and meet in the middle and then go reverse. And so I, it was really fun. We also had this thing, how many, who can get the most business cards? I'm very competitive.

I dunno if you could tell that. So business. So I was on a mission. I had to collect business cards 'cause she's very competitive too. And and I think we're pretty close tie. I think we were off by one when we met in the middle. We talked, we went back out. It was a great, it was a, it wasn't, didn't it?

It was. And so go with an accountability partner. You need to have an accountability partner. If you really, especially if you're uncomfortable, if you're, now that I'm comfortable, I can go by myself, but it's not as fun as I, when I go with other people and they clump. You know what clumping is?

When these realtors stick together, I'm like, are you kidding me? There's 30 other tables and who you meet out there? I want you to walk around. And you know what? They have fear, right? False evidence appearing real fear, which is crazy. Nothing's gonna kill them by saying, hi, I'm Henry.

Hi, I'm Michael. Hi Michael. W where do you, where, what, where are you from? What do you do? What type of work? Anything. Open up and open. And open up, open-ended question who, what, where, when, why, how. Make, you can't answer yes or no. Are you having a good time? No. I go through, there's a large part of what I teach about introverts and extroverts, and that goes along with, at a networking event.

'cause I always tell like extroverts to go alone, you don't wanna share your time or share a meeting or anything else. You don't want that type of backing. You wanna go out and you wanna talk with as many people, as many, build as many relationships as you can. If you're slightly introverted, then you can bring somebody with you, somebody that really knows you, knows about you and everything else.

So there's two different ways to look at it, but that's exactly right. So let's bring this podcast full circle. Okay. If you could leave our listeners with one networking principal that has carried you from middle school friendships to a successful career, what would it be?

It is a long play. This is a long play. There's no quick fix to anything you're doing. I think you need to start and if you're not happy with your making, you need to hit the reset button. All right? And you need to look at not only what you're doing and your, and if you like, your, what you're working, your career what's it gonna take you to get to the next level and emulate people that are, I joined a group of managers and now I've been invited to a bigger group now.

So I'm swimming with the, I'm the little guy in a, the big pool. So you always have to you wanna improve your tennis game or your pickleball game, I play all pickleball. You gotta play with better players and figure out a way to, to meet these people. It could be on the golf course, it could be on pickleball, it could be on a bowling league.

I don't care. But, network with other people that are successful. I don't know if I, I mentioned my, occasionally I call upon score, if you're familiar with score. Yeah. Business professionals that are retired, but occasionally that's really good to me. I think that you need to just decide and I'll end with this, one of my senior realtors west Point graduate in his eighties, shows up every day and and he's, a military guy and he thinks that way, but he has two things he does.

And I'm not following one of them today, but he, to just for him to remember the day or people say, how's it going? Today is Thursday, right? No. What day is today? Yeah, today's Thursday. Okay, terrific. To today. Hey, how you doing? Terrific. I'm terrific. How about you? Be positive. All right. So Monday's marvelous.

Tuesday's to terrific. Sorry. Tremendous. Wednesday's wonderful. Terrific, and fantastic. Monday, Tuesday, come up with a positive word. When, how's it going? How's it going and come up with the answer. He also does a second thing. He dresses. He doesn't wanna have to think about what he's gonna wear for the day.

So I'm wearing Monday's shirt, white. It gets a little darker, beige on Tuesday, Wednesday we wear red or blue depending upon who's in, in office. Thursday, gray and Friday's black. That's it. And brand yourself every day. I'm branded. And I get, I'm walking into Publix and people say, excuse me, where's the milk?

I'm like, come on, I'll sell you a house on the way to the milk. You have to have some Q line. Oh no, I'm so sorry. No. Come on. I know this, the store, like in the back of my hand. Be public, be social, be a walking billboard. And always have the, when somebody just even looks at my badge, I wear it every day.

I always have a line, can I sell you a house today? Oh no, I already own something. I'm like, what about an investment property? Yeah. Maybe a friend or relative that might be looking, the grant money out there is unbelievable. It's like you, am I robotic? I try not to be, but do I follow some regimen with, regarding words like, terrific, tremendous, wonderful.

Marvelous. Fantastic. Yeah, because it just helps me realize some people can't even find the word sometimes. You know what I mean? Even explaining what we do as a real estate, what makes you different? It's exposure. That's the word I use because we're, century 20 was the biggest global brand with 83 countries and 25% of the buyers in Florida are foreign nationals.

