Ben Ryken: Trusting Process – The Journey of a Top Auckland REA

Breaking Into Real Estate at 18

Ben: I had braces when I started. Would you let an 18-year-old with braces sell your house? I wouldn't.

Daniel: Folks, welcome to another episode of the Blueprint Podcast. We're lucky to be here, Rory and myself, with one of the top agents in Auckland, in my opinion--and facts prove it--Ben Ryken. Thanks for coming on, man. Ben's been in the business for just over eight years now, I believe, and he's worked his way up. He's been at the same firm for six. Very consistent, very stable performer, and a real lighthouse of knowledge for locals who are looking for real estate advice and sales solutions. So mate, thanks so much for coming on.

Ben: Thanks for having me. I'm really excited. We look forward to tapping into some of that knowledge as well.

Daniel: I guess before we deep dive and probe you--you're a real estate agent. It's a bit of a crazy industry. I think if you ask most real estate agents how they got into real estate, the classic answer is they fell into it. I don't think anyone grows up and wants to be a real estate agent. It's not like a career choice or something you go into your careers advisor and say, "Should I do this?"

Ben: Essentially, I was working at a warehouse, picking and packing and doing odd jobs. I went in for a salary negotiation and got bugger all, and I just thought, hey, I've just worked my arse off for a year. I thought, hey, I've been coming in early, I've been staying late, I've been working really hard, and I didn't really see the reward of it. And I literally--it sounds quite cliche--I literally googled, "What's a job in New Zealand where you can work really hard and get the reward for it, based on how hard you worked?" Real estate popped up top of the list. I had a lady that sold my mum's house out in Botany, got in touch with her, had a chat, and ended up joining her company and resigning from the job I had about three weeks after I did that Google search. It was quite impulsive, which I wouldn't advise to any 18-year-old. That's how old I was at the time. I wouldn't advise just jumping straight into it. So we've been doing a lot of sales for a while in real estate, but here I am almost 10 years later.

Daniel: You started at 18 years old?

Ben: Yeah.

Rory: Did you find there was resistance, being a young buck?

Ben: Oh yeah, absolutely. That's why I say, I advise any 18-year-olds who are keen on the industry to get in. When I started 10 years ago, there weren't a lot of young people in the industry. It was a lot of older people who, it was a second career for them. They were flight attendants, nurses, or came from corporate jobs--people that were in an industry where it was service-focused and they could transfer those skills over to real estate. And then, like I say, work pretty hard and reap the rewards. I didn't really have anyone to talk to about that. I just jumped in and went for it. Looking back, if I was to do anything differently, I'd try and do an apprenticeship and be an associate or personal assistant to a successful real estate agent first, to learn the ropes before you jump headfirst into commission-only sales and a sink-or-swim mentality.

Daniel: Yeah, I love that. I did it, but I would not recommend--do as I say, not as I do. We all have our own unique journey and you happened to take the harder road and benefited from that. Looking back, you would recommend someone else...

Ben: Yeah. I guess it was better to do that and learn what not to do at such a young age and not really have too much to risk. I was married, lots of bills to pay, but no kids, and we could give it a crack. I think it was worthwhile doing it the hard way.

Rory: Yeah, I think it resonates a lot with not just salespeople and real estate, but our business, just our clients as well and investments. Taking a journey, you're never going to get it 100% right. And there's not one playbook to actually nail that process. You have to figure it out, and it's a lot of trial and error. So you have to hit that on the head.

Building a Patch in Remuera

Daniel: A bit more about your career. So you've obviously honed in on your area, your patch. You've got Remmers, you've got a bit of St Heliers and Meadowbank, and maybe some more fringe suburbs there.

Ben: Yeah.

Daniel: But what made you commit to that area? You are an East Auckland banger like myself. I grew up in Botany.

Ben: To be honest, I think I had maybe gone into Remuera maybe three times in my life before going there for a job. You make it just seem so cool, picking up and going to real estate. But honestly, getting into real estate was quite an impulsive decision. I was at Bayleys in Howick, which had just been Professionals and Bayleys had bought them. I went to a business over breakfast, or one of those sort of networking groups where you have one person from each industry, share stories and speak. Someone said to me, "Do you know this guy? He started when he was young and he had a boutique agency in Remuera." And I said, "No, I don't." And I'll go talk to him, and again, I'm quite impulsive. Went and got a job there within four or five weeks and just started working in Remuera.

