The Relationship Advantage: How Connectors Build Wealth, Access, and Real Estate Opportunity

David Homan (00:00)
the simplest version, but relational to what this podcast is about. Real estate is a relationship game. It’s a trust game, a spidey sense or not. There is always one alpha and a bunch of betas or the rest. And oftentimes the alpha gets away with what they need to because they can. And as people build out their portfolios as brokers, as

dealers, as buyers, as sellers, those that do it right end up bringing in a very small circle of those they continually trust for which they have success or failure.

Quentin (02:06)
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host, Q Edmonds, and I’m excited to be here today. The universe is always so special to me, right? I feel like I keep finding people who I am in line with, who really kind of line up with the way I try to host my segment of what we do here, because I’m always want to talk about real estate, of course.

but also always want to talk about the person within the real estate, the person. So I’m always talking about mindset. And this gentleman here, I think there’s an alignment there. Also, he’s like me, he likes to connect the dots. I’m a connector. I like to connect people to sources. I like to connect people to themselves. I like to recognize what’s going on and put the pieces together. And I feel like he’s kind of similar to me on that as well. And so I am super excited for us to get to learn from, peek through the lens of Mr. David Homan, Mr. David, how you doing today,

David Homan (03:05)
doing great. I appreciate you having me on and I think the only thing I know how to do is connect the dots so you’re probably much more multifaceted than me. So I’m looking forward to learning too.

Quentin (03:15)
I don’t know, man, the way you saw it, I don’t know. I think we’re going to do quite a bit of learning from each other, if anything. So, Mr. David, I am the type, sir. I’m the type. I like to dive right in, right? And so I would love for you to tell the people what’s your major, you know, focus these days, what’s your major focus. Also, if you can give us a little bit of an origin story, kind of how you got into the spot that you’re in. We love the hero’s journey, man.

And then tell them what part of the world you’re in. People love to know geographically where people are. And so Mr. David, what you’re up to, your origin story, and where you are. My friend, you have the floor.

David Homan (03:51)
All right.

So I grew up ⁓ Northern Florida, Florida Gators, where my dad was a college professor. So that was the world in which I grew up, small town, no connections, somehow got to college near New York, ended up in New York thinking I might stay. 26 years later, that’s where you’re finding me now as we record this together. I’ve experienced some real adversity in my life from being sick when I was 12, panic attacks, running an organization that had full losses to the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme.

Everything that I have learned in my life was taking what people told me I should do a certain way and not understanding why that system didn’t work until I decided to break that system, do something completely antithetical to what I’d been taught. And by doing so became somebody that everyone now considers not only a masterful connector and community builder, but somebody at the forefront of looking at what relationship value, reputational value and true high end connection is.

That is a community that I run, private network called Orchestrated Connecting. The orchestrated part is because I’m also a classical composer and pianist who now mostly plays pop songs with my daughter who won’t sing in public, but she’ll sing with me alone. But besides the creative side, I’m a bestselling author, ⁓ a founder of a tech startup coming out this fall. And everything I do is this relationship game, but specifically to empower and augment and honor.

the connectors in this world.

Quentin (06:11)
Sir, so David, what I’m doing, I’m an active listener, right? So I write when people talk, I’m an active listener, because I love summarizing, love using my archive brain. But man, you said so many things that, so when people talk, I get pictures. So as you’re talking, I’m picturing things. You said so many things that kind of got me stuck. Like when you went into so many different directions, I was like, wait a minute, I wasn’t expecting that. Okay.

and the language that you was using. I was like, okay, wait a minute, hold up. This guy is really like cut from a similar cloth for me. And so this is what I’m do. I’m gonna give a brief summary of what you said, because I’m gonna make a statement and ask you a question. And so you grew up in Florida and your dad was a college professor. You moved to New York. You ran your own company, which experienced some losses mixed up with the Bernie Madoff stuff. You told me how you overcame panic attacks, man.

And you really, you know, into your niche, found yourself, became a connector. And then you started talking. ⁓ You talk about the composing, know, being a composer and you start about pop stuff with your daughter. Like that’s similar to me. Like I love pop stuff with my daughter. So it’s like, I kind of got stuck there. But one of the places that I landed on with the summary is that, you know, part of what you do is honoring connectors, right? Honoring connectors.

