Christophe Choo LIVE Interview with Katie Day and Steve Kim on REal Advice – Luxury Real Estate

Live interview in Las Vegas on the REal Advice Podcast hosted by Katie Day and Steve Kim.

Follow Katie Day on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/movemetotx/

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Call or email me today! Christophe Choo 310-777-6342
The Christophe Choo Real Estate Group
Coldwell Banker Global Luxury
Beverly Hills Realtor | Luxury Real Estate Agent
Email: [email protected]

Christophe Choo is in the top 1% of brokers internationally selling real estate since 1989 as the President of the Christophe Choo Real Estate Group at Coldwell Banker Global Luxury Real Estate in Beverly Hills. The #1 producing office in the United States for 24 years and the most comprehensive source for luxury real estate listings, from estate homes to luxury condominiums, incredible tear-down opportunities, and investment properties. Christophe was voted as the #1 Real Estate Video Influencer for North America in 2018.

Based in Beverly Hills, California, The Christophe Choo Real Estate Group provides exclusive luxury homes for sale on a local, global and international stage. Hence the tagline: “Locally Known – Globally Connected”.

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Christophe Choo Luxury Real Estate Series - Beverly Hills & Los Angeles CA http://www.ChristopheChoo.com

 

Transcripts:

Hello, my friends,

welcome to another edition

of the Real Advice podcast.

I am so excited.

Really, really excited for today's guest

who needs no introduction whatsoever,

but I'm going to give him one anyway.

Oh, really?

It's an amazing introduction,

so stay tuned. So Mr.

Christophe Choo is an award winning,

top producing luxury real estate

agent with over three

decades of experience

serving Los Angeles

most prominent West Side neighborhoods

spanning the platinum triangle,

including Beverly Hills,

Holmby Hills and Bel Air

christophe and with passion

enthusiasm for real estate,

have earned him a coveted position

among the nation's best

real estate agents,

with more than 550

real estate transactions

close throughout his career.

He's enjoyed top producer status

in the Coldwell Banker

Global Luxury Real Estate

President's Premiere for many years,

which honors the top

1% of Coldwell Banker Agents worldwide.

He consistently ranks

among the top 100 Coldwell Board.

Coldwell Banker

Global Luxury Specialists.

He has been ranked among America's

top agents in the thousand

by real trends, as advertised

in The Wall Street Journal.

His enthusiastic embrace

of social media and technology

also continues to raise

his star status being voted

the number r1 estate video

influencer in North America.

And if you don't know who he is, then

when you've been hiding under a rock, Mr.

Christophe Choo.

I don't know. Yeah.

What are what are we going to cover?

What are we?

You're someone who needs no introduction.

I know before we started

the podcast, we were even just engaging

in the fact that

we've been following each other

on social media in the moment.

Now you big embrace, hug.

It's like, I already know you.

That's nice.

But for the select few people

who don't know who you are,

can you just share with us

your journey of how

you got into maturity,

how you got into real

estate like why real estate? Like what?

That's a good question.

So

most people think I was born

with a silver spoon

in my mouth and a rich family.

That's not the case.

My parents, my mom was a hairdresser.

My stepfather worked in that kind of rare

art book business,

but I always wanted to be successful

and live a good life and be wealthy.

I just

I always wanted to live a fancy life.

I think luckily for me,

when I was six years old,

being half French and half Korean,

I spent every summer in France

for most of my youth

so I had a lot of exposure.

You know, when you're

six years old, seven, you know,

going to chateaus in France and you know,

you learn a lot.

And I traveled all around the world. So

I was modeling, studying around 16.

But even prior to that,

a twelve years old, I cleaned apartments

making $60, an afternoon

cleaning apartment.

So my mom's hairdressing customers,

when I was 16,

I worked at the Hollywood Bowl in L.A.

taking tickets.

I valet parked cars

for the private valet companies.

I worked in restaurants

as a cashier, as a waiter.

I did kind of everything.

And then I started modeling.

I was discovered on Sunset Boulevard.

And I started modeling.

And so 16 through about 22,

I was modeling and I just turned 18.

I was dating my wife now of 29 years and

be gone 2-3 months at a time modeling.

And she didn't like that.

She's like,

How about getting a stable job?

And I'm like, You know, I'm 18 years old.

What do I know, right?

I'm like, Well, what did you have in mind

is, how about real estate?

