The Secret to Selling 30 Homes a Year as a Solo Agent – Featuring Cesar Rincon

Top Agent Talks Podcast with Bob Mangold – Featuring Cesar Rincon

🎙 Welcome Agents!
Host Bob Mangold brings you another episode of the Top Agent Talks Podcast, where we interview successful real estate agents to uncover their strategies and insights. Be sure to share this episode with every agent you know!

🔥 Episode Sponsor:
This episode is sponsored by Home Boss Listing Hub, a platform designed to help agents scale their businesses to seven figures by focusing exclusively on listings.

🚀 Special Guest: Cesar Rincon

Our guest today is Cesar Rincon, an award-winning ICON agent from Houston, Texas. In just five years, Cesar has sold over 130 homes as a solo agent—an incredible achievement!

🔹 Key Takeaways from Cesar’s Success:

• 📱 Social Media is King – 95% of his business comes from social media.
• 🎥 Video Marketing Works – His journey started by simply filming new construction homes.
• 💡 Keep It Simple – Instead of listing specs, he focused on how easy the process is.
• 📞 Always Have a Call to Action – He encourages buyers to call him directly.

🏡 Why New Construction is a Game-Changer

Cesar shares why new construction homes are the best-kept secret for real estate agents:
✅ Easier transactions – Less hassle compared to resale homes.
✅ Fewer showings – No need to show 10+ homes; most clients choose within 2-3 visits.
✅ Smoother pipeline – Homes under contract close in 30-45 days, creating steady cash flow.

💰 The Power of Pre-Qualification

• Agents must understand basic mortgage qualifications.
• Avoid time-wasters by ensuring buyers are loan-ready before showing homes.
• Most buyers seek agents for mortgage guidance—don’t just pass them to a lender!

🛠 Business Strategy: The Importance of a Pipeline

• Real estate success = Consistent pipeline management.
• Plan for future quarters, not just the next deal.
• Having long-term deals in escrow ensures financial stability.

🎯 Ready to Scale Your Business?

Visit www.HomeBossListingHub.com to:
✔ Take a free business analysis
✔ Schedule a productivity & marketing review
✔ Learn how to build a recession-proof, 7-figure business

🎧 Thanks for tuning in! See you on the next Top Agent Talks Podcast! 🚀

Transcript

Hey, welcome fellow agents, Bob Mangold here with the Top Agent Talks podcast. Now the mission of this podcast is to identify and interview agents that are succeeding in today's market.  And most importantly to share their wisdom with the entire real estate community. So please help us out by sharing these podcasts with every agent that you know.

Now the Top Agent Talks podcast is sponsored by the Home Boss Listing Hub, which is the framework for agents looking to scale their business to seven figures. The proprietary Home Boss Listing Hub is an all inclusive platform that empowers solo agents to sell 35 to 50 homes a year in good markets or bad.

Working 40 hours a week by focusing exclusively on listings. Now, today I'm here with Cesar Rincon out of Houston, the Houston market. Cesar's an award winning icon agent at his company. And probably most importantly in only five years. Caesar sold over 130 homes and I'm going to let him tell the story, but I know he gets to travel quite a bit.

So Caesar, welcome to the show. Thank you, Bob. I appreciate you having me on. No, it's my pleasure. So let's start by talking about the one thing that you've done that's contributed the most to your success, because basically you're averaging almost 30 homes a year as a solo agent, right? You don't have a team. 

So not everybody does that. It all started and it continues to build on social media. When I got licensed just five years ago, I really wanted some planning on being a full time agent. What happened for me was I came across an opportunity with a builder. They that was, promoting a certain new community and so forth.

And I went to check it out. I had some time that day. My goal with real estate was just to do referrals. I know a lot of people my previous career in broadcasting and advertising. I had a big network. I knew a lot of people. I figured I could tap into doing some referrals and, capitalizing on it, right?

I had done some work for an attorney. And they pay out a lot of referral fees, right? But my friends, a personal injury attorney, they pay out referral fees when other attorneys refer them business. And I figured I'm not going to go to law school, but I can get my real estate license and connect realtors with people that I know and get a referral fee.

That was my whole game plan. And I came across this opportunity with new construction. I went, I saw it with my background in media. I actually did a video at the model home. I wasn't prepared for it. I was dressed nice that day. And I did a video. I put it on social media and people started calling and I started a referring those deals out because I had no idea what I was doing.

I could be in front of the camera and I could, edit videos and things like that, but I wasn't planning on showing homes and looking at the whole transaction of being a realtor.  And long story short, just a few months later, I got my first house under contract. A, the person I was referring to the business had too many leads.

Like I was giving her, my sister, too many leads. So she's Hey man, I need some help. I'm like, okay, I'll help you. And I went and I sold a house on the first day and then another one and another one. And before I knew it, I had 17 homes 25 homes in escrow and about. eight, eight to 10 week period, somewhere around there.

