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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Erika speaks with Chey Castro, a seasoned real estate professional from Arizona. Chey shares his journey from finance to real estate, discussing the challenges and opportunities in the current market, particularly in North Scottsdale. He emphasizes the importance of honesty and integrity in client relationships, the value of networking through golf, and his vision for being a trusted name in real estate. Chey’s insights provide valuable lessons for both new and experienced agents in the industry.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Chey Castro (00:00)
I love to say, you see these houses around here? I sell those. That’s like, that’s my go-to on golf. Like I got a, I got a great advice if anyone wants to listen about getting new clients. I literally go on golfnow.com or different golf apps, pick like the most expensive golf course there is, get out there, play. If there’s like a two-some or three-some, put yourself on. So you just go as a single, you join a group and you meet three new people. And by the fourth or fifth hole,By then they usually ask you, so what do you do for work? And you’re like, oh well let me tell you, I’m in real estate. Like do not go on the first toll and tell them that you’re a realtor, like that you’re dead in the water, because the next 17 tolls are gonna suck.
Erika (02:13)
Hey everyone, welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m your host, Erika And today I’m thrilled to be joined by Chey Castro. He’s shaking things up in the real estate world. Chey, I’m so glad to have you on the show today.Chey Castro (02:27)
Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.Erika (02:29)
Yeah, so let’s jump on in Chey for our listeners who don’t know you yet. Can you share more of your story and how you got involved in real estate?Chey Castro (02:40)
Sure. ⁓ Born and raised here in Arizona. ⁓My parents met at ASU. I went to Arizona State as well, finance degree. I went to Notre Dame for grad school, got a master’s in accounting. Worked in finance and accounting for a good six years before I got into real estate as an auditor at Ernst & Young and then a senior financial analyst for DMB Associates, which is a real estate developer. And they developed all of DC Ranch and Silverleaf in North Scottsdale. So I saw that over 20 years ago when it was all just dirt and
And long story short, kind of just saw how fun the sales team was having and what they were doing and I worked my way into sales ⁓ over 20 years ago.
Erika (03:24)
That’s awesome. And you had, you know, completely switched careers. So that was a risk that you took there was there a moment after you took that leap that you knew for sure this is what you were sticking with.Chey Castro (03:38)
That’s a good question. I don’t think so. I didn’t know what I was doing. I to be honest, I had lot of friends that were like, what are you doing? Because I went from…know, then accounting and finance, well, everything is about titles. And my title was senior financial analyst. And then I became a sales assistant. And I a lot of people making fun of me, like, especially the guys I went to Notre Dame with and used to work at Ernst & Young with. They’re like, why are you an assistant? Like, what? You’re supposed to advance your career and not go back. ⁓ But I just remember.
like thinking, you know what, I enjoy this because every day is different. I’m meeting new clients, I’m doing different things and I I didn’t make hardly any money until I made my first sale and once I did, I was like, I think I can do this and realized it’s, you know, let’s just go, let’s see where it goes and 20 years later, it’s still exciting every day. New clients, new houses, everything is different. It’s always a different story, so.
Erika (05:23)
Yeah, speaking of what you have going on, what kind of challenges and opportunities are you seeing in the Arizona market?Chey Castro (05:31)
I see that it’s very unique because the houses after COVID went up so much and prices went so high, especially in the North Scottsdale area where I live that… ⁓you know, it’s just crazy how much was, you you allow your clients or your listeners are investors. And I have so many clients that invested, bought a million dollar house. Now it’s worth 2 million and you know, all these huge returns, but now it’s worth 2 million or they want 2 million, but now it’s only worth one five and they want to list it for 2 million and it stays on market too long. So the challenge is, uh, what was that? I saw it on social media that, uh, sellers think it’s, think it’s 2021 and buyers think it’s 2000, uh, what is it? 2018.
or something like that when it was real bad. So it’s just a big disconnect right now. And it’s just trying to get that for buyers and sellers to line up because market rate is what buyers are willing to buy and what sellers are willing to sell for.
Erika (06:30)
Yeah, and ⁓ with your role in real estate, are you bridging that gap there?Chey Castro (06:35)
I’m being fully transparent, fully honest with clients. Sometimes I’ll go to a listing appointment and I’ll say it’s not worth that. We need to list it at this certain price and there’ll be another agent that they’re talking to that say, oh, I can get you 500 above that. They do that just so they can get the listing. And then six months from now they’re lower enterprise, lower enterprise, lower enterprise, and then they’re back to where we started. And it’s just a big waste of time, money, and energy. So I’m just trying to be honest with clients.buyers because I’m an Arizona native are buyers. A lot of my clients are buyers and so I know what the buyers their mentality are, what they’re thinking.