It took a little while to really focus on Remuera and the surrounding suburbs. When you're young and need to sell houses, I sold a house in Beachlands, I sold a house in Albany, I'd take what I could get. And it's taken a little while, and in the last few years I've really focused on a geographical area, knowing that as a business owner of selling homes, it's much more effective to have in-depth market knowledge about a specific area than trying to cover so many areas.

Rory: Sure. That makes sense. A hundred percent. And then your vendors and your buyers reap the benefits. You know the area, you know the property. And real estate is a people game, so it's not too much about the houses. It's about how you can convey that information to someone and give them confidence about the schools, the area. How close you are to the mall, is it safe for your kids, that sort of thing.

Daniel: How close is the Wendy's?

Rory: Yeah. Where's the nearest KFC?

Ben: Yeah. Very close now. So it's about being able to convey that with confidence. And I know that if I went and sold a house out in Henderson and someone asked me, "How's the local school?" I'd have no idea. So I wouldn't refer that business on. It wouldn't be fair to those sellers to try and represent their home and not do my very best.

Rory: How hard is it to develop a patch? To hone in on an area and build a career in a suburb? With rivals, like you mentioned the Professionals, Bayleys. Do you have turf wars in this?

Ben: Oh, it's a very competitive industry and certainly in Remuera, I'd say it's probably over 200 active agents selling in Remuera, but it's a large suburb as well. A lot of door knocking, cold calling, a lot of prospecting work, but most importantly building trust with people. And then, it's not--I've never knocked on a door--that's probably a lie. In the last six or seven years, I've never knocked on a door and asked someone, "Will you sell your home?" or "Do you want to sell your house?" I probably started with that mentality of just trying to find someone who wants to sell their house. But what I quickly realised trying to build a farming area was I need to provide value. I need to build a little community and I want people to see me as a trusted advisor, to come to me for information. So it was more about, "Hey, I'm Ben from Ray White Remuera. This is the information I provide to your neighbours and some other clients, can I give this to you as well?" And relationships like that have started from door knocking, been listings in the last few years, and it's just grown from there.

Magic. Lots of door knocking, June, July, in the rain. Most effective time to door knock is in the rain, people feel sorry for you. But essentially just a lot of hard work and there's no successful real estate agent--and there's a heck of a lot more agents more successful than me--that would tell you it's easy. It's just a lot of hard work. And time is your best friend. Obviously you've had to grind and do that prospecting work, create a community, and that takes time. Then you build a reputation and you become a trusted advisor that you are today.

Rory: But did you ever struggle in those early years? Is this for me? This is too hard.

Ben: Oh yeah. Probably when I look back, I had braces when I started. Would you let an 18-year-old with braces sell your house? I wouldn't. I hope none of my clients from there are listening.

Rory: But did you get a deal with braces?

Ben: Yeah, I was on deals with braces. Anything is possible. I don't want to hear any excuses from the sales team. I always had reservations about my age and experience. It takes a couple of years to build confidence from that. A lot of my friends didn't have houses to sell. And so you don't really get the easy road in, whereas when people join the industry, they're in their late thirties, forties, fifties, already got a network from a career, already got friends that will give them a shot. I didn't really have anyone to give me a shot. I had to go out and find people to take a chance on me and I'm really grateful for the people that did. Many people that I've sold for multiple times from 2015, 2016, those years.

Daniel: That's amazing. We call that your platform business--your close clients and friends and family who trust you, know you can do a really good job. And for us now that we're developed and old gentlemen with a bit of backing, we get that consistently and that pays the bills and then we can push harder to actually thrive and help more people.

Rory: Yeah. So fast forward, you dropped the braces, you kept knocking, you didn't quit, you never gave up. Long story short, you're consistently in the top five of your office and your office is the number one office in New Zealand.

Ben: We're the number one Ray White office in New Zealand for the last 10 years. I've been super lucky in the last few quarters, a couple of years, to--when people ask me, like sellers, I say I'm in the top of the pack, because it changes from quarter to quarter, month to month. Essentially we sell a few more houses and do a better job than our peers. And it's a really competitive industry, even within our own office. We've got 65-ish agents, maybe a little bit more now, close to 70 agents. It's quite cool to be in that position, but it's taken a lot of hard work and years to get there.

Daniel: And just to take a quick tangent, I think touching on that, your office, I've been lucky enough to know quite a few of your colleagues and they're really good professionals. How much of your success is just surrounding yourself with professionals?