And and it's just took off from there, but it was all because of the social media videos. If I can go back and trace like a tree of where my transactions came from, I would easily say, directly. Or indirectly from the referrals, 95 percent of them came from social media. And then I've had a few, sphere of influence transactions here and there.

My neighbor across the street, who's also a realtor with another brokerage, asked me to list his house and, a few transactions here and there, but mostly social media. One of the things we hear a lot, Hey guys, you have to do video, you have to do social media. And agents are so afraid of it.

Gosh, I hate the way I look. I don't know what to say. I don't know what to do it. All you did was you did a tour, a walking tour of a new home, right? Correct. Yes. That's all I did. And that's every new agent that I mentor, I literally say, let's go to a new construction home. We're blessed in Houston, Texas, where we have 40, 000 new home starts every year.

So there's new construction everywhere. Just go to a model home. Most of the model homes will let you film. And just do a video and it's like a showcase. And yeah, showcasing new construction homes. Every market has new construction, whether it's, you don't have to have 40, 000 starts.

If there's five new construction homes in your market and they're a staged nicely, just go out there and do a video and then, share your story, talk about the house. One thing I did, Bob, that was interesting is I never really talked about the house or a specific community or specific, details of the house.

I just talked about how simple the process could be and the payment range or the price range of the houses, right? That was it. That was it. I never talked about hey, this house is, 2, 250 square feet, four bathrooms, three bedrooms. I said, no, let's go check out this house. Wow, look at this high ceilings, things like that.

It's more generic because the more you narrow it down, the more you're, if somebody's interested in a smaller home and you're showing a bigger home, then you're discounting them. Vice versa. If somebody wants a huge home and you're showing a small home, then they write you off. So I just make it as generic as possible.

And then of course always with a call to action, asking people to call me. And then a good point in that folks is he doesn't say this is the community or it's located here or any of that because the truth is then why would they need to call him? Exactly. Yeah. So you don't want to make that mistake to do that.

And you don't even want to name the subdivision or even the builder, just like Caesar said, go in and take a video of the house, talk about the house. And I love that. Do the payment range where it's not even doing that. So do you end each video with Hey, if you want information on this particular home, reach out to me.

Yes, absolutely. I just say, give me a call. One thing I say, and some people say you're crazy for doing that. But it's I say, look, this is my cell phone. Call me this number. I'm the only one who answered. You're not going to get a virtual assistant. You're going to get a random person.

I'm going to answer the phone right and another thing I did a Bob as I was learning the process was I learned the basics of what it takes to get qualified. I have a very simple philosophy. No home, no loan, no home. Okay. I've only had two or three cash buyers. Everybody else is gonna need a loan and that's the biggest fear.

People don't know where to start. So in some of my videos later on after about six, seven months of being, doing these videos, I figured out  the basics, right? Obviously the loan process, you've been a mortgage, a loan officer, you know the business. There's so many details, but the general.

I always say Hey, you need, two years of employment and a credit score about this, and so when people call me, it's funny because people call me and they call me and they say, Hey, Caesar. Yeah, my name is so and I've been at my job for three years and my credit score is 689. 

I'm like, okay, great. Tell me more. And then, literally they're pre qualifying themselves. It's one of the biggest mistakes I think agents make is, I always hear this one, Bob, I just stay in my lane. I have a mortgage for that. Here's what I'll tell you folks. I believe it was the 2023 NAR survey of home buyers and sellers.

And the number was right around 70 percent and it might've been 67, whatever it was very close to seven out of 10 buyers said the number one thing they reach out to an agent for is some direction on the mortgage. Absolutely. So when this is the buyers telling us this, right? So now the agent says I don't really know about that.

I stay in my lane. I'm going to have you talk to my lender. Yeah. And what does that say about you then as the agent? Yeah. And funny story about that is the first few months. So I was getting the lead, I would give it to my sister and say, Hey, call this guy. And then we had some friends who are lenders in the business.

So we're like, Hey, let's talk, connect them with these lenders. And the deals would die because the person is counting on us to take care of them and hold their hand versus Oh, yeah, call, Joe, and then Joe doesn't return the call or they never called Joe or anything. So now we have a very streamlined process.

We're in a 10 minute conversation. We know. Based on that conversation, we go over, their employment history, their general financial situation, if they have some savings, if they have, decent credit or whatever it is, we know, hey, look, you're going to qualify, let's get this deal done now, or, hey, come in, we need to discuss a little further, and let's go over the numbers a little more in detail.

At this point, I don't send anybody to a loan officer unless I know they're going to qualify,  100%. And And I even had one time a lender from a loan officer from a big national mortgage company, they have the local branches now. She said dude, you should be a loan officer. You were right. They were going to qualify for this much.

I'm like, I'm telling you, I serve it in a silver platter now. And one of the things that is, is a, both as a lender and a realtor, I've always preached, is that as a realtor, you should know the basics of understanding that. So can I get them set up? Otherwise, you're wasting your time.