Erika (07:11)
Yeah, and you you have had a lot of deal volume with, you know, helping out different customers. Can you explain for our listeners who are just getting started and that, you know, they just got their license. How do you value the quality with the volume?Chey Castro (07:32)
⁓ You just have to treat every single client like…How do I say it like your best client you really have to do your best to give ad value to give them good advice to not tell them what just what they want to hear but tell them the truth and You know, it’s our job as professionals to know the truth and know our information to know the purchase contract I tell every everyone has getting into real estate the number one thing you did you need to know is you need to know that purchase contract like the back of your head you can go to line 213 is this line 50 is this like to know the purchase contract front and back because pretty much 90 %
of the things that we need to do is right there in the purchase contract. sometimes you give it to a client, like I have a client that, lot of them are very successful entrepreneurs, but they don’t do real estate. They’ve lived in their house 10 years. They haven’t sold a house in 10 years. We do it every single day. And so just the basics, the inspection period, the Eschgord upon everything that we take for granted that we know so well to someone that only buys a house once every 10 years, it’s all new to them. So it’s really, ⁓ it’s really,
just
telling them and educating clients on every aspect of the purchase and sales process. So they’re fully engaged and they have good communication and pick up the phone and call them. Don’t do a text, don’t do an email. I can’t tell you how many times where I’ll just text, I’ll just say, I’ll text them. And my wife is like, no, call them. And after I get done talking to the client, I’m like, thank you. I’m so grateful that I called in that text because things can get lost in translation so easily. And it’s happened. ⁓
I send a text and it gets read the wrong way. You just gotta call and talk to the clients and meet them face to face if you can. And just be, my mentor a long time ago would always say, be the doctor’s doctor. just like, you know what I mean? Like we’re paid very well. Lawyers get paid well and people when they meet with their lawyer, they listen to what they say because the lawyer is the expert. Well we need to be the expert in our profession.
Erika (10:02)
Yeah, absolutely. And with your experience, Chey, I’m sure that you’ve had some experience that has turned you into an expert. Maybe a deal went totally sideways or you completely had to pivot for a client. Can you share one of those moments on your journey and what you learned from it?Chey Castro (10:22)
yeah, I learned that even if it’s terrible, the worst thing ever, if you’re completely honest and truthful…And if you screwed up just own it and not try the worst thing you can do is try to lie your way out of something especially sophisticated buyers high-end high net worth people they can see through that like that and ⁓ I can’t specifically think of one but I do know over the last 20 years there’s been a couple times where Maybe I didn’t do something like I should or maybe I got lazy because you know being lazy or just you’re super busy and you miss certain things Maybe it’s you you miss to tell them when the inspection periods just little things. I can’t
I
think right now exactly an example, but I know they’ve happened before. And the reason that’s always ended up well ⁓ is because I’ve been honest. Actually, I can give you an example. I did an open house at a $5 million house, and it was a guard gated community, DC Ranch Country Club. And I had two people come in at different times. One was older, one was a young guy. And they came in at different times. At the same time, one came five minutes early, another guy came in.
The first guy came, I was talking to him, and then the next guy came and he was like asking me these questions and he’s like, hey, I don’t have a real estate agent. I would love to work with you. know, giving me all the things of like, I’d love to work with you. Here’s my contact information, all this stuff. Well, little I know the other guy was out there.
robbing the house basically. I went in the medicine cabinet and stole jewelry. Thank God I tell my clients anything of value, put it in a safe. The most expensive stuff was in a safe, but they lived there, so there was obviously stuff still there. And they ended up stealing a bunch of crap. And long story short, they were working together. I got the police involved. I got the guard gate involved. They ran their plates. I mean, it was a whole thing.
I don’t know, I haven’t told that story in a while, but it’s just like, it was bad. But my clients knew that, you know, I was trying to do the best I could. There was cameras everywhere too in the inside, so the clients saw the cameras, they saw what I was doing, and they just saw that, you know, two professional thieves tried to come in and, you know, steal from them. So just a crazy, crazy experience.
Erika (12:30)
that is crazy. Is there anything that you’ve changed about what you do having experienced that?Chey Castro (12:36)
So my wife and I do open houses together and we do our best that when someone comes in we follow them and we’re with them the whole time and don’t let people try to take away your attention. I don’t do open houses anymore to try to get clients or anything like that. When I do an open house, it’s to sell that house. I do them at my listings to try to sell that house and I basically treat open houses like I’m a listing, like I’m doing a show into a buyer. I walk with them.⁓
and you know if it gets too busy too crowded I I do my best to I don’t know how you say it but just be there and like when you go into the master bedroom I’m there you go in this area anywhere there’s valuable stuff I’m there and my wife is there all lies and it’s just it’s not trying to get distracted like no way someone’s ever gonna pull me away anymore and talk to one person while another person walking around it’s it’s a fool that makes sense
Erika (13:34)
Yeah, absolutely. And Chey, I know a lot of our listeners here are looking to level up in their real estate journey. So I think they benefit to hear this when it comes to building relationships and growing your network. What’s made the biggest difference for you?Chey Castro (13:51)
Joining a country club. I’ve been a member at DC ranch country club for a while. It’s a golf ⁓ You learn a lot about people on the golf course and so their character and just you know It’s the only sport where you call penalty on yourself. And so so I that’s the best way like I just got done playing in the Paradise Valley country club member guest ⁓couple, like three or four member guests a year I play in and just play a lot of golf with clients, people, other members. And then I bring a lot of clients to the golf course. it’s just a, for me, golf has been the best, the best way for me to really connect with, with clients, with people that, you know, that I want to stay in contact with because it’s so easy. think I told you earlier, the hardest part of our industry is staying top of mind because there’s so many other real estate agents and people.
get inundated with other realtors but you sell a house or a client you try to take them golfing once every quarter, once every two quarters or whatever but just being in top of mind is very important.
