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- It used to be that you would get married,
buy a house and have a couple of kids.
However, the Millennials and newer generations
have completely changed that tradition.
Hi I'm Lea Woodford of Smartfem and Friends
and today with me is Scott Kiburz.
A real estate expert and broker with Keller Williams.
Hi Scott, welcome to the show.
- Good to be here Lea, thank you.
- So let's just jump right in.
- Please. - How are the Millennials
disrupting the housing industry?
- Well the Millennials are having a major impact
on our real estate industry in the United States.
They currently are the single biggest buying source
of homes in US and followed closely behind
by the Boomers who a lot of times are downsizing
and moving into more of an urban lifestyle themselves
and/or potentially
long-term care alternate housing for adult.
The Millennials, as they've looked in the housing industry,
they like things a little bit smaller.
They don't need the big footprint,
the big giant house on the hill with big yard
and all the things to take care of.
They are certainly more green-centric and urban-centric.
They also like to be where there's city life,
in terms of rail, light rail train,
Uber and Lyft have had a major impact
on how they look at home ownership
and the combination of both work and lifestyle together
is very attractive to a lot of Millennials.
- Do you think this is a trend
or do you think this is gonna be something that continues?
- That's a great question.
We're seeing the early, early onset
of Millennials just starting to move out into the suburbs.
The phrase from Omaha to Buffalo has been quoted
a couple different times and what Millennials
are seeing now, compared to the major city areas,
San Francisco, Austin, New York,
there's a lot of buying power in the suburbs
and Millennials are just now starting to have
their own children, so we're on the early cusp
of a trend of Millennials starting to move out of the city.
- Now how different are Millennial homebuyers
from our traditional generations?
- Boy our traditional generations you know,
get married, have a family, have a house.
You know, baseball, soccer, dog in the backyard,
pool parties, et cetera.
Millennials, how they're a little bit different is
again, that work-life balance, or combination thereof
and they are certainly more green-centric
and environmentally focused and they look
at a work-life balance you know, really in concert.
- I don't see them wanting the big McMansion.
- Yeah, so they, in the downturn in the mid 2000s
when 70% of the homes in the United States
were underwater at some point they watched their parents
struggle through that, a lot of them
and they saw housing as a burden to a lot of them
and so they're certainly more cautious
and when they're looking at a home,
they're certainly buying things
that they can absolutely afford.
- So they're living within their means?
- Absolutely, great way to put that.
- So Scott, how has Washington effected
the way we're buying homes now?
- Well there was certainly some regulation put in
in the loan industry that has a positive effect
on home buying, so the people that are buying houses today,
surprise, can actually afford them.
Today, the housing market in the United States
is very brisk.
Here in Arizona we currently have about
a 65% absorption rate on a monthly basis.
And so we're certainly at a lower inventory
than what the industry could truly demand.
Somewhere around one and a half months of inventory
is all we have available at any one time right now.
As we move forward, that has an impact on Millennials.
You know, they and the buying cycle in general,
we have to make a decision and move fast
because homes don't stay on the market very long.
Now coming back to Washington, the regulations
have been put back into place with lending
and things like that and that's had a very positive effect.
- So do you think that
we're not gonna see any more of the sub-prime lending or?
- Or it's just a whisper of that not too long ago.
- Oh no. - Just a whisper.
Let's hope not at any serious level.
- Now, many Millennials do not have
the traditional nine to five, how difficult
is it gonna be for them to be homebuyers?
- Well, and I think that looks at
the type of homes that they're buying
versus the suburban home, raising a family,
that work-life balance life cycle is together with them
and they might have one or two jobs
or do more consulting and things like that
to generate the amount of money needed
to own a home and/or own a home together.
- So they do the side hustle?
- Great, way yes.
- So Scott, what are three tips that you can give
Millennials that are gonna be first-time homebuyers?
- Three tips have to do with working with professionals.
There's been billions and billions of dollars
put into the real estate industry
and that's caused a huge disruption
of how we go about buying and selling real estate
and that's here to stay.
With that said, the time that traditionally,
20, 30 years ago we bought a house,
it might take, three, six, nine, 12 months to find the home,
secure the home and move in.
Today, we can make a decision to buy a house
and be in a house in 30 to 50 days.
The buy cycle of home ownership
is become very quick because of all the knowledge
that's out there through the internet
and the information systems
and technology is advancing that.
With that, the same number of steps to close
on buying or selling a home haven't changed.
We still have the same 187 steps to complete.
So being, number one, being part of a professional realtor
to help you navigate the reefs and the water's edge
and help you get to successful close of escrow
is very important.
Right behind that is any kind of lending opportunity.
If you're working with a lender to help you secure a home,
make sure that that is a good experience
and you know what they're capable of doing.