And as a young, dumb

18 year old, I thought, OK,

I can show pretty houses,

drive a fancy car,

make a lot of money and be my own boss.

Yeah, I didn't know

there was such a thing

as escrow title inspections,

all that stuff.

So I actually was studying

in San Tropez at the

private club on the beach.

My my real estate classes

came, came to L.A.,

took the test passed and I went to the

I was living my family, my parents.

Still, I went to the office near my home.

The woman didn't hire me

because she says,

What are your goals

that want to make $1,000,000

a year and drive a Rolls-Royce?

She thought I was nuts,

so she's like, No,

you're not the right fit for our office.

So I went to the next closest office

because I wanted to be

at John Douglas Company,

which was the Premiere

luxury company back in 88-89.

They had just sold

a house for 24 million,

like one of the best houses in L.A.

So I thought that's the kind of company

I want to be with.

So I went there, I got hired

and first year I did

one sale and the whole twelve months

of 43,000 dollar condo co-op.

I made 17 hundred and $32

and then my manager said, Well, you know,

you've been here for a year,

you haven't made any business,

so you've got 90 days,

you're out of the office. Wow, really?

So I went to a Roger Butcher seminar.

You way too young to even know who he is.

He taught about calling

and prospecting expired listings.

So that's what I started to do.

So it's sending letters, calling and door

knocking expired listings.

And that's how I just started.

I started getting listing

because I was, you

know, 19, 18, 19 years old.

Nobody my age, my friends

weren't buying and selling

real estate, and I didn't know anybody,

so I just had to just

start knock on the door.

So that's kind of how it started.

And when I left,

that particular area

was called Hancock Park in L.A.

I moved to Beverly Hills,

maybe 22-23 years ago.

Betty Graham, who you know,

who's one of the coaches at.

Tom Ferry

She was the manager in Beverly Hills,

and I was at a seminar with

I was in management.

It was a training director in the office.

And so I went to a management retreat and

they said, Have you ever thought

about moving to Beverly Hills?

I said, Absolutely,

I've always wanted to.

I just didn't do anything about it. Yeah.

So I met with Betty the next day

and she said, Would you like to come

join the office?

I said, I said, absolutely

packed my stuff up

and moved to Beverly Hills.

Didn't have a second thought.

And that's how I began

my more luxury side of the business.

And so that evolution

moving over to Beverly Hills,

was it very similar

to the start in real estate

or was it like you hit

the ground running?

You now have these systems in place

and now you're crushing the market

in Beverly Hills?

Or did it take it took time,

took about a year or so

to get the ball rolling.

You know, new area, new people new

to learn the area better

because I didn't know it that well.

So it did take time.

Everything takes time. Yeah.

Well, I'm sorry.

I guess Steve gets really excited

and I'm like, I just ask.

I ask a question. Sorry.

Well, I'm so getting a little

technical on that, right?

Because now you've been doing it

for a very long time and obviously years.

I mean, you guys aren't even

in your thirties, right?

He is.

I'm 42 and I am selling real estate.

You weren't even born.

That's crazy when I,

when I meet people, doesn't like

you when it wasn't even born.

Anyways, so getting a little

tactical on just kind of

your journey and everything,

like what advice

would you give to someone that's

that's looking to break into luxury now

or to break into luxury specifically?

OK, you have to live it, breathe it,

be it in order to sell it.

Wealthy people want to work with people

that are like themselves.

I mean, in most cases,

clients that like us and hire us like us

because who we are and what we are.

But you've got to really know

that market live there be part of it.

And they have to like you,

and they have to see you

as part of their world,

if you're at a cocktail party

or a dinner party or a special event

and they keep saying, you know,

they keep seeing you.

And they see your business,

you see on social media and they say, Oh,

well, he's friends with our rich friends.

So he probably will have buyers

to buy our five, ten, 20,

30 million Dollar House.

So I think that's a

really important factor in terms

of breaking the luxury market.

Number two, sales

skills are always

no matter what, you've got to constantly

be learning your skills, rebuilding them.

I mean, that's why we

we all go to conferences all the time

and then mindset.

I think mindset is

one of the most critical factors

because in my business,

you have really big

highs and lows every single day.

And unfortunately, the higher

the deal is, the bigger

the commission, the higher

the bigger the highs are

and the lower the lows are.

So you've got a big deal

that represents a huge commission

and it's going great.

