How Roger Gauvreau Went from DJ to Top Realtor in 3 Years

Roger Gauvreau (00:00)
Sometimes you just have to be willing to take the chance. that’s, I think that that’s the, probably when you think of mindsets, when you think of changing the way that you think, ⁓ it is, it’s a very powerful thing, right? ⁓ So often in life we get stuck or we get comfortable.

And the two aren’t necessarily the same thing, but they certainly can intertwine with each other. ⁓ And oftentimes when you do get in that, I guess, unquote rut, if you will, and you do get stuck or you do get complacent, you’re willing to accept less than what your potential is. And so when you start to tap into what you do well, and you start to tap into the things that you excel at,

and then you apply those in other ways, you’ll find great success ⁓ in ways that you never thought were possible.

Kristen Knapp (02:34)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m Kristen and I’m here with Roger Gavreau who’s a realtor in the San Antonio market, also does sales at McCaw Custom Homes. So we’re gonna get into a lot of mindset stuff. We’re gonna get into the market. Excited to have you here, Roger.

Roger Gauvreau (02:50)
Well thanks Kristen, I’m glad you could have me on today, I’m excited to be here.

Kristen Knapp (02:54)
So you have a very interesting entrance into the real estate industry. So I would love for you to talk about that.

Roger Gauvreau (03:01)
I do. You know, it’s kind of funny. you know, at 17 years old, I got into the restaurant business. Why? Because a friend said, hey, come work with me at a restaurant. Right? So I did. And little did I know that was going to turn into pretty much a lifelong deal. And I stayed in the bar and restaurant business up until the pandemic. But the last 20 years of that, I was a DJ in a nightclub, which was pretty cool. And I used to tour around and do all that stuff.

But one day a friend of mine says to me, goes, Hey, Raj, he goes, you know, you are wasting yourself here. And I said, well, what are you talking about? And he goes, you’re wasting your talent. He goes, you should come work for me. And he was a broker. so, but I wasn’t particularly interested in real estate or life change at that time. And, and, know, it’s, it’s, it’s funny. I, ⁓ when you think about advice and you think about the smartest people that you ever come in contact with, right. They tend to give you advice, but you don’t always.

have the ability to receive advice. And so sometimes it takes a little bit, a little longer for things to sink in. And so when the pandemic hit and the entire world, it seemed, or at least the entire restaurant world and bar world was out of a job, I started to think, well, gosh, what am I gonna do? And I delivered groceries, which was cool, because I needed to do something to get by at that time, but I got my real estate license as well. And his words kind of, kind of,

echoed and got back in my head again. And ⁓ it’s so funny because I remember you take your classes and everybody says, you know, everybody’s going to fail. You’re going to fail. Everybody fails their tests. And I passed it on the first try. So at that point, I thought, well, you know what, maybe this is for me. that was, well, you know, actually I’m celebrating my three year anniversary in real estate this month. And ⁓ I haven’t looked back. So ⁓ yeah, I love it.

Kristen Knapp (04:35)
Yeah.

That’s amazing. mean, that’s such a scary time when the industry kind of, you know, the nightclub industry just kind of shut down and you’re left being like, what is my next step?

Roger Gauvreau (05:43)
It is because, especially for me, right? So, ⁓ you know, I take care of my nine-year-old grandson and my 76-year-old mom on top of it, right? So with everybody dependent on me, there wasn’t time for me to sit around and try and, you know, wait for things to clear up or wait for the pandemic to end or any of that stuff. I had to be proactive and, or actually just active, I suppose, and reactive, right? So, you know, the…

Incredible thing about life is that, you know, people are so resilient and if you give people an opportunity to show that, they will surprise you more often than not. And so that was kind of really what the case was and to jump into a whole new career, especially at an older age and take the chances ⁓ was real exciting for me.

Kristen Knapp (06:33)
That is super exciting and what drew you into real estate?

Roger Gauvreau (06:37)
Well, you know, it’s funny. I, for a while, I wrote an interior design blog and did some interior design work that was, you know, in between doing, you know, the, you know, the club work and stuff. And I enjoyed that. Mostly I did some doctor’s offices and things of that nature. I never really got to do any homes, but ⁓ as such, I’ve always been interested in design and those things. And so when…

When the real estate bug was put in my head by my friend Greg, I think I always mulled it over, but it just didn’t really come to fruition until all of a sudden I was almost really forced to make a change or me forced to make a decision. Right. ⁓ And I kind of, I kind of joke, you know, it’s, it’s a friend of mine. He unfortunately he’s passed away from cancer, but ⁓ at the time he was still battling through and we were out having lunch and he had had his, he had had his larynx taken out.