'Cause as you're buying a home, if the lender fails,
all the parts of the home ownership, close of escrow fail.
Then last but not least is spend some time
really thinking about why am I living in
this part of the United States and this type of home?
Is it a three-year plan, five, seven, ten?
Am I looking at this home as an investment?
Am I looking at this as a place to raise a family
or any combination thereof?
Have a good plan.
Those are my three tips. - You know that's interesting
'cause I, basically have a strategy for buying your home.
I've never heard that said before
but what a brilliant idea. - Thank you.
- Scott, how different is it training Millennials
to be real estate agents, say versus boomers?
- Gosh, I think there's one paramount difference.
Lea, when you and I were just a little bit younger,
our family members a lot of times asked,
what do you wanna be when you grow up?
Millennials, they wanna know what kind of effect
they're gonna have on their world and their community.
Just a completely different question.
And so, that carries over with Millennials
is how do they can have a good experience
with education, making a difference,
and being part of real estate, buyer-seller experience
for their customers and clients.
So we do a lot of coaching, teaching, mentoring,
not only in the process of the contract,
negotiations, marketing, but really dealing
with people one on one and being relational
and how to be best in class in service,
communication and effectiveness.
- So would you say that Millennials
are more relational versus transactional?
- They are, they are and with the disruption
that's coming with the technology that's coming
to the real estate market, we as an industry,
as a whole, we're on the cusp of real estate starting
or coming from relationship with the client, business,
moving slightly to a service business from that standpoint
that being very accountable and very much,
they just have to know the contract, the systems,
and models of negotiation, the people,
the connection to be an effective.
- They wanna know everything up front is what you're saying?
- Well yes and they just have to be trained
at a very high level to be effective.
- So Scott, you know there are lots of real estate companies
why did you choose to be a broker for Keller Williams?
- Well thank you, Lea that became a very obvious choice
for me, we have a focus
about faith, God, family, then business.
So we always know what our priorities are.
We're fortunate to have a very visionary CEO
in Gary Keller, or Chairman of the Board in Gary Keller.
He's ranked the number one most influential person
in real estate in the United States in 2018.
As we look ahead to things that are available
to any broker, brokerage, I really enjoy training
and with the amount of disruption that's happening
in our industry, training is paramount.
Just moving too fast, not to always be learning-based
and we're fortunate to be running three out of the last
six years for the number one training company in the world.
I'm really proud of that.
There is something in our industry for everybody.
You know, as a realtor, you can have a standalone agent,
you can be on a team, you can be an owner
of a franchise like myself.
You can work in commercial, residential,
land, urban lifestyle, suburban lifestyle,
buyers, sellers, there's lots of opportunity
to do the type of business that you're best at
and you enjoy the most and then the last
but not least, it's a very agent-center company.
Gary is, personal beliefs is,
this is about an agent relationship
and how can we best serve the agent
and when we're taking care of the agents
in our industry, they're also taking care
of the consumers in the industry.
You know, you make a really interesting point
because I believe everything stems
with customer service and when my husband and I
bought our house, our realtors were there until we closed.
And we've never heard from them again
and you know, despite having issues and stuff
and I called them, they're,
you just don't really wanna have a relationship
and that was one of the things that I loved about you
when you and I started talking, that you are right there
for your customers and your team is like that.
- Very proud of the team, yes.
67% of any kind of relationship in business
is in the followup and we're just a highly relational
group of people, we like to work hard, play hard
and we enjoy the business of real estate
and that shows through our agents and it spills over
gracefully to our client base.
- Well and you know, one of the things
that I like about your company too
is that you give back to the community and I think
some of the bigger companies forget to do that.
You know, your work with the Boys and Girls Club
and just everything that you've done
with Alice Cooper's teen center.
I mean, I constantly see your company pushing forward
and giving back to the community.
Why would you do that?
- Well you know in life,
there's a phrase called having a quest for success
in your earlier years and a journey
to significance in the second half of your life
and Keller Williams as a whole
is very city cultural focused.
And there's joy in that.
Giving back and making a difference in our community.
Gosh, just reading up recently on some of the
millions and billions of dollars
that's pouring into the hurricane-ravaged areas
of Houston, Florida, and Puerto Rico et cetera.
HUD has recently helped with 20, $40 billion coming in
to these communities but there's also things
that local people can do themselves
to at least get started with that.
And taking those actions, being part of the community
in that fashion does make a difference.
And that's joyful for a lot of people, especially me.
- Thanks Scott for coming on the show.
Now before you leave can you tell our viewing audience
how they can get in touch with you.
- Sure, they can come to our website
at kwbiltmore.com the letters K-W biltmore.com,
we'll be glad to serve you.
- Thank you again Scott.
- Thank you Lea, pleasure.
- My pleasure, this has been Lea Woodford
with Smartfem and Friends, thanks for watching.
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