So listen, I’m gonna make this statement, ask you this question. I’m gonna love asking you this question. And so, I hope you do too. I think you’re going to, I think you’re going to, but, so the statement that I always make is destiny has no wasted moments, right? Destiny has no wasted moments. If we reflect back on our life, we can see how the journey has kind of been connecting the dots to where we are now.

David Homan (07:35)
All right, let’s hope I love answering it.

Quentin (07:58)
And we’ve been borrowing from the parts, each iteration of our life. Like we’ve been borrowing from success, the losses, the failures, it’s been reshaping our mindset and it’s bringing us to the place where we are now. And so I would love to know for you, your connector, what has the moments, what has the journey taught you about yourself? Has it taught you discipline, resilience? Has it changed, rewired the way your brain works when it comes to innovation? What has the moments taught you about you, Mr. David?

David Homan (08:27)
I love that question. So I am going to love answering it. ⁓ I stood up to a bully named Davey when I was three and a half years old and stopped him from being a bully probably for the rest of his life. ⁓ Four times in my childhood, I had to use a little bit of violence, but I had to defend people. I eventually realized that my triggers in life, I hate injustice and I hate hypocrisy. And so I was somebody

Quentin (08:29)
Thank you.

⁓ my goodness.

David Homan (08:55)
who gave so much value to so many people and when I had a need, where were they? And I started talking to all the other people that are now part of my private group. They all had the same problem. They gave value, introductions. The most sacred thing I think we can do is this transfer of trust, so to speak.

And all the value I gave, I blamed other people for not understanding that value because I naturally would keep giving it and see it as a value. So what changed was I decided to be an asshole about all this. I built a network where you can’t be in it unless you’re so high integrity. I would leave my kids with you. turn away people who are next gens of billionaires or CEOs because I don’t think they’re enough high integrity to have the benefit of what I or my network can give.

I made a rule system that everyone thought for the first five years of my network was stupid because I literally keep kicking people out. And then it became this different mindset if I was protecting everyone. So what I learned was to find the voice and what the world had shat upon me about and to say, I can, I can take it now. I have that grit. I’m no longer that shy kid that was sitting second fiddle to the person that seemed like they could make the, you know, the next moon landing, but they actually couldn’t do anything. They just.

looked the part.

And I realized that the power I had was a power no one appreciated. Even when I was a CEO of a nonprofit or VP of a major film company, no one appreciated the importance of it because they all just think they can get intros for free. And so what I learned was that I had to be the one to say there’s a different way to prove it and to have the people who are the best on the planet for making community an impact.

come together, feel like they could thrive and be accepted by naming as you say, as I see you do when I say things a certain way, I see you immediately write down naming it in a way that makes complete sense, not just to the connector, but for the person who needs the advantage and the support of that connector, as opposed to being from a mild manner taker to a horrible version of them, those type of people, I’ve built this unassailable

defensive mode of saying this is how it is. It’s what my books about. It’s the way I’ve designed my tech company. Everything I’ve done, the way I set up rules in my community. If you’re coming to an event in mine in DC and you’re supposed to be there at seven o’clock and you didn’t leave in time because traffic from the Baltimore area is too bad, that’s your responsibility. But if you don’t take the responsibility to text me because I gave you my personal cell phone to say you’re running late, you don’t get to come back because you’re disrespecting everyone in my community.

by showing up late. And so I realized I had to come out hard because everyone else was letting things happen with the hope that good and destiny and karma would be there. My destiny wasn’t, was not being fulfilled despite all the value I’d given until in my early 30s, I realized there had to be a different way.

Quentin (12:41)
Yeah, man.

It actually almost got me emotional over here if I’m just being 100 % honest. And I’ve learned to honor my emotions because we’re human beings, right? So there are certain things that hit us. And as being humans, it brings forth certain emotion. So I’m very emotional because there is so much alignment. I am one. I hate bullies too. I grew up in Baltimore.

You know, have you seen the show The Wire? Are you familiar with the show The Wire at all?

David Homan (13:15)
yeah, I

mean, I’ve also worked within Hollywood, so I’ve met some of those actors and the group and yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no. Actually, it’s phrases back. Anyone who’s listening who’s not seen The Wire, shame on you. Go watch it today after listening to that podcast. No, you…

Quentin (13:18)
Yeah, duh, duh. I apologize. You don’t know what that’s meant, but now that you said it, it makes sense, Yeah.

Don’t shame him. Don’t shame him David, don’t

shame him bro, don’t shame him. We all get rewards you know, don’t shame him man.