You're super excited

and then it crashes and then you're like,

you want to cry and and die.

And so you got to

just kind of brush yourself off

and keep moving on.

Keep moving on, keep moving on.

So that's kind of the general advice.

So bringing it into that type of market,

like every agent I find, it's like,

Yeah, I want to start

transacting in those.

Oh yeah.

Like, would the advice

be like, You know what?

Get your feet wet in the market

that you're most comfortable with.

And then the evolution can be, yes,

like to go to to attack

that type of market.

You didn't do this overnight.

No, you two. Absolutely. Yeah.

Because your first deal

that you just shared with us 43,017

hundred dollars. Yup.

Not really understanding that

the backend of what's involved. Yes.

Now someone, let's say,

who's five or ten years into the business

and they're just they've hit a wall.

They're stagnant.

What might be that one or two things

that you could share

with them to be like, Look,

this is kind of the jumpstart.

Got it back into the business.

So to go back, the

first thing is as a training director,

which I was for my office

and then the Southern California

region for Coldwell Banker,

the new agents would come

in and meet with them,

and most of them say,

I only want to sell luxury properties.

And to me, that was the kiss of death.

No, they weren't ever going to make it.

Do they also like

looking at pretty houses?

But, you know, as you know, in the NAR

stats for 30 years

what I think 80% of the agents

don't stay in the business

a year later, they're out.

It's a very high rate

of people leaving because,

you know, we all,

especially now with the

million dollar listing

and all these shows

where they see these young 20 year olds

come on TV and in 30 minutes,

they walk into a door. They say hello.

They get a 40 minute listing

and then they sell it

two minutes later

and they're like,

Commission is x dollars.

I mean, it's just it's a fake situation.

But the question was specifically about.

So let's say someone's,

you know, they've done pretty well,

but then they're five

or ten years into the business,

just kind of hit the ceiling.

Got it right.

So going back to

because this is specific

about going to luxury, right?

So we do caravan still in Los Angeles.

Do you have broker caravans?

We don't do them

much in our market, really? OK.

So broker caravans in our area

basically every Tuesday

from eleven to two.

If you have a listing,

you want to have it open,

you can have it open.

You know, the big, big

properties are invitation only

and you know, all that kind of stuff.

But uh,

even when I was starting

in Beverly Hills,

I would go in every caravan,

spend two or three hours

and look at as many houses as I could.

You have to know the inventory cold,

and it's one thing

to look on the MLS sheet

and look at the photos.

It's a different thing in the high end,

especially to look at, OK,

what is this acre look like?

Who? Who are the neighbors?

What are the views?

What are the finishes?

So going on Caravan was very important,

and I remember

there was a lady in my office

had been in the business

35 or 40 years older lady.

And she was she would come with me

and she said to me,

Why do you keep going?

Look at these five, ten,

50 million dollar houses.

You don't have buyers for that.

I said, Well, not today,

but if I do tomorrow,

I know exactly what to show them.

And so I remember

I got my first 5 million dollar listing,

which was super exciting and I sold it

and and then I kept going on Caravan

And that was my high sell at that point.

This is maybe 17, 18 years ago.

And then I got a random call

from a friend of ours socially.

This is

it was a Saturday,

Sunday morning at the office at 8:30

and got a call

hold and say, No, that's Sunday morning.

Yeah, at 8:30, at the office,

I'm at the office.

That's what the 1%, that's

what the starting point zero.

1% and there weren't

even iPhones in those days.

We had flip phones,

but they call it in the office line

and there was no assistant.

So I picked up.

Yeah, and they're like,

Well, you know, we're going to be

selling the house.

We want you to come meet us tomorrow

to talk about the house.

And I knew the house had been there

many times, for parties

it was one of the

prettiest houses in L.A.

and it's a great spot

to meet tomorrow morning. 8:30, so fine.

I called up my wife and said, Honey,

I got to stay at the office

this afternoon and work and prepare.

But I go to the office

every single day of the year,

even Christmas and New

Year's Thanksgiving.

Every day I only live five minutes away.

So look, I don't like to work from home,

even during COVID.

Every single day I went to the office.

I have a private office

and a balcony and no staff.

Nobody was there, but I was there.

I need to be in my office

and do my work there.

I don't like to work from home

if I don't have to.

So what does

what does your daily routine look like?

Because I know I've seen it,

so I've seen you on social

and posting on Facebook

and Instagram and different things.