Ben: I got to credit that because you sponge off the people you're around. Depending on which office you sit in or who you talk to at the water cooler or in the kitchen, heating up your lunch, you can either get really good energy and feel good about your day, or you can get bad energy and be a bit mopey. If someone loses the deal and they're sad about it, that energy can pass on to you and then all of a sudden you are mopey for the rest of the day too. So I've been guilty of that before. I have to put my hand up. A good friend of mine in Ray White, but not in our office, always says to me, "It's just another cheeseburger." And what that means is, for us, we're dealing with people's biggest assets. It's a huge thing for ourselves. And we take that really seriously. Every time someone decides to sell their home with me, I'm so grateful because they could choose hundreds of other people to do it, but they've chosen me. But when we say it's just another cheeseburger, we're just doing our job. And I don't need to take the highs and the lows so seriously that it needs to impact my day or week or month or year. The "just another cheeseburger" thing is like anyone working at a McDonald's--they're wrapping up a cheeseburger and they're passing it down the line and then they do their job again.

Yeah. Sometimes real estate agents, because of the accolades we collect and how we have to self-promote to get business--we have to put our faces on billboards and business cards and put ourselves out there. You don't get business sitting in the shadows. Sometimes we take ourselves a little too seriously and if something happens, a deal falls over, we don't get a listing, it can affect our whole day. Just another cheeseburger.

Trust the Process

Daniel: It's quite a phrase. And you've got another one actually.

Ben: Trust the process.

Daniel: Yes, trust the process.

Rory: We love it. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? What does it mean to you personally and what does it mean in your business and to a client?

Ben: So "trust the process" came about many years ago and there's a sort of funny story about how it came about and it wasn't really to do with real estate. But once I brought it into my professional life, what it really meant is, as the market changed, and it wasn't this boom market we were used to--and even in 2015, 2016 when I started, that was a really good market, and then it went, it was a bit challenging for 2017, 18, 19--it was that, I'm not going to change my process based on the market, I'm not going to waver from what I know to do to get a good result for my sellers, so I would always invite my sellers to trust the process. And it was a bit of a funny thing for a little while, a bit of a gimmicky sort of thing. And then I started to have people call me and say, "Hey, Ben, are you ready to trust the process?" And at first I thought it was just people who had seen it on social media or whatever, but I had elderly people who just had seen it on my pamphlets and brochures and dailies we put into the letterbox. They would call me and say that as well. And I thought, okay, it's not just a tagline that fits with just my demographic of who I am, but it can make sense to everyone if they actually understand it.

Daniel: It's religious. Honestly, it makes you feel religious. Trust the process.

Rory: It's super powerful. It's gold. They talk about it a lot. You hear the All Blacks talking about it a lot. About our game plans. We've got to just trust our processes. You're talking about sort of tough markets and stuff, like success isn't a straight line and it's not linear. And sometimes the work we do doesn't pay off on the day. It might pay off tomorrow. It might pay off in a year's time.

Ben: I was just giggling before, because I remember that I've actually got a COVID mask from 2021 that says "trust the process" on it.

Daniel: Oh really?

Ben: Yeah, I mean like ultimate marketing, that is good. I'm walking around in New World, trust the process. If only we'd been wearing masks for a little bit longer. So I might have ordered a few too many of those. And then the mask thing was thrown out the window and yeah. The guy who's letting him to COVID test me, he's like, "Oh, maybe it's time to trust the process."

Daniel: Insane marketing.

Rory: Yeah. That's gold. We're going to need to get a catchphrase for Blueprint though.

Ben: Yeah, for sure.

Daniel: The most rewarding thing is like when we started our brand, Blueprint Finance, and you get clients saying back to me, "Hey, I'm super excited to work with Blueprint." And that means not just myself or one of the mortgage advisors, but get my insurance sorted, and yeah, the whole package. So it's like, "I want to get blueprinted." It's a great name. Like I love that. I love the name Blueprint.

Ben: Do you actually?

Daniel: Yeah, it's because of the Jay-Z album Blueprint.

Ben: That's what I was thinking, because that's what it is, yes, it's mapping out what you're doing with all your financials and "trust the process" the same. I don't even want my clients to feel like there isn't a plan. And there might be times that, hey, I'm not sure about the next step, but let's discover it together and trust the process. For my sellers to trust me to get them a good result, it was also for me to know that if I do the work, then I'll get the results as well in terms of winning business and getting good results and hopefully selling more houses.

Daniel: I think it's also just the idea that there's a process, which I bet a lot of salespeople don't actually even address. A lot of people are a bit ad hoc and won't have the same way to do every single thing.

Ben: Exactly. Which is concerning.