So he couldn’t speak, but he could type on his phone or whatever. And we were out having lunch and I started laughing and he said, he looks at me and he kind of this puzzled look. And I said, do you understand how stubborn you and I are? And he kind of goes like that. And I said, do you realize that it took a pandemic and cancer to get you and I out of a bar? ⁓

But, you know, I joked with them about it and but, you know, it’s, ⁓ and I do joke about that time in that regard. You know, we all lost somebody we knew or somebody close to us or we know somebody who lost somebody. ⁓ And so I don’t mean to make light of it. ⁓ But the reality of it for me personally, even though I did lose a few friends, the reality of it for me when I look at professionally ⁓ is that it gave me the

gave me the wherewithal to make the changes I needed to make and switch a lot of the mindsets that I needed to switch. ⁓

Kristen Knapp (08:34)
Yeah, think that’s

it’s such a you know, that’s a product of just a really resilient person where when you’re at a low point to just truck through it and to actually make changes and to actually switch your path. It takes a lot to be able to do that.

Roger Gauvreau (08:52)
It does, but I think that everybody has that within them, right?

Sometimes you just have to be willing to take the chance. that’s, I think that that’s the, probably when you think of mindsets, when you think of changing the way that you think, ⁓ it is, it’s a very powerful thing, right? ⁓ So often in life we get stuck or we get comfortable.

And the two aren’t necessarily the same thing, but they certainly can intertwine with each other. ⁓ And oftentimes when you do get in that, I guess, unquote rut, if you will, and you do get stuck or you do get complacent, you’re willing to accept less than what your potential is. And so when you start to tap into what you do well, and you start to tap into the things that you excel at,

and then you apply those in other ways, you’ll find great success ⁓ in ways that you never thought were possible.

Kristen Knapp (10:34)
I love that. That’s such a great mindset, you know, outlook to have. And then I imagine being a realtor, you get to help so many people. That must be super gratifying. Yeah.

Roger Gauvreau (10:43)
I I do.

I love it. ⁓ You know, it’s, it’s, you know, I’ll tell you something. It’s, it’s, ⁓

I literally have at times been brought to tears on closing day. ⁓ so, and starting now because I’m thinking of this one family in particular, but ⁓ when you get a chance to really help somebody achieve what, you know, there was a survey, I think it was Harvard University back in the 90s or so, ⁓ had done a survey about what do you, just, you people.

Kristen Knapp (10:55)
Yeah. ⁓

Roger Gauvreau (11:21)
But what do you consider the American dream? And the overwhelming answer, I think it was like 87 % or so, the overwhelming answer was to own a home. That the American dream to people is being a homeowner. And so when you have, especially when you have a first time buyer and the excitement within them and…

how difficult it can be too, right? It’s so hard sometimes to buy that first home and to qualify and jump through all the hoops and do all the things that the lenders need and all the things that the title companies need and everything and everybody pokes and prods and grabs and all that kind of stuff at you, right? And to be the person that can kind of help you get through that and help you to ⁓ kind of shield, be shielded from a lot of that and just kind of keep you in that right spot.

and keep you happy and keep you excited. And then we get to closing day and you get those keys and it’s the best feeling in the world.

Kristen Knapp (12:19)
Yeah, I mean that’s such a great part of the job and you get to, you know, kind of tap into your design love and you get to tap into your love of helping people. It’s just such a great industry for all of that.

Roger Gauvreau (12:26)
Mm-hmm.

And you know, I do that too, right? So since I do work for a custom home builder, I do also think in that mentality of, you know, what would I change? What would I do? What adjustments, what renovations, what would I do to a house? So I do tend to give those types of opinions to people when we’re out looking at resale homes, you know, of what the potential, you know, maybe a space could be for them. So I think that that added bonus has been a ⁓ little bit kind of a…

Kristen Knapp (12:35)
Yeah.

Right.

