Real Estate Contract Mistakes Agents Must Avoid | Former Paralegal Leanda Andrade

Leanda Andrade (00:00)
We were rationing and we were budgeting and it was really, really tough. And at some point, somebody was like, Did you take it to God? And I was like, No, I actually turned away from him because I was mad about my business because he wasn’t providing. And I turned my face away from him. And then in that moment, I was like, Whoa, I need to bring God back into my business.

I prayed, and my phone won’t stop ringing off the hook.

Scott Bursey (02:01)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast, powered by Investor Fuel. I’m your host, Scott Bursey. Glad you’re with us.

And today we’re delighted to be joined by Leanda Andrade of RE/MAX Advantage Plus. Leanda brings a unique high-stakes edge to the real estate market. With eight years of experience as a paralegal, specializing in bankruptcy and real estate law, she navigates the complexities of contracts like few others in the industry. Listeners, you can expect to learn how to leverage legal precision to secure client equity and master the art of guiding your clients through even the most difficult closings. Leanda, welcome to the show.

Leanda Andrade (02:41)
Thank you for having me. Happy to be here.

Scott Bursey (02:43)
Awesome having you here, Leanda. And to help our listeners get up to speed, please give us the ninety second highlight reel of how your career ignited and where you’re pouring your fuel now.

Leanda Andrade (02:54)
Career Ignited. Wow. Completely God led. I was working for eight years as paralegal, touching on real estate the entire time, every law firm I was at. And I got the opportunity to learn about multifamily investing. And I said yes to it. And then that led me to meet phenomenal people. And it it’s given me the opportunity to become a realtor.

And I got my license and God has just provided the whole way. It’s a whole God. God did it. God got me into real estate.

Scott Bursey (03:31)
That is a powerful foundation, Leanda. It’s clear that background gives you a massive advantage when things get tough. What really caught my attention about you was the way that you’ve been able to seamlessly translate your intense paralegal experience into a client-first faith-driven advisory role. Turning complex legal work into massive peace of mind for your buyers and sellers.

Building on that, given your background in bankruptcy law, what specific contract clause do you think most agents overlook that ends up hurting their clients’ equity?

Leanda Andrade (04:11)
So I can tell you when you’re a paralegal and you’re going through mountains of paperwork, high attention to detail is essential. So that alone has just helped me in real estate. There are several things that we can put, terms that we can put in your in your offer that can protect you.

I would say number one, the purchase price. Like, let’s do the research. I will run the comps, and when I run the comps, I don’t just do a general comp search. I’m actually looking at each one of those addresses that come up. Sometimes that’s 20 plus. And I’m really narrowing it down to area.

The qualities of the home, the style of the home, the year of the home, the square footage. Because you can’t really get the true value of a home by just looking at the general comps. So I really take my time on that and I find homes that are that would show the true value. So you’re not overpaying for a property.

Scott Bursey (06:19)
Love that tactical approach. That is outstanding. Leanda, wondering if you could share what’s the biggest legal hurdle you see newer agents struggle with that you find yourself constantly having to help them navigate, perhaps?

Leanda Andrade (06:36)
Say for newer agents, not really a legal. So one thing, realtors, if you’re a licensed realtor and you’re with a broker, we actually have errors and omissions. It’s insurance for us in case something happens, which God forbid it does. So so we have insurance through our brokerage that protects us that could hire an attorney for us should anything go wrong. And I would also say when you sign an arbitration agreement as a new agent, and I didn’t know this, if you sign an arbitration agreement with and you include it in the purchase agreement, you don’t have to sign it as a realtor. You can strike the signature line out for your section and by striking it out, you give yourself an opportunity to be able to hire legal counsel, a lawyer to represent you. If you sign the arbitration agreement, you’re agreeing to waiving the right to having an attorney. And that could make a huge difference for you if you’re fighting a legal battle.

Scott Bursey (07:48)
Leanda, if you could help us connect the dots, since you utilize a faith-driven approach, how do you see that philosophy building deeper trust during those high-stress closing periods?