Daniel: Yeah. No, look, that's great.

Negotiation, Partnership, and Looking Ahead

Rory: Ben, I've known you for a long time. I've seen you with your clients. Can we touch on how we met? This is actually a really good story.

Ben: It might be a weird story for some. You tell it.

Rory: Ben and I go way back, but firstly, I knew his wife before I knew him. Knew of each other and there's this running app called Strava.

Daniel: No Olympic athlete doesn't know Strava.

Rory: Strava. This is going to sound like you're never going to live this down. It's making a resurgence because run clubs are the new places to find dates.

Ben: Yeah.

Rory: So it's making a resurgence, but we've been on it forever.

Ben: Yeah. We started, so back in 2015 we were both on Strava because I was right into my running and so was Ben. Ben's always been into his running. And we follow each other on Strava. I was actually following his dad first, because his dad was prolific on Strava. He was in his late fifties and running like 50, 60k.

Daniel: Yeah. Quite cocky.

Rory: And then I said, "Oh, let's get Ben on the Strava." Hadn't met him before. It was like when you follow someone on Instagram. They follow you back and that's like the start of a thing.

Ben: That's cool.

Rory: I'm assuming, I don't know, I've been married for 10 years.

Ben: We send each other kudos. It's like liking each other's activity. If I post a 10k run, he can send me a kudos, he was flicking me some kudos and I was like, back. We're just hitting each other. And then one day he just hit me up and said, "Let's go for a run." And we started running, but we didn't know what each other did. He said, "I'm a real estate agent." That was the first time we met in person and we hit it off straight away. Because we were the only guys that we knew doing what we did. And probably the only few at that time, maybe even now, that really enjoy their jobs. So we really bonded over that. And now the rest is history.

Rory: Yeah, absolutely. It's a funny story because it's like, such a weird thing to be like, "Hey, should we go for a run? I've never met you." And where did we go? Like the Sommerville running track or something.

Ben: Yeah. I'm pretty sure. And it was like, "Hey, I'm Dan. Hey, I'm Ben. Nice to meet you. Let's go for a run."

Daniel: It sounds like you guys get a bit of common Strava, pretty young in your careers, it was just pretty impressive. And then some differences as well, like Ben, I know you're a bit of a wine connoisseur, and there was a point in time where Dan bought you one of his favourite drops, and you reviewed it on your app.

Ben: I did, unfortunately.

Daniel: What'd you say, mate?

Ben: Oh, I can't remember what the words were. There's definitely photographic evidence of our reaction. I was running an Instagram page at the time, Ben's Wine Reviews, and it just came from a love of red wine. Dan was kind enough to drive out quite a distance, and dropped me off a nice bottle of Fickle Mistress.

Daniel: It was my favourite.

Ben: And for our weekend away. And I was like, cool, I'll do a wine review on this. I couldn't tell you it was not good.

Daniel: Did it get a five?

Ben: No, it was out of 10. I can tell you it was on the low three range. It was just brutal, like you treating your friend like that.

Daniel: But that's what I'm...

Rory: Yeah. And that's the thing that's important. If you're doing something that's just not up to par, Ben's the first guy to tell you, which is great. You need a mate like that.

Daniel: But back to where I was like, boys, we lost a lot of listeners just now. Let's get back on track.

So what I was actually trying to say is you're a master negotiator. I've seen you helping your clients get wins on the auction floor. I've also seen you negotiate with your wife for a night out. Yes, you're a master negotiator. These things happen over time, nine years in the business. How do you find your skills as being a negotiator improving and what are the important things when you're trying to negotiate for your vendors?

Ben: I think when you first start out in sales, you think you just need to try and convince someone to do something. The more you're in it, you realise you just need to figure out what their needs are. So I've learned to ask more questions and do more listening. Try and figure out exactly what that person needs. Like what's the end goal for them? And yeah, there's been deals that have been really lucky to have happened and there's been deals that I know how, if I hadn't pushed and prodded and done my thing, that wouldn't have come together. They made a massive difference to the buyer and the seller's lives.

Daniel: Of course.

Ben: So it's really cool to be that middle person. And I think that's why our role as a real estate agent will never become obsolete, because you do need that person to massage both parties into a deal where they're not feeling it. And I know that if I'd put two people in a room together, it would not be done. You need to address these things. What does this person want? What does that person want? Because it's all based on self-interest. Just learning by experience--I don't think you can learn any better way than doing the deals or being part of the deals. The odd time I would be listening to a colleague in the office on the phone to a buyer or seller and watch them get a deal across the line. But I just love it. I love the thrill of the chase and getting a deal done. I walked in here, I was telling you guys about a deal that I'm doing at the moment after an auction pass-in today. I can't wait to close that tonight and hopefully get the buyer across the line, get the seller a sale and move on. Better work to be done.

