Bob is an ambitious leader and professional as well as an expert in marketing and negotiating real estate to maximize profit for his buyers and sellers. Driven by a passion to help others and a strong moral compass, Bob holds a spotless real estate record that he attributes to the winning formula upon which he has built his career and his team: Integrity, Knowledge, Results. This formula has served him, his clients, and his team members well for over 40 years.
Bob has more than 200 Lucido team members across the country; recognized by REAL Trends and The Wall Street Journal as the #1 real estate team in the country across all brokerages. In 2017 Bob's team sold over 2100 homes.
Podcast Highlights:
- If you are not growing your dying so always be growing
- Build a killer system then duplicate it
- Your reputation and integrity defines you so guard it fiercely
Contact Bob:
[Podcast Transcript Using Artificial Intelligence]
Umar Hameed 0:06
Are you ready to become awesomer? Hello everyone. This is Umar Hameed, your host and welcome to the no limit selling Podcast, where industry leaders share their tips, strategies and advice on how to make you better, stronger, faster, get ready for another episode.
Umar Hameed 0:36
Today I have the privilege of joining Bob Lucido in his office talking about how he built his fabulous team. Bob, welcome to the show.
Bob Lucido 0:44
Thank you, Umar. Thanks, appreciate the invitation. And first off want to say I'm honored to be here to discuss this, but I didn't build it by myself, I had the assistance of a lot of great people. So I get way too much credit. I must give credit to my wife, who co founded it with me, Tracy, and so many other people that played a significant role in the growth of the company.
Umar Hameed 1:06
Brilliant. So in 90 seconds, tell us who you are and what you guys do.
Bob Lucido 1:12
Well, we are proud to be associated with Keller Williams, the number one real estate brokerage in the world. They provide great support and great leadership. We are a real estate team that assists buyers and sellers in achieving their dreams, helping them buy and sell homes leasing. And we work with investors, we work with buyers and sellers of residential properties. And we also have new homes we have several different different divisions in the company, which I'll get to, but we essentially help people achieve their dreams
Umar Hameed 1:45
This year, how many transactions will you do?
Bob Lucido 1:48
We're on track to do about over 2000. But it's been a good journey. We've had great growth over the year this year. We have focused this year we've probably since we've joined Keller Williams four and a half years ago, we've grown about 30% 35% a year. This year, we've not been focused on growth, yet would look good if our numbers were bigger we focused on is our infrastructure, making sure that our systems and processes were aligned that we were doing. We were on a solid foundation that we we tightened up all the different areas to make sure we were systematized.
Umar Hameed 2:25
Got the right platform to help people your agents grow.
Bob Lucido 2:28
Yes.
Umar Hameed 2:29
Brilliant. So tell me about when you got into real estate, and at what point did you realize you needed to build a team?
Bob Lucido 2:35
Well, I got in real estate, I'm 60. I got in real estate when I was 18 years old. So I wasn't thinking of a team. When I was 18. I was writing about how to make sales and what to learn this business didn't really sell resells until 2008 I was strictly new homes for for 32 of the 42 years,
Umar Hameed 2:55
Right.
Bob Lucido 2:55
So 2008 we started the Bible SEO team and realized that we could leverage and grow because we we have a lot of different relationships. And we can help other people achieve their dreams. So we started out with a team of about five or six people right here on Route 40. And then we've grown every year to now we have a team, over 200 people.
Umar Hameed 3:17
Excellent. So at the time you started to grow the team and there's a different dynamic in leadership when you're trying to just motivate yourself and do what you need to do. And it was your you and your wife at that point.
Bob Lucido 3:29
Tracy and I and then we had about five or six team members. And then we grew from there. And but essentially it was very small.
Umar Hameed 3:39
So it was five agents?
Bob Lucido 3:40
Approximately five or six.
Umar Hameed 3:42
Okay, so before you brought the agents in, it was probably you and Tracy and some admin folks?
Bob Lucido 3:47
It was really myself I was I was with the my other company was builders first choice. It was a new home sales company.
Umar Hameed 3:53
Nice.
Bob Lucido 3:53
And then Tracy was a full time mom, she decided to get into real estate and she was working somewhere else. And then just decided that I was going to get into real estate myself to resales and then said ventually she came over and joined me and so we started our team.
Umar Hameed 4:10
So when you started your team, it changed your role because it was like you had to produce as well as lead.
Bob Lucido 4:15
Yeah.