Like that of you at the office,

and I've always known

that you have this like relentless,

you know, personality.

So what is your kind of daily

routine look like?

I typically get up around

five 6:00 in the morning.

I get to the office between 6:30 - 7:30.

I like to have quiet time

and do my social, do my emails,

you know, do all that kind of planning.

one of my team members comes

in at eight,

then my staff come in at nine and then we

and then one things

every morning I still do

is affirmations at 9:00.

So every morning I have a

one of my Tom Ferry friends.

We do affirmations,

but it sounds in the background,

affirmations and role

playing in that kind of stuff. So.

And then once 9:00 starts,

I mean, the day starts going

and you're dealing with situations.

And you know,

we have to show a lot

of our own properties

unfortunately the high end, especially

So you go showings, inspections.

I go to lunch almost every day

and then afternoon appointments.

So that's kind of that's the same.

The routine hasn't changed that much.

The difference is in the old days,

I was prospect in the beginning,

prospecting three hours a day.

I mean, literally,

I also I also want to point out

that 32 years in the business

and you still role play

and do affirmations every day

because that's like I know people

that are three years in the business

and they think that they know it

all, so they no longer role play.

They no longer do that.

And that's I mean, 32 years.

Yeah, 32 years.

You feel like that's that's

which is crazy because

obviously I'm a coach for Tom.

Yeah, but I still role play with my coach

and with my team. Yeah, which is crazy.

You so nonchalantly just talk about,

yeah, I wake up around

five and I crash the day.

I'm in the office around 6:37

and I go through it

like by the time you start role

playing is when people start

kind of getting out of bed

because real estate is unlimited,

earning potential

and freedom and flexibility,

and we can all laugh at that.

When Beverly Hills,

I mean, most of the agents don't

show up till ten or eleven or twelve.

Look I mean Maybe

they're working at home.

I don't know what they're doing, but

probably not. Probably not.

I want to switch gears a little bit,

and we talked about the bumbum,

you know, in video

influencer and all that.

So

I know you've had quite the video journey

and you know, from

the car tours and flip,

you know, flip video to now,

you know, high, high quality production.

But I mean, you still do like Facebook

lives, you still do quick,

you know, at a broker open

or broker caravan,

you know you're doing video on your own.

Yeah.

So I want to talk a little bit

kind of about your journey

and what how you've seen video

impact your business

over the past ten, 15 years.

I knew nothing about real estate videos.

It was at a Tom Ferry conference

with Gary Vaynerchuk

in 2008 because that

was my first video

and it was on YouTube

and it's still there.

So Gary Vaynerchuk was speaking to us

at a one on one conference

and he says, You're Mr.

Beverly Hills.

You need to be a DJ

for content in the community.

Does that ring a bell to me?

I'm like,

That sounds like an interesting concept.

And Google had just purchased YouTube,

and that's this is, you know, websites.

I mean, I've had websites for 25

since they came out,

but things are really social

media was really starting

to gain traction at that point.

I mean, Instagram wasn't

even in existence at that time.

So I thought, Well, this is said,

that's something I could do.

So I went that afternoon to Best

Buys are good guys

and one of those places

because Tom said, Buy

a flip cam and I bought the flip cam.

My assistant was with me at the retreat,

so I bought a tripod

and made my first video

there at the summit.

And it was silly.

And, you know, just kind of like,

it's 119 degrees.

What am I doing here

in the middle of the desert

in the summertime?

And I just started doing videos

and creating content.

And then my first big video

was the helicopter

tour of the most

expensive homes in Los Angeles,

which no one had done.

No one was really doing

real estate videos, so I did that.

It was very, very expensive,

but I just knew I had to do it and

we did that and we put it online.

And the interesting thing is immediately

we started getting calls from lawyers

corporate that you got to

take these videos down.

Oh yeah.

You're showing ingress

and egress into our homes.

And you know, it

wasn't really the sellers.

I think it was the agents

that were really pissed off

and they were causing the waves.

So Corporate said,

You've got to take it down

and I'm like, Are you kidding me?

So I did take it down

for a couple of months, and then

companies were promoting my videos.

This is how to do videos,

including our company.

So I called up the press

and said, Look, I said,

you told me to take it down,

but I got a text this morning

at the sales conference in Vegas.

You guys are showing my video

on how to create videos,

and you guys told me to take it down.