Daniel: Yeah, I think that passion, that drive, the number one thing that clients can see and that's why you get so much repeat business and referrals--they can sense that need for success and winning a good outcome for all parties. We've got a lot of mutual friends and everyone who's done business with you has got such good things to say about you. It's all about that passion, right?

Ben: What's important is when I can prove to a seller that I've done everything possible to get them the best price or results. And it's not about price for a seller--sometimes it's about certainty, sometimes it's about the terms of a deal. For a buyer, they know we're working for a seller and trying to get the best result for the seller, but making them feel comfortable and stress-free in that process as well. And that's why when you get really good reviews or really good feedback from the buyers, it's just as important as that feedback from a seller. And they'll become a seller one day as well.

Rory: Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. It's a two-way transaction, eh? And like you touched on earlier, it's all about people, eh? I have concerns sometimes about some of our sectors--financial services, robo advice and that--but AI is not coming for your job, eh? I can't see it happening and there's lots of players trying to create something where you do it yourself, but the fact of the matter is that we do something that can be difficult at times. We talk about money a lot with people and lots of people don't like to discuss money. We break things down into bite-sized chunks where people can understand it better. We help put perspective into people's minds. When someone's--just an example--if there's a five grand gap on a deal and a seller goes, "Oh, look, I won't sell it. I'll just do it again next time." But five grand was their marketing budget. And they'll have to pay that again in three months' time to get it on the market again. Those two numbers cancel each other out. That's just a very small example. There's a lot of examples like that with a lot bigger numbers. But putting that perspective into a buyer or a seller's mind about those things to allow them to come to their own conclusion of why they would do that deal then and there is really important.

Daniel: Been some great news a couple months ago. Yeah, the better half just joined the team so obviously we're all pretty wrapped about that. How is that dynamic? Improving obviously the client experience and also the sales process.

Ben: It's improving it massively and it's very interesting because I spoke to a few people about doing it before I invited her to join the team. Yeah, and we made it official. And it was 50/50, some people said, "Oh no, don't work with your partner," and then a lot of people said, "Oh no, you'll really enjoy it." And it's funny because there are a lot of husband and wife teams in real estate. I don't think Mickey ever planned to do it, but it just made a lot of sense. I needed some operation support and that other person to bounce off. And I needed a female as well because sometimes you're in a dynamic where you're dealing with a husband and wife and you're a guy, a young guy dealing with people in their 50s, 60s, 70s who need a sort of female, softer person to be there with. And so it's not to manipulate the situation or anything. I always give the example of sometimes when you know a buyer hasn't got a house that she's wanted to buy at auction and she's a little elderly lady. I can't really wrap my arm around her and console her--it's just inappropriate for me--but Mickey can.

Rory: Yeah. It's so good.

Ben: So those sorts of situations, it really helps. She's so detail-orientated and she brings all of her skills from her PR and events background into the job. And we're marketers before we negotiate. It's like before I can sell a house, I've got to promote it. And she's got that skill already. It has unfortunately turned our evenings into brainstorming sessions sometimes--"Have you done this or have you done that?"--but hey, real estate's an all-consuming thing and there's no such thing as part-time real estate.

Daniel: I think you touched on a great point. The fact that she complements you in a way is that you just have that deficit, right? Certain client types. And also, yes, you do talk about it after hours, it's a passion you share together now, which is just one more thing to get closer about.

Ben: Yeah, absolutely. And our clients see us enjoy working together as well, and I think that resonates with them. And then they enjoy working with us too.

Daniel: Do the kids like that mum and dad are working together?

Ben: Yeah, I don't know if they really understand it. But they think it's cool. They love coming to the office. They're obsessed with the printer. "Did we use the printer today?" "Yes we did." "How much printing did we do?" "Quite a lot of printing." I guess what I'm concerned about is that my daughters might feel like their only option is to go into real estate and I certainly wouldn't want that for them. But hey, if they think their mum and dad do cool jobs and they want to be part of it, then they might be the first people ever to grow up wanting to be a real estate agent.

Rory: Yeah. The ones that didn't fall into it. You might be interviewing them on a podcast at 18.

Ben: Look at these old guys now.

Daniel: Yeah. Oh, that's cool.