David Homan (13:35)
It is no, but

there are a few shows that show the reality of what living in certain communities is like in this modern day multi trillion dollar economy we’re in. And there are a few shows that show the evolution of people who not only for their own flaws, but the flaws of the system of society, make them make choices that other people instantly judge without walking in their shoes. And like,

That’s why I want to point that out, even though we only got a little bit of time on this podcast, because when we focus on the power of story, it’s always about somebody who overcame something. And when I focus on the power of story, it’s people who overcame something because of the power of an introduction, a mentor, a door opening that got them to another higher place in their life.

Quentin (14:25)
Yeah, man. That’s, yeah, brother. You speaking my language, man. ⁓ How you speaking my language? you know, like I said, much like you, grew up in Baltimore, was, you know, I would say bully. You use the word bully. You know, the word jump, being jumped by guys, ⁓ having to fight three guys at one time, you know, different things like that. It built in me that I would not let anybody around me get taken advantage of.

So going through high school, had guys that wanted to beat up guys and I’m jumping, I’m the one to defend the underdog. And so that bit target on my back. And I think for me that has developed something in me. believe my, one of my purpose is for to make space for people to be known, heard, seen, heard and known, right? We may not always agree.

But just because we disagree does not mean you do not deserve to be seen, known, and heard. I believe everybody should have space for that. Because I believe when you start to, when my mentor says, when you know who you are, you know what to do. So when you’re seen, known, and heard, it helps you with your identity to know who you are. And I love your self-awareness because he’s like, listen, I became an asshole.

David Homan (16:15)
Mm-hmm.

Quentin (16:25)
I want people to be self-aware about where they are because if you don’t know who you are, there’s no way for you to maybe work for a change or maybe embrace who you are. You’ll be wandering this course, not knowing where you should land. so I love, man, I love so many things that you said, man. I love you being a connector. I love the environment that you’re building when it comes to connectivity.

I love your self-awareness, man. There is so much synergy based on the things that you said. Man, I would love to know with the business, what is the next real goal? What’s the next real step? What are you looking to solve at Scale Next?

David Homan (17:10)
Yeah, so I think the question probably everyone if they’re enjoying listening to this, if I haven’t shamed them, but not watching a great, great TV show is like, how the heck does this relate to real estate? So everything I do is about access. My community is private. It’s not monetized my advisory firm, I’m a coach strategist and connector, I can unlock doors that either I already have or I know how to open.

Quentin (17:20)
Mm, mm, mm.

David Homan (17:36)
The next evolution of my business is my technology called SOAR Connect. SOAR stands for Strength of Authentic Relationships. So let’s say you’re a real estate investor, you think that strip malls are going to come back. They may or not, let’s just say for instance, you think that they are. And you’ve met me, you’ve gotten enough of an understanding from our conversation now as we continue, that’s your focus.

Right now you have no capacity technologically to know who I know or who that I actually trust. I have no wherewithal or bandwidth to think who buys or invests in strip malls. And the impasse is hundreds and hundreds of cold calls, endless real estate conferences, talking to people mostly pitching you. And then what happens as you’re waiting in line in the bathroom is you meet that one person who goes, you know, my uncle and I just had an exit. We’re investing in strip malls in, you know,

In between DC and Baltimore, do you happen to anything about that? And you’re like, yes, that’s, that’s, that’s what I do, but it’s frigging random. The technology I’ve built builds a trust score between people, everyone you’ve ever met trust, the trusted advantage is what Reid Hoffman is talking about. recent Horowitz, all the biggest people in tech are going, how do we quantify trust in it? And they’re saying, let’s quantify trust by giving you all their data and they’ll tell you who to trust. And I think that the opposite is true.

Quentin (18:42)
Mm.

David Homan (19:02)
We should empower of a user to know who they trust for their judgment for the one action you take in my tech, which is to make an ask or the opposite to answer somebody’s ask. So the evolution of my business is what if within say a year from now, as we built trust with each other, you could say, David, here’s my ask. Who do you know investing in strip loss? And I can take everyone I’ve ever met, those that I trust first, expanded as much as possible. Again, that’s part of the revenue model because

Querying 30,000 people I’ve met is not an easy thing, even with Cloud. Our sophistication is it could take everyone who’s invested in strip balls, the companies, the executives, the people, the family offices, match that against the people that I trust and come back for me to say, three of my friends just opted in to talk to you. They do the same thing. Your ask is their ask. I trust them. I trust you. You don’t know each other. Now I’m going to bridge the introduction.

and all of your reputations are online for how you handle it.

the simplest version, but relational to what this podcast is about. Real estate is a relationship game. It’s a trust game, a spidey sense or not. There is always one alpha and a bunch of betas or the rest. And oftentimes the alpha gets away with what they need to because they can. And as people build out their portfolios as brokers, as

dealers, as buyers, as sellers, those that do it right end up bringing in a very small circle of those they continually trust for which they have success or

but what stays above it is relational. And my belief is that everyone’s small trusted circles, even just in this large niche, but niche of real estate, what if you could overlap those trusted circles with a technology that was always opt-in permission?