So let me put it back online went down.

So that was the first

high production video

I've done many, many, many videos.

I think I have 2,800 videos on my YouTube

channel and what?

2,800 That's well, 12-13 years.

And I remember Tom

and I were coaching one on one,

and it was four years into doing videos

and I was about monetization, right?

I kept saying, Tom,

I had 800 videos at that time.

I'm like,

I haven't made any money from this.

No one's calling me.

I'm not getting any deals.

I mean, this is a waste of time.

This is Christophe.

Keep doing it.

Keep to what's going to happen.

It's going to happen.

Maybe 30 days later,

I got a random call

and I'm at the office in the morning,

my assistant

There wasn't security,

it was like 10:00 in the morning.

My assistant is like this lady talking

you, she's in her car

and she wants to talk to you

about buying and selling a house.

Is it great!

I got on the phone

said in one of my first questions,

how'd you find out about it?

Oh, I saw your videos.

I'm like, Really which videos?

So I saw your helicopter tour.

And I thought, if we

spend that much money

in a helicopter tour,

you'd spend money to market my house.

Number two, I saw your driving

tour of Stone Canyon Drive

and you were very honest.

I said, Really? How so?

Stone Canyon is a part of Bel Air,

which is a very pricey area.

Houses are like 4 million to 150

million on that street. And

I said, if you're a sun lover,

this is probably not for you.

I said, it's five minutes

in Beverly Hills.

It's a very woodsy community.

It's one street going up and down

with offshoot streets,

lots of trees, but it's a canyon.

So I said, if you like the sun,

the sun's going to come in your house.

Couple hours later in the morning,

and we'll set a couple hours

earlier in the afternoon,

and this particular buyer

was in escrow on a house on that street.

And when they went

at 4:00 in the afternoon

for the inspections,

there was no sun at the pool,

so it was a 11 million dollar deal.

They backed out of the deal.

So she says, Well,

I said, You know, who are you?

My husband's a big real estate attorney.

He's a partner in several law firms.

That real estate attorney.

Why would they be calling it?

Wouldn't he know a lot of agents?

Yeah, she is.

My husband would like to meet you

on Monday night at 8:00 or 8:30

and said, OK, sir,

because they were going to

they wanted to spend 10-12 million to buy

and then their house was around

four or 5 million.

So I took the meeting

and I wear a three piece suit with a tie,

you know, lawyer,

I had my legal yellow pad with the lines,

so I sat down and I said,

and I can talk to them

because we did TV shows of them

buying and selling, I said.

I said, Mr. Natsios, do you mind?

first of all, can I call you Tony?

And he said, sure.

And I said, I have my little yellow pad.

You mind if I take notes

and ask you questions

and he says absolutely.

So I started going through the notes

half an hour into my questions

and it was just the scripts. Yeah, yeah.

When you plan on moving,

you know, all that's basic stuff, right?

I said, you know, put my foot pad.

I said, I like you.

I said, I think you like me.

Why don't we just get started

and find you the right House?

And he says, Christophe,

my wife decided to hire you

the first phone call.

I just want to meet you in person.

It was, I just you

a half an hour, right question.

So within 30 days,

I found them a house,

which they bought for over 10 million.

It was a tough negotiation.

He's a tough negotiator.

26 times back and forth.

And he said to me says,

What's it worth it?

It's worth just started 14 million.

They drop it down to two.

They just dropped it down to twelve.

I said, I think it's worth

just over 10 million.

So what should we offer?

So let's offer like 9.5

and he says nope I want to offer 8.3.

Like, that's kind of low

says Nope, that's what I want to offer.

So back and forth,

and we actually was

just before Thanksgiving,

we started things like

Thanksgiving times like,

I don't want to counter I said,

What do you mean

you don't want to counter this?

No, I want them to see that

they want to sell more

than I want to buy.

So I think we waited two or three weeks,

but I think we rewrote a new offer

and then we finally

made the deal on closed.

And then I sold their house

a few months later.

Then their friend bought

a house for 5 million

and then they're

his secretary, sold

her condo for 4.75, which I did,

and then bought a place for 1.5

So we did like 27 million in business

in like 100 days after that first call.

So out of curiosity

when that happened,

did Tom say I told you so

or was he a gracious?

Was he gracious? And

maybe he did say, I told you so

well, I will ask him later.