Rory: Hey, while we're on a personal note, let's just talk about something personal again. We want to do it actually--heavy taste of wine and we were going to blindfold out and really test your knowledge. It's going to be the next podcast, eh?

Ben: Yeah, you know we had to keep that one for a rainy day because we know that you aren't drinking. Dan says that you're doing 75 Hard, which is, I know a little bit about, it's a hell of a challenge mate. But what's the issue? Provoked you to do that.

Daniel: Funnily enough, I said to you the other day, Dan, that when you're doing the 75 Hard, Rory just comes up in conversation and that's all you can really talk about. Unfortunately, here we are again. Sorry listeners. What drove me to do it? When you have kids, you take a little bit of attention off yourself and your own health and you start getting busy with the kids. My wife and I were both feeling out of routine, exercising and eating okay, but we really needed some sort of big change to get back. Like we used to run all the time. We used to go to the gym a lot. We used to be really healthy as far as our standards go. After COVID and all that sort of stuff, we just felt a bit... just life, eh?

Rory: Yeah, just life.

Ben: A mutual friend of Dan Rice did it and he had a great time. I think it's changed his life and he'll listen to this and probably agree with it. And I saw his results and how it's changed his mentality about exercise and fitness and health and that really inspired me. Because, and again, he'll be listening to this, I used to try and drag his arse out of the house for a run. And he would never want to. And yeah, he's motivated me to do it and been a good support person as well as Dan and some other mates. And yeah, unfortunately can't enjoy a nice red wine at the moment. It's a bit of a silly time of the year to do it, going into a silly season, but so far so good. Day 23 today, I think.

Daniel: Day 23, I was going to ask. That's awesome, eh? And it is such a challenge. And I don't think you can go through that and come out the other side not better from it. But 23 days in, we won't go into every detail of 75 Hard. You can Google it. But what's the hardest part?

Ben: Oh, the drinking the water.

Daniel: Oh yeah, it's a gallon of water a day?

Ben: Yeah, like over 3 litres a day. And the way that Mickey describes it, she said, "Now you know what it's like to be 9 months pregnant." Because they say, yeah, I need to pee every three minutes. And that's why this podcast stopped. It's just been good. I've been getting back to the gym, going for walks, reducing TV time. A bit of leisure time there, but just feeling good in the routine. 75 days is a long time, especially when you're doing things day by day. It's going through all the other areas of my life in a positive way.

Rory: Yeah, for sure.

Daniel: And speaking about positivity and mindset, the recent changes--moving to spring out of a pretty tough winter for New Zealand business, marking a significant milestone in the recession. I wouldn't say we're anywhere near the end of the recession, I'd say we're still deep in it. Very sharp OCR cut. So finally a bit of positivity injected back into the market. Just reflecting on what was a challenging couple of years. What do you see for the years ahead for yourself and Auckland real estate in general?

Ben: The last couple of years have been challenging because we've had to sell houses for prices that people sometimes weren't too happy with because of the market. And people had lower borrowing capacity, so they couldn't buy the house they thought they could buy. It has been challenging. There's still a silver lining and for a lot of people it will allow them to move on to the next step of their lives if they were selling, or if they were buying, they borrowed a little bit less, and they're probably grateful they didn't put themselves into a position that was a bit more stressful with the higher interest rates.

Daniel: That's right.

Ben: With the OCR cutting by 50 basis points, it gives a lot of confidence to the market, and also going into spring, which is a busy selling season. Had the timing been different and we were going into winter with this, it would feel a little bit different because there'd be lower levels of stock. But what we can see already is that buyers are understanding that, well, it's a great time to buy right now because interest rates are going to start falling. They already are, but they will start falling. But the prices aren't inflated prices like we saw in the COVID market. They're not adjusted yet. There's a saying that most real estate agents use, which is "marry the house, date the rates." And if you can buy a house at today's price and enjoy the lower rates of tomorrow, then that's great as well. It's a great outcome.

Rory: Well said.

Daniel: We wrap up this segment with what's called the fast five. We've got five questions that we ask, or I guess it's something a bit changed per guest. But we've got some for you. The whole idea is quick fire. We'll put you in the hot seat. You got to give us the truth and it's going to reflect a bit about who you are as a bloke.

Rory: Ben, who's your most influential music artist?