Roger Gauvreau (12:57)
I guess a helpful avenue for me when it comes to ⁓ helping people visualize different things.

Kristen Knapp (13:03)
Absolutely.

You have kind of both ends of the spectrum there where you can really be a well-rounded helpful person to somebody. And then when you were starting in the real estate industry, like how did you build up your client base in the beginning?

Roger Gauvreau (13:19)
You know, so I started taking classes, first of all, right? My friend who I mentioned that had gotten the real estate bug in my head, you know, the day that I passed that exam, he was the second person I called. The first one was my mom to tell her I passed. ⁓ But he was the second person I called because I thought that, you know, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him and I wanted him to know. And so he called, he said, okay, what you doing right now? And I said, I just walked out of the testing center.

And he goes, okay, cool. He goes, meet me at Republic Title. He goes, we’re going somewhere. And I said, okay. And he takes me out and he does a lot of flips and things of that nature. Now he’s not so much a realtor anymore. ⁓ But he said, you know, he goes, I got this class, you know, I think you should take and as a graduation gift, if I pay for it, would you go? And I said, of course I would. And so ⁓ it was a class that dealt with how you work by referral.

systems that you can put in place to help you build that referral client base. And I learned so much in that class, it made me want to take the second and the third editions of it as well. you know, so when you ask, know, like, what do you do or what did I do when I first started out? I guess the first thing I did was start to educate myself on how, right? ⁓ You know, when you take real estate classes, they teach you enough to stay out of jail. And they teach you enough.

to hopefully keep you from making mistakes that could get you into trouble, right? But they don’t teach you how to show home. They don’t teach you how to navigate rough waters. They don’t teach you ⁓ how to just kind of do the basic everyday kind of things, right? ⁓ And so when it came to that and developing systems, I found that continuing education was important. A funny story about that is so,

Kristen Knapp (14:50)
Yeah.

Roger Gauvreau (15:54)
One of my continuing education classes was a marketing class. And ⁓ most real estate agents I’ve found, you know, they wait till the last minute to do their CE classes, right? It’s, look at the calendar, realize they’ve got three weeks till their license has to renew, and then they got to sign up for classes and get them done. And I had signed up for my CE classes pretty much right away because I thought, what’s a marketing class going to do for me in two years when I really need it right now? And so I started taking those classes right away.

I remember one of my instructors, she was my instructor for promulgated forms. And here she was my instructor for, ⁓ this, marketing class. And she, she goes through this exercise. I’m sure she does it with all of her classes where she says, you know, how many have been five years or longer, you know, raise your hand and on down the chain until you get to, know, who’s been an agent for less than a year. And I’m the only one in my, in the class with my hand up and, and she goes, she goes, wow, how long have you been an agent? And I said three months. And she goes, well,

She goes, you’re already taking this class? I said, yeah. And she goes, what made you decide to take this class? I said, well, you told me to. And she looked at me and I said, well, you were my teacher for promulgated forms and you told everybody to get them out of the way as soon as possible that it’s more beneficial. And she looks at me and she goes, you listened to me? I said, yeah, of course I did. And so she goes, my gosh, I’m so happy about that. Well, anyway.

Kristen Knapp (16:59)
Okay.

You

Thank

you

Roger Gauvreau (17:22)
The moral of the story is the more you can educate yourself as a new agent, the better off you’re gonna be, the more information you can get. I would certainly tell people ⁓ to touch into the sphere you have. I think the big misconception though is that everybody thinks that they’re gonna get their real estate license and all their friends and family are gonna buy a house for them. And the reality of that is that they’re not. ⁓ But guess what? They might know somebody at work who might.

Kristen Knapp (17:44)
All

Roger Gauvreau (17:50)
and they might notice a friend from church who might, and they might know a friend from their kid’s school who might. And so if you get to where you start to talk to your friends and your family, not so much about, here’s my sales pitch to you, but hey, just in case you don’t remember, I got a real estate license and I’d be happy to help any friends that you might have. And so, ⁓ you know, I would say about 90%, other than the lades that I get from the…

you know, from a cost of homes. Other than the leads I get from the builder, ⁓ all of my regular real estate clients have all been referral. ⁓ And I love that, you know, if you can get to where you’re working mostly from referral, then you’re never gonna have to search for a client. So I would tell people that the thing you wanna tap into is develop that sphere, develop the people, ⁓ but develop their mindset, right? So ⁓ be the person that…

they think of, or be the person that they think of when they think real estate, right? So when they do have that conversation at work, or they do have that conversation at church, or they do have that conversation at their kid’s school, right? That all of a sudden they go, hey, you know who you need to call, and they call you. And so ⁓ I would say for new agents, it’s really important to develop those relationships ⁓ and be valuable to people. You know, there’s nothing wrong with

Kristen Knapp (18:53)
So.