And then I also hear, Oh, I was out and I was showing them five houses and then you find out their credit score is a 505.  That's an issue, right? To me, it just makes sense as a realtor to learn the basics of that stuff. Yes. So that you do that. Now, because you sell so many new homes, the good news on that pretty much you have to show them the home, be with them when they go in to see the home,  review the contract, and it's fairly simple, right?

Yeah, I say, If you're not selling new construction homes, you're working too hard, okay? Because if you have a good conversation with the buyer and you filtered out the areas that they want to be in, the price range, and you've done your homework, obviously this comes with experience, right? But you've done your homework, you shouldn't have to show them more than two or maybe three houses.

And the thing about new construction is they're beautiful, right? They're brand new, they have the new smell and you can't beat that. Sometimes you go show a resale home and that resale home, smells and, oh, I don't know, oh, that's an ugly wall. And the house may be A good house, but the appearance pushes them away and then you find yourself driving around like crazy.

Now, of course, if a buyer needs to be in a certain neighborhood in a certain area, yes, you're going to look at everything that they, within that box. But if there's an opportunity to sell a brand new house, absolutely best value for the clients.  So it's one of the reasons every time I reach out to Caesar, just check him out on Facebook.

He's out of the country, he's on vacation, whatever, yet he's still selling on average, very close to 30 homes a year. One of the ways that you're able to take and do that. Is because they're new construction and once they're, once it's under contract, there's not much for you to do. Yeah. And, and in most cases, like I said, Houston we're blessed.

We have a lot of inventory home. So a lot of homes will close in 30 to 45 days. You know what I've heard from other realtors and how it takes too long, four months, three months. Who cares if you fill your pipeline and you have 10 and escrow, it's like a assembly line, some are. Midway, some are almost completed and you just mix it up.

But it does make, and here's what I believe, bob, I believe the client first, right? It's not about it's easy for me. It's easy for them because it's so stressful to find a house. Find the perfect house. There is no such thing, right? I'm working with some buyers right now.  They want to be in a certain school district.

They have to be there. There's very little new construction or if any new construction in this area. And we've looked at houses in all shapes and sizes.  Obviously, their need is the school district, right? But if they weren't, we would have bought a house two months ago, because I know what they like. We just have to find it within the confines, right?

So value first for the client. And with new construction, obviously there's warranties. Everything is, brand new they can start to customize. In some cases, they can pick their, floors or countertops and things like that. So the customer can buy their finished product  ahead of time.

What they really want, right? Rarely, you've been in the business a long time. Rarely will a client walk into a house and say, this is the perfect house. I'm not going to touch it. No, they're always going to be customizing it. So with a new home, they get a blank canvas to work with. The other thing that Caesar touched on, folks, that I think is important is to understand the concept of pipeline.

in real estate. So I started as a lender first. So lenders talk in terms of pipeline Hey, I've got this person, they're out looking, it might be 90 days, 120 days. What's so offensive to saying, Hey, I've got a new construction that's going to close in July. And no, I got two or three closings in July and it's January, right?

Once we understand the concept of pipeline saying, how do I fill my pipeline? Cause the reality is folks, whatever Caesar's working on today.  He's probably not getting paid on for 60 to 90 days anyway, right? So if we understand the concept of fill your pipeline and the farther out I could fill it the happier I am I sleep better at night knowing my cash flow is consistent when we understand the concept of pipeline.

Absolutely. I have extensive corporate career and all we looked at was projections, right? Projections, first quarter, second quarter, third quarter projections, and as individual agents, and I need to do this more as individual agents, we're just looking at the next deal. And we need to be focusing more on Hey, what's going to happen in second quarter, third quarter, fourth quarter, Houston has the world cup coming next year.

We need to start promoting that and making sure that, people know. So definitely you want to have the further out the better because, and I'm guilty of as anybody else, sometimes our pipeline dries up. And then you can't sleep at night, right?  And it's just a big ebb and flow. And so the further out you can project the better off you are, right?

So that's why i'm such a big  Function or a focus heavily on creating production and marketing plans  To do that so that we start thinking in terms of quarters Meaning, hey, what happens? Okay, cool. I've got X number of closings for the first quarter. What about the second? What about the third?

What about the fourth? And if we start to think that way, it also changes our approach to clients, if you will, in how we approach them, right? Because everybody wants the deal now because, oh, I have to make my mortgage payment or whatever. That's not what's good for the client, and that's not good for us.

Cesar, thanks so much. It's amazing how quickly 15 minutes goes by, isn't it? I appreciate you being here. Please keep knocking it out. And folks, before we leave, if you need help scaling your business, go to our website, www. homebosslistinghub. com, take the free business analysis, and then go ahead and schedule a productivity and marketing review to learn what you need to implement.

in order to build that recession proof seven figure business.  It's free. There's no cost for doing that, but it helps change the way that you think about your business. So thanks again for listening and we'll see you on the next Top Agent Talks podcast. Cesar, thanks again for being here. Have an amazing day folks. 

Thanks. Bye bye.