What if that could open up opportunities in different geographies, spectrums, scales? But if I said to you, should meet this friend there in real estate and I trust them and I would leave my kids with them, how likely are you to take that call? How likely are you to look at it at a different lens? How likely are you to build enough trust to know that your Spidey sense is now right or wrong, but you started at a whole different level? So this is the evolution of what has been, you know,

decades of studying this, learning from the failures of it, building a community, finding no tech, writing a book as a playbook for everyone to do this for their own personal journey and their community. Because people think that what I do doesn’t make sense in the context of, well, you don’t do big deals or transactions. And then somebody pitches me on a product, which in this case was a robotic cleaning company for the real estate industry. And I texted a friend of mine who’s one of the top 10 building owners in New York.

And they bought my friend’s company within three months of my intro because there was trust on either side and a need met in between.

Quentin (22:05)
Man, sir, and you said a lot. Trust is such a valuable word in life, definitely in business, but in life period. I read a book, I didn’t finish it all the way, so let me be honest, but I got to do a good portion of it. But it’s a book called The Speed to Trust by Stephen Covey, an incredible book talking about how much trust matters.

David Homan (22:24)
Mm-hmm.

Quentin (22:29)
I’m saying I always say is that trust is gained in drops and lost in buckets. So trust is this tremendous thing. And I love the fact that you’re talking about having a trust score, building a network around trust and how to, I want to use the words you use. said,

just how.

David Homan (22:48)
Well, so my

my inference from that book you reference, which is worth finishing, by the way, and and shame on everyone who hasn’t read it, like pick it up. Yeah, yeah, I hear you. But part of my world, part of my speech I actually just did last night as a keynote is about building relationships at the speed of trust. And and my book takes from that work, but it builds in a different social science than the insular versions of just give or take.

Quentin (22:54)
Okay. Yeah. Thanks, thanks, Dave. I have enough shame in my life, David. Thank you,

Mm, mm!

David Homan (23:18)
Never Eat Alone, ⁓ Gather, those are all incredible books. But my argument with my co-author, Noah, the quickest version, right, is you should be curious and vulnerable with everyone you meet to ascertain whether you can build trust with them. That should be in as diverse a network as you can, because without diversity in your network, age, race, religion, geography, height, whatever it might be, you are keeping into the choir and that eco chamber is limiting.

And then when you make first an offer of generosity with an ask that there be gratitude back, eventually then you’re the one that people are being generous to. As long as you stay honorable, curious and vulnerable with this diverse, generous mindset. Again, this is an entire book in 25 seconds. Then you actually achieve what everyone thinks they do when they go to some big mastermind, unlock your power and get the biggest deal of the century. And I go, there’s a reason why

I know seven of the top 10 real estate owners in New York. There’s a reason why I have access to the people that everyone wants access to in the family office space. There’s a reason why I cannot name drop a billionaire or a major wealth holder. I know I have trusted access to them by myself or through somebody trusted in my network. This is a game I played for a while, but it’s a way of being that actually works tangibly.

and lets you fulfill your destiny, your purpose more while doing it.

Quentin (24:51)
So listen, I asked everybody this question and you synthesized this question, but I’m still want to ask it because I still want you maybe to expand on it if you choose to. So I asked everyone what is their perspective on the word relationship. And so David, I have to have your perspective on the word relationship. Again, you already synthesized it, but still I need to point blank here your take on the word relationship.

David Homan (25:04)
Fair enough.

So when I describe to people I have a relationship with somebody else, people think I’m crazy because I have thousands and thousands of friends. So there are different tiers of that. But what is a constant in my life is that I’ve built enough depth in a relationship that no matter how long or the reason why I see somebody, we catch up as if it’s just building from the day before, even if it was a decade.

So to build a relationship is to build something that’s intentional. To stack, to aggregate those together is to make it a purposeful community of intentional relationship.