Umar Hameed 4:15
So what was that like that transition? And how long did it take you to kind of figure it out till you got it right.
Bob Lucido 4:21
Well, I still am in production. So I still I I lead and I'm in production.
Umar Hameed 4:28
I walk my talk.
Bob Lucido 4:29
Well, yes, I'm still out there a lot. There's a lot of great people in the real estate business throughout the country. A lot of those people are out of production.
Umar Hameed 4:36
Yes.
Bob Lucido 4:37
I am. in production I choose to be my people can relate to me because I do what they do. So they can see it firsthand that when I suggest for them to do some I've done it I've either succeeded or failed. So we have found a big vision ever since we started and we were we were smaller five, six people. Then we grew the biggest, the biggest way to grow is to create an incredible value proposition. And we created a great, I believe a great value every year, every week keeps me up at night, what value can I bring my my clients and my team members, my partners, right to make them to help them in growing their business. So we kept adding different value components to error.
Umar Hameed 5:19
Give me an example.
Bob Lucido 5:21
Well, we started out let's talk about, we have two programs, we have a guaranteed sales program. And we also have a help program, essentially where somebody needs to fix up their house prior to going on the market.
Umar Hameed 5:32
Interesting.
Bob Lucido 5:32
We have a program that they don't have to they can get all the work done could be $1,000, could be 200,000. And then we'll pay a dime into closing.
Umar Hameed 5:41
That's huge. Is this unique to you? Or is this because I've not heard of it before,
Bob Lucido 5:45
We're one of the few people that offer this program nationwide,
Umar Hameed 5:48
I'm about to give you a high five.
Bob Lucido 5:49
There we go. It's a it's a great program, our clients like it. So these are just two very small components of what we've offered to our clients. Now what we've offered our sales team members and our clients, free staging, consultation, brochures, custom photography, and then we've added different divisions in the company. And this is really huge. Because I don't know of any company in the world that has what we have here we have a custom, we have a new home division, we have a military division. It's called our heroes program.
Umar Hameed 6:22
Nice.
Bob Lucido 6:23
We have a silver group, which we're which is our senior housing, people moving into assisted senior housing, assisted living communities. We work with no special program for those people. We have a luxury division where the world's leader for luxury in the Keller Williams team, a company. So we have all these we have a commercial investment division, and we have a land, land and new homes. So we have all these different programs to help our clients and property management.
Umar Hameed 6:53
Brilliant. So it gives the full spectrum. So there's a couple of things that come to mind. I think to be successful in what you do, you have to have, you have to be relevant. It sounds like by adding value. And you're always monitoring that you say you stay up at night thinking about it as to how do I stay relevant to my constituents.
Bob Lucido 7:13
You're they're alive and growing or dead and dying, and you better be adding value to,
Umar Hameed 7:16
The status quo.
Bob Lucido 7:17
No, you better be adding value to your team members, or they're gonna leave or you won't be able to attract people into your world. Or you better be adding value to your clients, or they're going to look for something somewhere else to go.
Umar Hameed 7:29
So the second thing is having focus and it sounds like what you ended up doing was, we can have focus if we're just one company. So doing those divisions allows people, the agents in that division to be highly focused your constituents.
Bob Lucido 7:43
Yep.
Umar Hameed 7:43
So that's the second thing. And then the third thing I want to explore more, it's about integrity. So you have a certain way of doing business. When you have one other agent, all of a sudden, you have to have the responsibility that they behave in the same way. And they value the same values as you. How do you make that a living, breathing thing when you have 200 agents?
Bob Lucido 8:06
Well, that's the concept of duplication is to create, recruit, and bring in people that bind to the vision of the company. And to we set standards and we have our leadership team. I believe that people will. We take great pride in our reputation, our integrity, who we are, that people can trust us that they know that we're people ever, ever word.
Umar Hameed 8:32
So how do you take that? And I get all that. And I believe all that. In a lot of companies, they have their values written on the wall.
Bob Lucido 8:40
Mm hmm.
Umar Hameed 8:41
But a lot of their people do not follow them in the same way. So how do you ensure that it's not just words, but it's instilled in their hearts and their actions?