Leanda Andrade (08:00)
Mm. So in the beginning I—God just put me in the fire. Like honestly, I didn’t understand what was going on. I was a new agent months in, barely, I barely got licensed. And each transaction I had difficult, challenging. It was—they were the worst. I was calling my help desk, which we have on the Minnesota Real Estate Team. I’m so grateful for it because not every brokerage has it. They’re awake at 8 AM to answer calls up until like 9 or 10 PM. They will—they will answer the phone for me and pick it up, which is amazing, especially when you’re new. So I would—I was calling them and they were like, “Wow, I didn’t get a situation like that until I was like 30, 40 years in.” And I was like, I didn’t understand why I was getting these challenging transactions. And then it hit me. I was like, God is preparing me for something bigger. If I want to be the best realtor in Minnesota, which was my affirmation list and my prayer, I have to be able to navigate these challenging situations. So I really got thrown in the fire the first year. And it was—I just kept getting hit and like I felt like I was getting beat up and I didn’t understand it and I wanted to quit. I really wanted to quit. And I—I hear that it’s typical for realtors to quit within the first year. But He held me together through it and I’m so grateful for all of those challenging transactions because I’m a better agent. I’m a calmer agent. I know how to set boundaries now. I know how to keep my clients calm in challenging situations and just talk—be able to talk them through it. Be like, “I’ve handled this before. We’ve gotten through this.”

Scott Bursey (09:52)
Have you seen that translate directly into more repeat business and referrals?

Leanda Andrade (10:38)
Of course. Yeah. I—I’ve sold for—for parents and their children and then for—I’ll start with the child first and then I’ll help their parent. And I get friends’ referrals. I’m getting a lot of—now that I’m in my second year of being a licensed realtor, I’m getting a lot of people from my personal sphere that actually want to work with me now. That wasn’t the case in my first year. People want to watch you and they want to see how is she going to do? But now that they’ve seen me do some transactions, they know—they have seen and heard that I’m knowledgeable, they’re considering working with me now, which is nice.

Scott Bursey (11:24)
And Leanda, curious to know, in this current shifting market, where do you see the biggest risk for sellers who don’t have a strong legal advocate on their side?

Leanda Andrade (11:34)
I see a lot of people wanting to sell their house on their own. They want to avoid paying realtor commission. And that’s great. You can ask ChatGPT. I’m sure it will guide you up to a certain point, but it’s not going to replace having somebody in the industry with actual knowledge, an actual team who’s actually been through these situations and can help you truly navigate it. ChatGPT can only take you so far. It can only take you so far. So I would say meet with a few realtors, give it a consideration. If you want to do a for sale by owner, that’s great. You can sell your home, but you’re going to leave money on the table. You’re—you’re—you’re leaving yourself vulnerable to be taken advantage of. There are things that you don’t know. And I would say to be okay with that and ask for help.

Scott Bursey (12:36)
Would love your thoughts on how do you educate and continue to educate yourself and s—to stay ahead of the changing regulatory landscape in real estate.

We’d love to get your thoughts on how are you evolving your educational strategy to stay ahead of the changing regulatory landscape in real estate?

Leanda Andrade (12:57)
Yeah, we have great continued education for—for real estate. So I get—okay, so other brokerages will try to poach you when you’re a realtor. They’ll send you emails, they’ll try to get you to their brokerage, they’ll entice you with food and free realtor education credits. And I say yes. One, I love—I love knowledge, I love learning. Two, why not have a free credit? We need a certain amount per year. And then three, like I can learn. I know I—I said we talked about this earlier. I was like, I don’t really want to be in a room full of other realtors, but I do—I do give myself a chance, especially if I’m doing CE, to connect with other realtors because you never know where a conversation can lead you, where the partnership could go, what—what—what are they doing that’s working for them or what are they struggling with? And you got to kind of feed them first. So if I give them a bit of value first, it kind of softens their shell. Realtors are kind of tough. It kind of softens their shell and then we’re able to open up the conversation. So I get a ton of value out of that, not only with the classes that they’re teaching, but also just connecting with other realtors and the free food.

Scott Bursey (14:17)
What does your network look like right now? And maybe more importantly, when it comes to relationships and networking, what has made the biggest difference for you?