Quentin (26:03)
Well, you hit on my word after people, most of time they answer that question. I always say, I always equate the word relationship with community. Community is common unity. It’s when you find common unity with somebody, when y’all have the same mindset. Listen, I say healing happens in community. Because I believe when you build something with someone, support happens from all over. It supports your mentality. It supports you financially. It supports you physically. You have an ecosystem.

David Homan (26:11)
Mm-hmm.

Quentin (26:33)
that if you need help, you can lean on somebody that say, hey, I need help here and vice versa. So I think relationships is all about community, that common unity. And unity is different from uniformity because uniformity, everybody do the same thing. But unity, people do different things, but still with the common goal in mind. so, yeah, man, David, sir.

David Homan (26:47)
Mm-hmm.

Quentin (26:57)
I have enjoyed this conversation immensely. feel like we’re just getting started. I feel like I have at least another 30 minutes and I can go with you easily. And we can talk about so many different things. man, for the sake of scheduling, for the sake of staying true to the format, I’m going to ask you, if someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, collaborate with you, learn more about what you’re doing, how can they get in contact with you,

David Homan (27:24)
Easiest way is my new website that I rebuilt, David Homan, ⁓ H-O-M-A-N is the last name, .com (davidhoman.com). In there is everything I do, my book, my connector test, ⁓ my startup, my advisory firms, the business, the community that I run, my email, just right out there. But if somebody writes to me, they better be intentional. They better understand I have no time in life. And therefore, if they’re going to ask for my time, needs to be for something that can help me amplify them.

Quentin (27:31)
Yeah. Yeah.

David Homan (27:54)
and those I’m looking to

Quentin (27:56)
I’m just laughing man. I’m like, where do you, in my mind, like where did this guy come from? So we’ll talk a little bit more behind the scenes, but let me say three things to you. And I say these sincerely, I say organically. I do say it at the end of each part, but I really, I sincerely mean this and I say it organically. So first thing, thank you for your time. I think time is our most precious commodity and you could have chose to do whatever you wanted to do with your time.

but you chose to spend time with us. So I take that as valuable. So thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. Secondly, thank you for your story. I believe stories have a way of planting seeds in people. We may not see the growth. It may grow two years from now, three years from now, but the seed is planted. So you came on today, you planted seeds. And I always say thank you for the gift of your vulnerability, the gift of your integrity, the gift of your authenticity.

David Homan (28:33)
My pleasure.

Quentin (28:54)
authenticity. I believe you planted seeds for people that’s really going to matter later. It’ll matter now or later, either one. Lastly, man, thank you for your mindset. Thank you for the way you think and bringing that mindset to this platform. I greatly appreciate you coming on today, David.

David Homan (29:10)
It’s been a pleasure. I’m sorry for any shaming that I did for you or others as a preamble for a postamble for this, but I’m grateful for the opportunity and the time and for everyone listening.

Quentin (29:21)
I appreciate it. I’m gonna put this, I wanna put this on record. Are you familiar with Brene Brown? So you know, man, you know what Brene said about Shane. Yeah, exactly. yeah, that’s exactly.

David Homan (29:27)
absolutely. One of the most she’s one of the most brilliant friends. yeah. I mean, look,

shame, rage, all these things are part of a motivation and a mindset shift. In my book, I talk about people who aren’t purposeful, people who rage against the dying of the night, people who live lives of quiet desperation. And when we get stuck in that we’re stuck in the trauma of what happened to us being unable to get out of that cycle.

And therefore we choose to endlessly be a martyr or a victim. And everyone, including your story with being jumped and bullied and everything, everyone in my community is a giver because they chose not just to not be a victim or a martyr, to blame the world for what’s happened to them. In many cases, horrible, horrible things, but they chose to be a protector of all the others, not just move forward. And that is what Brene’s work talks about.

That is what so much of this work is because everything is possible with a different purpose mindset, which is why I love your podcast and the best way for people to build a legacy for their family, the most sure way still is real estate.

Quentin (30:42)
Well, listen, y’all heard Mr. David. It’s nothing more for me to say. Y’all heard him. Listen, his information is in the show notes. Please get in contact with him. DavidHoman.com. Like, please, please get in contact with him. And definitely make sure you are subscribed here, because I promise you, we’re going to continue to bring up amazing people just like Mr. David. So, sir, I say thank you again. And to everyone else, y’all have a fantastic day.