Yes. And there's still repeat clients.

I mean, they bought a vacation home

a year ago in Newport

Beach for 7.4 million.

You said, Hey, we wonder if

they were looking in Malibu

for a weekend house.

And we kept looking

and looking for two years.

Couldn't find the right thing.

And they said, Well,

let's consider Newport.

So I know Newport pretty well.

So we spent two days.

We look at a couple of houses

and there was one house

that was really not

what they were looking for,

but I just thought

it was the most unique house

in the Balboa Peninsula on the islands,

not an island, but on the peninsula.

And it was the tallest house

on all of the Peninsula

It was built in 1928

by a very famous architect,

and the wife is really into decor

and decorating and all that stuff. So

they saw this house, they fell off

and they bought it as a beach house.

So just and they become really wonderful,

wonderful friends.

So that's that's the story of our videos

kind of started and evolved.

I need to get back to doing more.

Videos I've kind of slacked off

lately in doing videos.

You're doing them all the time

and you're doing them

every Monday morning,

Monday morning motivation, right?

So I've got to get back on that bandwagon

of doing it more and more

because I think it's really important.

Would you say it's,

you know, if you had the choice

between production value versus complete

and utter transparency,

where would you start

from a history of this? first of all?

I prefer personally

the production videos.

I like the way they look.

I like the finished quality

and I really like to

basically produce the video.

I mean, I hire the right people

for the specific house.

I choose the story.

I choose exactly.

I want it

and I just have them implement it.

But at high production video,

especially on like a 20,000 25,000

square foot house

can take three or four days

in a full, full day shoots,

a lot of work, a lot of effort

and a lot of money.

I do like them and they're beautiful,

but the truth of the matter

is if you go to my YouTube channel

and you see I will do a production video

and I'll do like a walking tour.

The walking tours

that are completely unedited,

just like one walk through nonstop

and sometimes are 20 minutes

and I'm like out of breath,

walking around, walking around.

Yeah, and especially Big House,

and I don't even know

what I'm going to say.

I just kind of just walk and talk.

Just to me, it's like a virtual showing,

like the buyers there,

and I'm just walking through the house,

showing them what I'm showing them. So

the real videos are

what the consumers want.

That's that's what the buyers always say.

I love those because

I can really see the house,

but I still do them all.

Yeah, but I'll do a live.

I'll do a production VIDEO

I'll do a just me walking through VIDEO.

I'm also now doing more the MTV style.

I kind of switched it around where

my assistant will follow me

and I'm doing the same walking tour

but I'm in the camera

pointing things out. Got it? Yeah.

So I'm always playing around

with it, with anything.

I get a concept or idea.

I just play with it.

All works and I like the live

and the kind of MTV style is what I think

it shows your personality more.

You know, the high production

quality is great

and it showcases the property,

especially if it's a showstopper,

you know, property? Yeah.

But you know, I like the ones

that I've seen some

where your live birds will fly in

or something will happen like,

oh geez, you know, like,

Oh goodness, let's go over here

now, you know, so

and I'll say stupid things

in the live ones, you know,

the ones that are recorded,

they can get it out .

But I'll say the same thing.

Like, beautiful, like

in the beginning,

I would say beautiful or magnificent,

like ten times in a video.

So we'd have these little cheat sheets

of like the not a thesaurus,

but the words like this luxury

like 50 different versions of luxury.

And I'll study that.

So I don't say that

beautiful and magnificent

20 million times in a video.

We all do it. Yeah, yeah.

And I'll say something stupid

and all that from myself

on the video all the time.

And it's funny.

People really like the laughs like,

I love your laugh and people.

It's so funny on YouTube.

Like, I'll come home

and I'll just watch you videos.

And I feel very soothed

you have a very soothing voice and

and I like your laugh.

So it's it's it's interesting

what people respond to.

I love your laugh.

I think it's it's

so it's it's so hard to describe,

but it's it's a Christophe thing

when you laugh, it's a Christophe

You think he'll pick you out in

a room with like 1000 people.

Can I just ask one question

because you do so much with video?

Yeah, so much.

What's the one advice

you would give to someone

who's just struggling?

Like they're struggling,

they're struggling

to start their video journey.

So the number one fear factor

for most people in videos

is how they look

and how they come across on camera .

I tell people all the time,

you are who you are,

whether you got a camera in front of you

or you don't, that's who you are.