Ben: Oh, this is a guy. This is a big music guy. We've been to a lot of gigs together, guy. And this is, he's driving the appraisal. He is pumping himself up, whatever the music. You can't ask such deep questions. My most influential artist... Off the top of my head, it'd be like Chance the Rapper or Kanye because I do love rap. But if I think about what I really love, it's music like Prince, Michael Jackson, like all that old school stuff as well. That just gets in a good sort of vibe and it's timeless music.

Daniel: As long as we haven't cancelled Michael Jackson yet.

Ben: No, he's definitely, yeah, it's still up for review, isn't it?

Rory: Michael's a great answer, because he influenced all your favourite rappers, and your hip hop artists, right? Think about how many samples Kanye West used from Michael Jackson's songs.

Ben: Yeah, PYT. That's an incredible sample.

Daniel: Exactly. Next one.

Rory: Oh, yeah, next one. Alright. Cricket. Cricket. Who is the GOAT? Come on mate. Didn't we spend four hours watching a test match?

Ben: You're not a cricket player.

Rory: I'm not a cricket player or a cricket fan.

Ben: We're going to make it rugby league, I watched a bit of rugby league. I was obsessed with Benji Marshall. As a teenager, I had pictures of him on my wall. I was a chameleon West Tigers fan--if it wasn't the Warriors playing, I'd be a West Tigers fan.

Daniel: Man, I was gonna ask him Carlos Spencer or Benji Marshall. I thought we were gonna ask him Carlos Spencer or Beauden Barrett. That's a way cooler question.

Ben: We have watched some test matches together. I just want to spend time with you mate. Next time you come we'll do some research.

Rory: Now, I did say rugby league, but obviously some of our listeners, this isn't applicable. We always ask this, because of our industry, this is really good for you. Real estate, are you about long term holds or short term flipping transactions?

Ben: I subscribe to the Warren Buffett ideology, which is, it's not timing the market, it's time in the market. So I guess a long term hold. And a lot of more successful and wiser people I've met have always had that ideology as well. I look to them and what they're doing. I guess if there's a right time to sell a house, it's a right time to sell a house too.

Daniel: If it's opportunity into another investment, right?

Ben: Yeah, definitely. I know this is meant to be quick fire, but I was listening to the Psychology of Money this morning and they're talking about Warren Buffett and if he had stopped investing at 60 and wrapped it up thinking, "I've done enough," he would have been a multi-millionaire, but well under 100 million. It was in those later years that he went to be the multi-billionaire that he was. And not through being necessarily the greatest investor either. They talk about his year over year returns are like 22 percent. But he started at the age of 10. It's time in the market. They reference another guy who's getting, 68 percent year over year returns. Who's still very wealthy, but nowhere near Warren, because of time in the market. It's 100 percent time in the market. The exponential curve--those later, the more you can get, the more you can boom over. And that's why we've got an advantage as young guys, listening to the information and really being clued up on it, and not only discovering that in our later years. A lot of people, I think, only start to think about those sorts of ideologies into their forties or fifties. And by then, you've got plenty of decades ahead, but it doesn't have the same impact as being in your twenties or thirties.

Daniel: I think it also flicks onto our careers as well. In the industries that we're in, it's also time in the market to build trust and gain a large client base and be more influential in a positive way to your clients. When I have an outlook of our future in the industry, that's really what I'm aiming to be--20 year plus, well recognised in the industry. That's what we want for Blueprint. That's what we want for your business.

Ben: I say to my wife, Mickey, that I'll be probably the only person in Remuera real estate that's done a decade of real estate still in their twenties. Yes, it's a lot of experience, but you still get the youthful enthusiasm and energy and willingness to do anything to get a deal done for our seller. That's quite cool.

Daniel: That's amazing. You're gonna be 10 years in the game before the next guy's even started his career.

Rory: Yeah. Cool, man. I don't think you're gonna struggle with this one to be honest. I think I know the answer--Indian or Chinese?

Ben: Oh, Indian. Yeah. Caucasian. Yeah. Very mild. Kiwi mild.

Daniel: This last one is actually Rory's sort of trademark question. So we just like to ask clients, if you could go back 10 years and give your 10-year-younger self a piece of advice, what would it be?

Ben: Oh, that's a tough one. Probably like I said at the top end of this podcast, to maybe go and work for someone else and learn the ropes with some money coming in. I went straight into commission-only sales, which was a really tough gig at 18, 19 with no track record or experience. But in saying that, I think I would also tell myself to enjoy my early 20s a bit more than my late teens. Like I was just so focused on work and I guess it's got me to where I am today and I still feel like I'm in chapter two or three of a hundred-chapter book, to just enjoy it and not miss out on a few things. So we've gone to a few gigs, but we probably could have gone to a few more gigs together.