Bob Lucido 8:49
Well, you have to lead by example, number one, too. We have roundtables every month in all of our offices, we have team meetings, and you share the vision and you share our values and how we operate and we won't compromise our integrity for any financial gain whatsoever. One of the things I'm very proud of in my 42 years, I have a spotless record on my in my real estate career. Not one blemish on my,
Umar Hameed 9:15
You just met me. So one of the things that some of my clients do is not only do they share their ideas and the ideals, but they showcase employees that have lived up to it and give a story around it makes it more real.
Bob Lucido 9:32
Repeat again.
Umar Hameed 9:33
So a good example would be let's say, we go above and beyond for our customers, right? It's words on a wall and you can repeat it. But what they'll do is say today, we just want to highlight, Susan, right? This is what you did for the client and this is living up to going above and beyond and all of a sudden it gives people a depth of what that means.
Umar Hameed 9:50
Yeah.
Umar Hameed 9:50
And it becomes the folklore of the company where those stories get shared and it orientates new agents coming in as well. So often the under It's not just words, this 10 examples this week.
Bob Lucido 10:04
I love those testimonials. We just got one from one of our team members, Jim. The clients were raving fans and of this particular agent. And that brings great joy to us that our team meeting, I'll read that letter,
Umar Hameed 10:18
Brilliant.
Bob Lucido 10:19
And recognize Jim for his outstanding accomplishments, I want people to see what other people are doing. And it's kind of a competitive environment, because we all want to serve the customer properly in an outstanding way. So we say that there's four companies that we strive to be like, number one, Ritz Carlton, two Lexus, three Nordstroms. And for a client that I had the pleasure of, representing for 11 years from 1989, the year 2000 Bazaruto company, one of the nation's largest apartment developers, and we had the pleasure of representing them and handling their sales and Tom Kazuto. And his team are just great leaders to,
Umar Hameed 10:58
Tom's son?
Bob Lucido 11:00
Tom is the dad and Toby now has taken over the company.
Umar Hameed 11:02
So I was at a conference where Tom was talking about how he met his wife.
Bob Lucido 11:08
Right.
Umar Hameed 11:08
Have you heard the story?
Bob Lucido 11:09
Barbara.
Umar Hameed 11:10
Barbara, they had decided to meet in Hawaii, he was in the service and just came for a visit. She came as well and said, you know, why don't we just get married? He said I can't get married. I don't have a suit said that's okay I brought one.
Bob Lucido 11:23
That's good.
Umar Hameed 11:24
That's a closer.
Bob Lucido 11:25
I didn't hear that. I like that.
Umar Hameed 11:26
So they had to be times where you looked in the mirror and said, you know what things aren't going as well as they could have this frustrations. Tell me about one of those times in your career where it was frustrating. And what did you do to kind of overcome that and fix the issue and kind of move on?
Bob Lucido 11:40
Oh, in this business, you have lost the joy of this business, you have many downs?
Umar Hameed 11:45
Yes.
Bob Lucido 11:45
Many ups, many highs and lows. And well, let's talk about maybe a, one of our team members may be deciding to move to a different location.
Umar Hameed 11:55
That'd be good.
Bob Lucido 11:56
That's, that's always delicate. When somebody does that. Because you create relationships, you have expectations, and you feel for people. And if they elect to leave it kind of it's difficult for anybody, any company. I especially take it personally because I, I want people to be my partners for life. So you'll be upset about that. And then two hours later, our Director of recruitment will say we just recruited two outstanding agents, and I'll meet them and it gives me I love the energy of new people, whether they're 80 years old, or 18. They're young, and heart and passion that inspires me. So there's new blood is the lifeblood of any organization.
Umar Hameed 12:39
So what's the somebody asked me this question once? What's the juice in your work? Like, where is the joy? It was something I hadn't really considered before. For me it was when somebody calls me up and says, You've changed my life is like what I live for. So for you in this in this company, where's the juice? Where's the joy for you? Like, what what are the things that really make you happy,
Bob Lucido 13:01
I'm proud to say that I've coached and recruited in train help train over 1000 salespeople, not just in this company, but I'm another company in my career, and bringing somebody in and helping them showing them the big picture, and coaching them and helping them along the way to grow and be a successful salesperson and a representative in the real estate industry. And to be a leader and have them be able to provide financially for the family where they normally wouldn't be able to effect I just had one of my team members, Johnny mentioned to me yesterday that we provided and given them the opportunity he's never had before. It really touches you to help you. It really inspires you to sell. Yeah, because you're I'm a coach at heart, I coach kids all my life. I coach my own sons and my daughter and tennis and they grew up and they were high level athletes and college and my one son played professional baseball. And I just love coaching. And it's a real passion of mine. In fact, when and if I ever want to retire one day from this business, I might be 80-90 years old is
Umar Hameed 14:07
Still be coaching.