So the only difference is

there's a camera

in front of you recording it.

So I mean, you're going

to go to an appointment

to talk to someone and be great.

And the only difference is

if there's a camera there,

what difference does it make?

It's the same thing.

And I think what help me is

I was on a lot of TV shows.

It was a cast member

of HGTV selling away.

So I learned a lot

from being on television

and you make a mistake.

We don't even I mean, like

if I make a mistake with my lines,

I just stop for ten seconds

and I just pick it right back up. Yeah,

just don't be fearful.

I mean, you look the way you look like,

I said, and just be yourself, people.

People will either

like you or they don't.

If they call you and say, how you,

I saw your videos.

If they call you

and they want to do business

with you from your videos,

it's pretty much you're going to be

they're their agent.

Have you always had this

like rock solid mindset?

Yeah, that's really

predicated on mindset.

Yeah, very much like a growth mindset.

Well, I've been in coaching since 1991.

If it did, you

did you formulate your mindset

then or was it you?

Did your parents teach you?

No, no.

My parents did teach me

any of that stuff.

No, no, nothing at all.

It was all self-taught.

I started reading books when I was young.

one of the best books was Kathryn Ponder

the power, prosperous thinking.

It was all about writing

down, visualizing and creating the world.

You want that Tom talks about his story

about his perfect wife.

So it's the same kind of concept.

So I kind of did it on

my own for a number of years.

Certainly when I was in real estate,

I was commuting. In the beginning

we got married and I was commuting

from South Pasadena

to Hancock Park,

which was between an hour,

an hour and a half each way,

every day to go to work, which was a lot.

But I would leave before 6:00 a.m.

so wouldn't hit the traffic.

And I thought I didn't go to college,

so I thought, Well,

this will be my college education.

So all I did was listen to

in those days it was cassette tapes

like literally cassette tapes.

So it was Mike Ferry

Mike Ferry was my first coach

which was all my.

I bought every single cassette

he ever had and boxes

of them in my garage.

So I just listened and listened.

And I've been in coaching since 1991.

I've had coaches

consistently nonstop since 1991.

So 20, 30 years.

Having a coach, that's

such a great Segway

because that's actually what

I would want to talk about next,

because that's that's

how we all know each other.

Like, obviously, like

I knew you from Coldwell Banker,

you know, and also,

you know, through the Tom Ferry

organization and coaching and all that.

So, you know, coaching

has been an integral part,

I think, in all of our lives

and all of our careers. What?

I know a lot of people

similar to the video oral question

that we all get all the time.

You know, they they have difficulty

in pulling the trigger

on spending, you know,

five grand, ten grand, 20-30

grand a year on coaching What

what would be your advice

or would you say those

at the Mike Ferry

superstar retreat in 1991?

I went to the retreat

and I saw the top producers on the stage,

and coaching in those days

was $1,000 a month.

And I just knew I had to do it.

And I thought to myself,

if I spent $12,000 next twelve months,

which I didn't have,

I was worried my credit card

will even go through

for the first month, right?

Is it going to work?

And I knew in my mind

I said I can make $120,000

return on this $12,000. I just knew it.

And it's not just the coaching weekly,

it's it's, you know, going

three, four or five,

six times a year to the events,

meeting the other top producers.

And it was brand

new and I would see all the

top producers on stage

and I friended them all.

I mean, the opposition,

let me take you out to lunch.

Let me get together.

Can I role play with you?

I mean, Karen Bernardi,

you know, from Colorado,

who's been with the top Coldwell

Banker agents for forever.

You know, we became friends

and we were role playing

two or three days a week.

And I just I learned I emulated.

I go to the conferences,

I implement what I learned,

and I think it's, you know,

it's the coaching weekly.

It's the meeting,

the people, it's the education.

It's all three of the above.

But coaching to me,

I don't think I'll ever

not being coaching. I said,

When you think of

it like you think of it,

even like the peak performers

in any industry.

Yeah, they all have coaches

and they don't even have one coach.

They have multiple coaches. Yeah, yeah.

And also, let's think about it

in our business.

We a lot of referrals,

some other agents, right?

So you think about,

you know, I have had

a couple of referrals

is one referral paid for my coaching

for the last 32 years, right?

So I'm serious.

That happens all the time.

I've had my coaching pay for,

you know, for the year,

but you know, I'll work on the 32 year

I'll work on that

That's intense So Christophe,

at what point in your career

did you switch into,

you know, team building?