Yeah.

huh.

Roger Gauvreau (19:15)
with

popping by somebody’s house with a coffee cake that you baked and a cool pan that they can keep as a keepsake. Because guess what? Every single time they use that pan, they’re going to think of you. Or maybe a pie during the holiday season, you drop by with a fresh baked pie in a pie pan that they’re going to keep that’s got a holiday theme on it or something, right? Well, guess what? Every time they reach into the cupboard, they’re going to see that pie pan. They’re going to think of you. And so you can do different things.

Kristen Knapp (19:18)
you

Yeah.

Roger Gauvreau (19:42)
that will leave lasting impressions on people that so many new agents don’t consider and they don’t think of. And so I would say to new agents, think outside the box. Think of what you can do that personalizes your business, that makes you memorable. Think of things that you can do that will make you leave that lasting impression on people so that you are the person that they think of when other people have that conversation around them. And sure enough, the more and more they start talking to other people about you,

And if you do a great job and you tell people every single time that you’re gonna wanna refer me to all of your friends and family because I’m gonna work so hard for you that you’re gonna love it, and you come through on that, well guess what, they’re gonna keep referring you, their friends are gonna refer you, and before you know it, they might even use you too.

Kristen Knapp (20:28)
That’s amazing and really like adding that human touch to it and the personal touch to it.

Roger Gauvreau (20:33)
It’s so important, right? I mean, you know, it’s like a handwritten card. You you go to your mailbox and you go through and you’re like, bill, bill, bill, you know, junk mail, junk mail, bill, junk mail, whatever. And you just kind of, then it goes on the counter until you’re ready to deal with the pile, right? But as you’re flipping through it, all of a sudden you see something that’s, you know, addressed to you handwritten, it’s got a return address handwritten, and you recognize the name that’s on it. Well, you’re stop and open that up, right?

Kristen Knapp (20:41)
Right.

Roger Gauvreau (21:01)
And if it’s just a thank you card that just says, you know, whether it’s a past client, hey, you know, thank you for trusting me. I hope you’re having a great time. I hope you enjoy your new home, yada, yada, whatever. That’s great. ⁓ If it’s to a friend or something of that nature, that’s fine. You know, hey, love being your friend, whatever. ⁓ But when you can do those things and you can leave those types of lasting impressions on people, then you’re going to build a referral business that you are not going to be able to stop.

Kristen Knapp (21:30)
Right. I love that. That’s such good advice. ⁓ And what did that first, like, home look like, your first sale or your first client, what did that feel like?

Roger Gauvreau (21:41)
It was amazing. I’ll tell you, it’s so funny because you never know where your first, your second, your next, or maybe even your last client’s ever gonna come from, We all, again, right? We all think that, I’m gonna just put on Facebook and I’m a realtor and all of a sudden, hey, everybody’s gonna call me. And you never really know. you know, as I said, during, when the pandemic started, I was delivering groceries and…

And at that time, right, it was contactless. You know, there was a door in between. You didn’t talk to people. didn’t, you know, it was all via text. you know, sometimes if people had a door with a window on it, they might stand on the other side and wave and say thank you or whatever, you know. And it was amazing because you knew you were making a difference in people’s lives, right? People were afraid to open that door. They were afraid to leave their homes and you were bringing them the things that they needed to survive. So it was a really amazing experience in all honesty.

when you talk about service to people. I’m going to break off for just a second because there’s a story about that that I think is really important. And there was this one family who was very early on in the process. the husband had messaged me through our thing when it was time for me to check out and come to his house. And he said, when you get here, he’s all open up the garage door. I’ve got a couple white tables. He said, just put all the bags on the…

I said sure no problem. And so when I got there I texted him and let him know I was there and he opened up the garage doors and sure enough there were these two long white tables and you know I started emptying everything out and putting all the stuff on the tables and he’s got this cleaning station. I mean there’s like wipes and Lysol you name it, gloves, mat, everything right? So he’s got this whole cleaning station and individually one by one he’s taking every item out of each bag and he’s one by one sanitizing each item and putting it on the table behind him.