Bob Lucido 14:08
I want to go back into high schools and coach young kids on just not just real estate business, but on life. Because I think that's missing in the schools today. I wish I had I wish I had that.
Umar Hameed 14:19
One of the frustrations either in yourself or in it's tough, running a company with 200 agents and you get all the admin if it was easy, a lot of people would do it too. But to do it well and be successful at it. You still have to grow leaders to help you build this company. So tell me about any frustrations that you have to deal with. And more importantly, how do you grow people to the next level? So they become leaders as well?
Bob Lucido 14:42
Well, the frustrations would there's many in this business, just like there's many highs in the business. Yes. frustrations. What I think would be raised would be when people perform below your level of expectations. I have high expectations and I'm very trusting in people and I think when people perform below that level It's a little disheartening. So I like when I sit down with somebody, I want to show them a big vision of what they can do in the real estate business, how we could be partners one day, how we can help grow the business. And I've done that with many people, one of my team members, 23 years ago, I recruited somebody, a little lady, my name is Shannon. And she came in, I think, at 21 years old as $8 an hour, she does such a great job, she became a community sales manager selling new homes. She's making about $150,000 a year and do an incredible job, then promoted to be a sales and marketing manager overseeing other top salespeople, then promoted to be our partner in the Pennsylvania region, she did extraordinarily well. That to me, just makes me feel so good, helping somebody achieve their highest level of potential.
Umar Hameed 15:56
Brilliant.
Bob Lucido 15:56
And it just, it feels good.
Umar Hameed 15:58
That's where you and I resonate. It's like, one of the saddest things is how many people live smaller lives. Because fear, and and what drives me crazy is people saying, well, fear is false expectations appearing real. And it's like, bullshit, because to the person, it's real.
Bob Lucido 16:15
Right.
Umar Hameed 16:15
And so the question is not so much that the fear is there. But what internally is causing it surely, if we can figure out what's causing it. And I think that's one of the jobs that leaders should do and great leaders do is, you talked about vision, creating a compelling vision that gets people to say, that's a journey worth taking, yeah. And then building up enough trust, that for a moment, they can let go of their own world, go on the journey of trust with you. And all of a sudden, they start achieving more than they ever thought possible. So leaders job is to remove the fear through trust and vision and building a great culture.
Bob Lucido 16:50
That's wonderfully said, show a big vision. Coach him, help him share the wonderful environment within culture. And then you achieve your dreams. Zig Ziglar said it very well. You can get whatever you want in this world. If you help enough other people get what they want.
Umar Hameed 17:06
Yeah.
Bob Lucido 17:06
So I believe with coming with a servant's heart and servant's mentality be able to help people. And if you help enough, people can get whatever you want.
Umar Hameed 17:14
One of the best ways to learn is to teach. Because sometimes you just take it for granted. When you're teaching someone, you get your own epiphany, right? So do you have an example of one of those, as you're leaving people, the insights you get, like one of those that might be useful for the audience?
Umar Hameed 17:29
Sure, me just this morning, we do a roundtable here. And they look into the office once a month, and about 15 people here. And I don't just sit there and preach, I ask questions, and I bring out and try to bring them their challenges and their their, their wonderful accomplishments. And through these questions that I ask and participation with everybody here. You know, I learned so I learned more than these people here did today they left inspired, I left more inspired because I learned more. I just spoke to about 250 people in Virginia last week at the National Association of Hispanic real estate professionals. See it was was wonderful. And when I'm on stage, you're teaching and you're coaching. But you're getting feedback, I ask a lot of questions. I don't necessarily interact, very interactive. I want to hear what works for them and what doesn't. And I want to challenge him to take action on the things that we talked about, because a lot of people like to say they'll do stuff, I want people to know who's really going to take the action.
Umar Hameed 18:31
I was at a real estate investors conference. And they said, Why don't you come on the panel this evening. And so there's a bunch of people on stage and there was this one guy who was eating garbage out of a dumpster. And then he became the investment guy in Vegas within 500 properties. And there were all these, like amazing people that have done amazing things in real estate. And I was like, why am I here?
Bob Lucido 18:53
Right.