Daniel: That's true. Trust the program.

Ben: Yeah. Jacob used the wrong break. He thought I'd steer you away from some of it. Someone in a video switch up. People now who do go and do a three or four year, like being an associate, getting a small cut of a sale and building that network, building trust with people and then going out on their own. If I was to go back and tell myself, I'd say, go do that because you go in so many different ways.

Rory: It's an apprenticeship.

Ben: Yeah. Like I only feel like I started doing five years into it, which is normal for me. But at the same time, I could have just gone onto a successful team, and done the same work, but had results immediately, and had financial security immediately. It's a lot of insecurity in the first five years.

Daniel: Yeah, sure. And that's the real pain, isn't it?

Ben: Yeah. The real pain is that, and that's what makes people give up because they go, "I've been doing this for a year, made no money. It's not gonna happen." I just couldn't do anything else. I dropped out of school apart from doing the mortgage programme, I'm like, I literally don't know anything else. There wasn't really an option to give up. But that's probably a big reason for your success. It's like, when we jumped into Blueprint, to some regard, you burned the ships. And that's what you did.

Daniel: Yeah. There was no plan B.

Rory: No, there's still no plan B.

Ben: And there's no success. Plan B is joining Blueprint, but yeah.

Daniel: That's really it. Mate, you can make a gun broker for sure. But yeah, it's burning the ships in your career, your relationship, your marriage and your investing life. I'm going to invest in my KiwiSaver or the S&P 500 or NZX or this property and you stick to it. Even doing a small amount, say just dipping your toes in, but consistency. If I could go back and speak to myself from when I was 18, had braces and decided to join real estate, I would say, mate, go and join a team, slow down. Impulsiveness and acting fast got my wife really young, and there's no way I can land her nowadays.

Rory: You bought the dip.

Ben: They've always seemed to work out, those decisions. And Mickey's like that too, we both know we're impulsive decision makers, but we make it work and live with the bad ones we make as well as the good ones.

Daniel: You're action takers.

Ben: We're action takers and we don't mind if we take a wrong action because we know that we'll have the confidence to take the right action again. It's like buying 500 masks with, let's say, "trust the process," and then three months later, no one's wearing masks.

Rory: One of the questions I'd like to ask Ben is just to cast your mind back to Ben 10 years ago. And what advice would you give?

Ben: Absolutely. Yeah, a very different Ben as well, ten years ago. I think that the main thing I would do is tell young Ben from ten years ago is dress a little bit better. Get suits that fit me. You're on a budget. And probably, join a team or get a mentor of some sort and maybe not jump into that sort of commission-only sales role that I did. For sure it's taught me a lot, but I know that I would maybe have learned a little bit differently had I done that. I definitely have no regrets as to what I have done. However, I think that it might have been a bit more financial security, might have learned a different way or a bit quicker if I had joined a team. Yes, so maybe find a mentor or a team that I could have joined earlier on than just going out on my own and trying to sink or swim.

Daniel: It makes sense actually now we talk about that again because you googled, you know, "If I work really hard, will this career be successful?" So you were finding your path. You didn't have Brenda say, wasn't in your family, or you didn't have an uncle that was an agent that said, "Hey Ben, get into the industry. It'd be great." You carved your own path and jumped straight into the fire.

Ben: If there was a different answer on Google, I would've just done that too. That's my personality. But real estate was one of the top answers and that's why I chose to give it a try.

Rory: You could have been selling scrap metal, infinite money glitch.

Daniel: Now, Ben, the most exciting thing to me is towards the end of your last five years, I know you've got some really good mentors to help you. And just seeing your growth during that period was next level. What I'm really excited about is in five years' time or 10 years' time, when the young buck comes in and comes under your wing, and just what they'll learn. Because I've had the privilege of training a junior advisor here at Blueprint. It's one of the most rewarding things I've done in my career. And I'm excited to see your growth through that.

Rory: Ben's associate would be like 40 years old.

Daniel: Nah, but seriously, Ben. Thanks for coming on mate. It's been an absolute pleasure. I've been learning about you on the fly. You're an interesting guy and lots of wisdom.

Ben: I appreciate it. Happy to hang out with you guys at Blueprint headquarters.

Daniel: Thanks so much, man. You're very much a friend at Blueprint. Thanks for all your support. And like Rory said, you're just a true inspiration. You see the vision, you go for it. And we're just lucky to be sharing the industry with you.

Rory: Trust the process.