And I think that for a lot of people that might feel excessive, maybe, you know, especially looking back at how we all didn’t know how we were going to react to the situations that were presented to us. But he went on to say, says, you know, he goes, my wife’s got a very delicate immune system. And if she was to get this, the doctor said that she wouldn’t survive. He goes, so I have to do everything I can to protect her. And it was at that moment that I really did realize that I was making a difference.

and ⁓ making a difference in people’s lives, making a difference in their survival. And ⁓ so it was a very gratifying experience. it’s one of those things that, you know, that mindset follows me in real estate as well, right? Is that when you’re helping somebody buy a home, you’re making a difference in their lives and you’re helping them, you know, with so many things. so, ⁓ you know, just, I’m sorry about the going off track there, but ⁓

Kristen Knapp (24:24)
Right.

⁓

Roger Gauvreau (24:34)
But it ⁓ was an incredible experience. going back to that, so my first client, right, she was one of my shift people. And I had, as I had told most people, know, yeah, I’m in real estate school and this, whatever. Well, once I got my license, you know, all of a sudden, one day I’m delivering to her. And at this point, things had lightened up and I was oftentimes in her kitchen, you know, talking and probably standing there for a half hour while she’s unloading groceries into her fridge, just shooting the breeze, you know. And… ⁓

And so she goes, she goes, well, hey, she goes, I want to sell this house to buy a bigger property. She goes, she goes, so when can we get together and talk? And I was like, now? I was like, we can talk whenever you want, right? And so she ended up being my first client. ⁓ I remember asking her, you know, why she chose me, knowing that I was brand new, right?

And she said, well, she goes, know, she goes, you’ve always been so kind. She said, you’ve always been detail oriented when it comes to this stuff. She goes, and I just really like you. She goes, and everybody deserves a shot to get their things going in life. And I thought, wow, that’s pretty awesome. And so, yeah, so she was my first, I helped her sell.

a that she sold. sold that for about $5.500. We bought her seven acre ranch property out in the boonies that she absolutely loves. It’s got this incredible view and she’s got her six dogs that run all over that property. That was how I got my first client was again personal relationships.

Kristen Knapp (26:13)
amazing.

Right.

Roger Gauvreau (26:29)
And you just don’t know where they’re going to come from. I’ve got somebody I’m working with right now that they were a referral from a referral. was a friend of mine referred me to somebody who needed to sell a property a year ago. And now I’m working with her brother on some others. And so I think those personal relationships are the cornerstone of success in this business. ⁓ Yes, you can cold call. And yes,

Kristen Knapp (26:32)
Right.

Mm-hmm.

Roger Gauvreau (26:58)
You can sit by the phones and yes, you can answer emails and you can follow leads and you can do all those things that are tried and true and you can door knock. You can do all that. ⁓ but I think that the, in this day and age, the biggest road to success is doing quality work, standing by it and having people send you referral business.

Kristen Knapp (27:21)
Right. Well, I love that. think this has been so valuable for people starting out in the industry and how to build their businesses. ⁓ Where can people find you?

Roger Gauvreau (27:30)
Well, so they can find me at Facebook if they want, rogergauvreau.realtor or my personal page is out there, rogergauvreau both public. They can find me on Instagram at rogergauvreau as well, or on TikTok at rogergauvreaurealtor I got some fun stuff on there. And you can also find me at, ⁓ on From the Macaw Custom Homes website as well. So if anybody’s looking to build a custom home, I’m all in on that too. So it’s a lot of fun. I am, I am.

Kristen Knapp (27:43)
music.

He’s your guy, yeah.

Well, I love it. Thank you so much for being here today. I think that you gave such great insight on what it takes to get started. And I think people learned a lot. So thank you so much for being here.

Roger Gauvreau (28:00)
So…

Well, thank you so much for having me, Kristen. I hope you have a wonderful day and to everybody out there. I hope you guys have a wonderful day too.

Kristen Knapp (28:14)
me too.

Yes, thank you everybody for listening and we will see you back next time. Bye.