Umar Hameed 18:53
And so one of the experts says, you know, money, money's not a problem. When you're in your dentist office, all you need to do is ask him, you know, would you like to get 10% investment back? So everyone's like, really impressed. And then I finally have my opportunity. And I go, excuse me, can I have the mic? And it was about 500 people in the audience. How many people here would be comfortable enough to do that?
Bob Lucido 19:15
Right.
Umar Hameed 19:17
No hands. So it's all about that fear that stops us. Before we part company today, you've learned a lot of lessons building this team and being a dominant player in real estate. If one of your children decided to go into real estate, you would not give them the speech but you'd say child of mine, here are the four things you'd really need to know what would be like the essence you teach them to build a team that would be successful?
Bob Lucido 19:43
In first off. I'm very proud of all three of our children.
Umar Hameed 19:46
I can tell were talking about them before.
Bob Lucido 19:49
And I've never invited one of my children into the business. I don't I'm never going to invite them if they want to. They have to want that to be passionate. I want them to follow their passion.
Umar Hameed 20:01
Absolutely. Me too. And the only reason I asked that question in that way, is that when you ask people, you know, what are the things people need to know?
Bob Lucido 20:09
Sure.
Umar Hameed 20:09
It's a different filter. One is like your kin, and the people you love with that intimacy, then sometimes it's like, well, I wouldn't say the fluffy stuff. What I'd really say is,
Bob Lucido 20:18
I'll share with you first have our daughter Lauren, our oldest is our Director of Marketing. I did not invite her into the company, she came in, and she started at the lower end and worked her way up to be the director of marketing. She does an incredible job. And our son Roberts, professional baseball wasn't professional baseball, and now he's gonna go into commercial real estate. And we have our youngest son Jonathan is in law school, so very proud of all of them. So my coaching to them whether going into this business or any other, any other business. First off, there's five things that I look for when I'm hiring somebody or want to be a partner with somebody. First is integrity. Warren Buffett says if they don't have that the interview is over. So I want to know can I trust this guy? Can I trust this person? Number two, they got to be a team player. People that are in it for themselves are cancerous to an organization short term, it'll boost your income long term. Okay. Number three, they got to be coachable. I go to seminars all the time. I'm constantly reading John Maxwell, I'm reading all the time to be best in ourselves.
Umar Hameed 21:15
Yeah.
Bob Lucido 21:15
Before mentioned before, they have to have a servant's heart. They have to, like Nordstrom has Ritz Carlton, Bazaruto, Lexus. were nothing but high paid servants in a nice suit. We are servants. And number five. This is very important. They got to have a lot the tiger in their eye, they got to be passion. I've seen a lot of people with great degrees are lazy. And I don't want I don't want to be around those two. I want to be around people that inspire me that are energetic. So my my kids, if they're getting into this business or any business, I would tell them, these four elements five, number one, be passionate about what you're going into.
Umar Hameed 21:54
Yes.
Bob Lucido 21:55
Number two, admire and respect and enjoy the people that you're working with, because your name is associated with them. I left the partnership years ago, 25 years ago, because I said when I was 90 years old was going to be proud that I was associated with this person came back to myself had to answer that question. I'm like, No, I don't think so. So number one, be passionate. Number two, be proud of who you're associated with. Number three, be a constant learner. Anthony Robbins has a quote CANI, constant, never ending improvement. Be constantly learning and being better and challenge yourself every day. Sure, look at the competition. But most importantly, challenge yourself to be better. And number four, don't ever ever, ever, ever give up.
Umar Hameed 22:39
Thank you, Winston Churchill.
Bob Lucido 22:40
Yes, I've got the quote right my office. Be persistent.
Umar Hameed 22:44
Yeah, that's one of the elements of success. tenacity,
Bob Lucido 22:47
Be persistent. Number five. You can be nice in business and when you don't have to crush the other person and walk away and you can be we try to create win-win relationships. I want you to win. I want us to win. We want that we want everybody to win. We'd like to win a little bit more, but I'd like everybody to walk away feeling good.
Umar Hameed 23:05
Bob, thanks so much for sitting down with me.
Bob Lucido 23:07
My pleasure Umar. Appreciate the opportunity.
Umar Hameed 23:14
If you enjoyed this episode, please go to iTunes and leave a five-star rating. And if you're looking for more tools, go to my website at nolimitselling.com. I've got a free mind training course there that's going to teach you some insights from the world of neuro-linguistic programming and that is the fastest way to get better results.