Erika (15:36)
Yeah, absolutely. And golf is not a short game either. that is a lot of time together.Chey Castro (15:42)
Five hours right next to, and I played golf with the CEO of a huge company. I think they have 50,000 employees, ridiculous amount of employees. And I’m right there with the CEO talking to them on the golf course. And I’m just thinking in my mind, like, how many people would pay so much money to be able to sit and talk to the CEO of their company for five hours? And it’s just a cool deal. It’s a cool deal to be able to do that.Erika (16:06)
Right, right. And to break it down for our listeners who are brand spanking new at this is, you know, do you look for opportunities to talk about real estate or is it more about building that relationship there?Chey Castro (16:21)
100 % building a relationship. I don’t say anything until they ask. I don’t… I don’t…Here’s my cart and just you’re done. You won’t even be taken seriously I’ve I’ve heard stories of people get kicked out of the country club because they’re they’re like, hey, let me tell you know Let me like I was a financial advisor that were like basic you wouldn’t do this But the thing is in the men’s locker room It was like he pulls out his computer and says look at these rates if you invest with me, know Like like they don’t want it that they’re there for golf to have fun to enjoy To get their mind off of their their work because they’re so busy all the time the last thing they want to do
is get someone there talking about, hey, real estate stuff. If they ask me, 100%. And if they ask you, you be ready. Which usually, either people already know what I do, so there’s no need to mention it. If they bring it up, we’ll talk about it. If they don’t know what I do, usually, if you’re good guy and having fun, I mean, it’s normal conversation. Someone’s gonna ask you what you do for work. And…
I love to say, you see these houses around here? I sell those. That’s like, that’s my go-to on golf. Like I got a, I got a great advice if anyone wants to listen about getting new clients. I literally go on golfnow.com or different golf apps, pick like the most expensive golf course there is, get out there, play. If there’s like a two-some or three-some, put yourself on. So you just go as a single, you join a group and you meet three new people. And by the fourth or fifth hole,
By then they usually ask you, so what do you do for work? And you’re like, oh well let me tell you, I’m in real estate. Like do not go on the first toll and tell them that you’re a realtor, like that you’re dead in the water, because the next 17 tolls are gonna suck.
But if you’re a good guy and you’re fun to golf with and you’re a good character, 99.9 % sure they’re gonna ask you what you do for work.
And that’s your opportunity just to be brief, but firm and ⁓ confident and you know. ⁓
It’s a great, what we do is amazing. I’m very blessed to be a real estate agent. wish it was harder to become a real estate agent. wish barriers of entry weren’t so easy. You go to class for a couple hours, you take a test, that’s super easy, and you become a realtor. And you’re helping people with the biggest decision of sales of their purchase of their career, of their life. And I just wish it was a little harder to get in. Because I think if we’d be treated with more respect, we’d be treated like lawyers.
And I do compare us to lawyers because people pass for our professional opinion. ⁓
Erika (18:55)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Chey, what do you have going on next? What a vision or goal do you have as a realtor?Chey Castro (19:03)
I just to be top of mind for like I said, I look out my window at my home office and I can see silver leaf and every house there on the mountain is $10 million plus, you know, at least. I just pray that I am top of mind when a husband and wife are thinking, Hey, we should sell, you know, who should we call? We should call Chey. Like that’s that right there is, is what I pray for every day that I become top of mind and people know who I am and know that I’m going to, ifIf they do call me, I’m going to give them great service. I’m going to be honest, truthful, authentic, integrity, and do my absolute best to give them good service and get their house sold. And I’m going to be honest with them too. If they want to solve for 10 and it’s only worth seven, I’m going to let them know. I’m going to be honest with them.
Erika (19:48)
you know, that kind of integrity we need in the real estate space.Chey Castro (19:52)
Absolutely.Erika (19:52)
Well, for our listeners here who are in Arizona, if they want to connect, reach out, you know, maybe they need some help, what’s the best way for them to reach you?Chey Castro (20:02)
Youcan go on my social media, just my name, cheycastro33 is my Instagram. cheycastro33 is my Instagram. Go on there, send me a message and I would love to help. I love this industry, I love what we do and I would love to help people become the best they can. There’s enough to go around for everybody.
Erika (20:21)
Absolutely. Well, Chey, I appreciate your time, your story, and just the integrity that you’re bringing to the game.Chey Castro (20:29)
Thank you. I appreciate it.Erika (20:31)
And for our listeners, if you enjoyed this episode, make sure that you’re subscribed to the Real Estate Pros podcast. We’ve got more conversations lined up with pros like Chey who are out there building incredible real estate businesses. We’ll see you on the next episode.