Leanda Andrade (14:27)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So I’m actually a person that would travel out of state to network. I’ve gone to all of the conferences. You can say them and you can name them. And I’ll be like, “Yeah, I went there. I attended or I volunteered. I had a blast.” I traveled everywhere connecting with people from all over the US. I learned so much. And that was how I started networking is like traveling and going to these different conferences. And it was amazing. It got me out of my shell. It taught me how to talk to people because they’re strangers. You’re never going to see them again, maybe. I did end up staying connected with a lot of the people that I’ve met. But here in Minnesota, once I got my real estate license, I was like, there isn’t a lot of value for me to network outside of Minnesota right now if my clientele is here in Minnesota, in Saint Paul, in Minneapolis. So I started to go to local events. I looked on Facebook, I looked on Eventbrite, I was—I was just Googling different community events and I would go to real estate events, investor events, there are alumni events that you can join, even if you didn’t go to that college. So I started doing that.

And I realized I was only meeting these people one time. It wasn’t enough to generate a true connection. So when I’m networking, I used to want to meet everybody in the room and talk to everybody. But now I just look for that one person, one person in the room. And I—I just sit and I talk with them and I have a meaningful conversation. And I found that to be helpful.

And as of recently I have been—I’ve been getting deeply involved with my church. So leading a woman’s small group was so fulfilling and just the relationships that I’ve built with other women of faith, like those—those strong bonds, like they’re for life.

And my church also has core groups that start, they’re actually starting up. They’ll be starting up this winter. So I’m really looking forward to that. And not only do—does my church, have service together, but we also do fellowship. Like we do life together. We have lunch every Sunday after service. We have barbecues, we celebrate birthdays. There’s almost like every day of the week there is something to be able to do within community and that’s really special.

Scott Bursey (17:18)
That’s a powerful network to lean on. Thank you for highlighting that. Leanda, if an agent wanted to replicate your success in navigating complex contracts, what is the most important skill they should master today?

Leanda Andrade (17:32)
If we are—if we are talking about contracts, I would say write purchase agreement after purchase agreement. You have access to the MLS. You can see a property and you can use the MLS listing number and you can practice. You can put that into a purchase agreement, take it into the transaction desk. That’s the platform that we use. And just write offers over and over and over and over again. So it’s so funny. The other day, me and my son we were watching a movie or we were doing something, and I had to write a purchase agreement. Not I had to, I—I had the opportunity to. And I was like, “David, I could—I can write this purchase agreement in—in 10 minutes.” And he’s like, “No, you can do it in five minutes.” And I was like, “Okay, I’m going to start. Are you ready? Set the timer.” So he set the timer. And I was—I was writing the purchase agreement accurately. I’ll tell you, it was accurate. And I ended—my time was eleven minutes. I was one minute over.

Scott Bursey (18:37)
It’s all about the reps. Wow. And that is a process. Thank you for that. And really you have given us a lot of really good words of wisdom today, Leanda. But is there any additional words that you could leave with our listeners?

Leanda Andrade (18:54)
Yeah. A truck at really tough go in real estate my first year and I wanted to quit. So I’m going to tell you if you’re in real estate and you want to quit, don’t keep going. My business was drowning. I went months, I went months without making a sale. We—we were going to the food shelf to get food.

We were rationing and we were budgeting and it was really, really tough. And at some point, somebody was like, Did you take it to God? And I was like, No, I actually turned away from him because I was mad about my business because he wasn’t providing. And I turned my face away from him. And then in that moment, I was like, Whoa, I need to bring God back into my business.

I prayed, and my phone won’t stop ringing off the hook.

So I would tell you, like, yes, it is a difficult industry to be in, but it is so worth it. And just don’t, just don’t quit. Just don’t give up. If you could tough it out to year two, year three, you will see a big difference in your business. And if you ever need support, feel free to reach out.

Scott Bursey (20:09)
Extremely effective advice. Leanda, for those of our listeners that want to keep this conversation moving, stay in your lane or collaborate with you, what’s the best way for them to reach you?

Leanda Andrade (20:20)
Reach out to me on Instagram or Facebook. It’s Leanda Andrade.

Scott Bursey (20:24)
Leanda, thank you so much for joining us today on the Real Estate Pros podcast.

Leanda Andrade (20:28)
Course. Thanks for having me.

Scott Bursey (20:30)
This has been simply outstanding. And for our listeners, we appreciate you. If you receive value from today’s episode, please subscribe. We’ll be filling your tanks with the lineup of elite guests, just like Leanda, who are accelerating and setting the pace for the rest of the industry. Until next time, keep your standards high and your vision clear. We’ll see you in the next episode, everyone.