That's why you need somebody like me, your elevator speech, right? Yeah. Yeah. A absolutely. And there's something to be said for branding yourself. Okay. By you wearing those different colors, the same colors on the same day during the week, people recognize that. When you see that accident attorney up on a billboard, you just see his picture and his name, no contact information, no anything That's called branding.

And I've tried to brand myself, so I have to, if you have a few minutes, I just, I'd love to tell you a short story Sure. About, about branding. So I got involved with ai, right? AI is like the buzzword. And I write three or four articles a week on three or four different platforms about networking, leadership things like that.

All with AI generated text, but it gets my word out. Now, I've been doing this for three or four months. So I gotta tell you a funny story. The person who I'm working with is, has a partner in California. That person in California has a partner in Las Vegas because they do shows, right? So one day this, his partner, the partner in California, Abe was talking to this person in Las Vegas and they're talking about something with AI and everything else.

He goes, wait, I have to stop you for a second. Who's Michael Foreman? He's why, he goes, because his name for credentials, it's all over the place. He is the go-to person for networking. And he goes how do you know? He goes, I see it all over the place. He goes, all right, so this guy in Las Vegas was talking to a person in California about me in Georgia.

Crazy. So it's absolutely crazy. So this is what I did. I made up a t-shirt on the front is my logo on the back it says, who is Michael Foreman with a QR code? That's Q So I'll and I'll send you one. So it's I'm still a large, but I'm shrink shrinking. That's all right. That's right. I'll send you a large I love it.

It was MyPhone. I love it. Yeah. But it's great. But you don't, you never know who is gonna see it and what they're gonna say. So Henry, I gotta tell you, this was absolutely fantastic, and I think we can make this podcast go another two or three hours just by giving us stories back and forth. Oh my God.

Okay. But if somebody were to contact you, what would be the best way that they would contact you? I even Superman had kryptonite, right? My kryptonite is my inbox. That's kryptonite to me. So I'm a texter and I'm a caller. All right. So 5 6 1 4 2 7 4 8 8 8 South Florida, Winton Beach 5 6 1 4 2 7 48 88.

That's it. Direct and I pick up everybody and I, except for this call I'm the guy that picks up and says, Hey, can I call you back? But not today. I turned it off. Okay good. Alright. I, my Gmail, Henry l kaplan@gmail.com. Henry L the Hulk, HLK Henry L Kaplan, with a k@gmail.com. Thanks. Okay, Henry, this was great and I will talk to you.

 Well, hold on folks. Don't go anywhere. Let's hear from our sponsors. David Neal, co-founder Revved Up Kids. Revved Up Kids is on a mission to protect children and teens from sexual abuse, exploitation, and trafficking. They provide prevention, training programs for children, teens, and adults. To learn more, go to RevD up kids.org.

Henry Kaplan Century 21. When it comes to making the biggest financial decision of your life, leave it in the hands of a proven professional. Henry Kaplan Henry is a global real estate agent with Century 21, celebrating his 41st year in business. No matter where you're moving, Henry, has the right connections for you.

You can contact Henry at 5 6 1 4 2 7 4 8 8 8.

  a huge thank you to our guests for sharing such incredible insights today, and of course, a big shout out to you, our amazing listeners, for tuning in and spending your time with us. If you're interested in my digital courses being coached or having me come and talk to your company, just go to MichaelAForman.com and fill out the request form.

Remember, networking isn't about being perfect. It's about being present. So take what you've learned today. Get out there and make some meaningful connections. If you've enjoyed this episode, please don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review and share it with someone who could use a little networking inspiration.

Let's keep the conversation going. You can find me on Apple, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or my website michaelaforman.com/podcasts.

Michael is a business networking expert specializing in enhancing professionals' networking and communication skills to drive profitability. As a leading authority in this field, he is highly sought after for his dynamic presentations and workshops. His extensive experience has consistently led to significant improvements in corporate profitability by empowering individuals and organizations to connect more effectively and efficiently.

https://www.michaelaforman.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelforman/

https://www.instagram.com/flyboy_197/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCI6GkxoRFCk969A_rCfpHWQ

Digital Courses

https://michael-s-site-fc88.thinkific.com/