Well, I'm still having

a struggle with that.

I've had a few people

on the team here and there, but

and they would say for two months,

three months, or

I'll fire them in one day,

depending on, you know, the situation.

Most people, just, in my opinion, aren't

especially in Beverly Hills.

Maybe that's my story,

aren't willing to do what it takes.

They just want to show up.

They want to go to parties.

They want to go to lunches

and make a lot of money.

It's just I'm still doing today

what I've done for 30 years,

all that, you know, routine.

They don't want to do it.

They don't want to come

in the office early.

And I just I don't understand that.

So the question again was,

so are we building the team? Yeah.

Like at what point in your career

were you like, OK, like I don't.

I only have a finite

number of hours in a day.

I was five or six years ago

when I started that

concept of doing that,

and that's sort of the concept.

But so did following that concept

and doing it.

But it's been it's

been a real struggle right now.

I've got one new team member

as an agent that just joined me.

I'm working on another one.

It's it's been a little challenge

wrapping my mindset around

how to really make it happen,

how to not spend

too much of my time, but really

spend my time to help them.

I used to do newly licensed agents.

I'm not doing that anymore

because the new ones is

the learning curve is just too, too

too hard, too hard.

They got to have some experience

under their belt, even with that stuff.

So.

So that's something

I've got to learn more of and

and figure out how to make that happen.

That's not been the case so far.

Well, and I think it's probably

because everyone sees you like,

you know, your lifestyle

and your brand and all of these things,

but they don't see that

you're at the office at 6:00 a.m.

They don't see that

you're a role playing

and you know,

they just want the lifestyle,

not the actual work.

Well, you built a big team

in a very short period of time, right?

You have eight or nine

agents in your team.

We've got nine total right now,

so that's amazing.

Thank you. It's amazing.

It's been. It's been a journey.

It's been a journey, for sure.

But I think every team

we can share that it's challenging.

It's probably the most challenging thing

when it comes to real estate in your

in your career is

building the team right?

And it comes down to fundamentally

hiring the right people.

Yes, right? Yes.

So again,

we go back to the fact that like,

I want to be a real estate agent

because I want to make gobs of money

and I want freedom and flexibility.

And we all know that that's oil and water

and that doesn't exist.

What's the one characteristic

you look for, though? New team member?

What's the one thing good?

What is Christophe to look for?

I would say probably no one is good

will good work ethic and a good, good

personality I can work with

as someone I interviewed .

He was doing things open houses for us.

I interviewed with him

a lunch interview

and there were some things

he said that just

didn't settle well with me.

So I don't think

I'm going to have him join.

I just I'm in charge of my business

and what I do.

I don't need someone joining me

telling me what they

want me to do for them.

And I mean it just

that's just not going to work.

Interesting to see how that works,

but that's maybe that's just

my Leo control freak nature.

I don't know.

I would agree with you on that one.

Yeah.

Have you heard any thoughts

about expanding?

Like, I know, like in

Canada, where I'm from,

we can't really expand into

different provinces, right? Right.

But have you ever thought of it?

Well, Tom and I were talking

at dinner last night like,

what did you do?

You know, we're here in Miami,

and I can barely.

Do Beverly Hills, let alone

even Kathy Ferry this morning

text me, see, this guy is doing it

and I'm like, Thanks, Kathy.

I just look at like Ryan Serhant right?

That started as brokerage

last year and has now, you know,

is just popping up

in all different states

and things like that.

And it's it's interesting

to watch, right?

Having big fame like that.

And I was talking to Tom about it

because several big offices

open in Beverly Hills.

I won't mention the companies,

and he asked me to kind of

start that process.

I didn't really want to start

building an office.

That's not my thing.

So and I said to Tom, I said,

I said, maybe I made a wrong decision,

but I felt it was right,

and I think it's still right, you know?

So now we have to do what's right for us.

And look, it's always changing.

So no world domination today,

but maybe, maybe tomorrow.

I don't see that.

I don't think I want to do

a different states.

And look, I love being at home.

I don't like being away from my wife.

I like to be together or travel together.

So to be gone a week or two

every month, you know,

opening it, just

that's not for me, you know? Yeah.

What is Chris job to look like

in the next ten years?

That's a good question.

I still plan to be in real estate.

I don't think I'll ever retire

from real estate.

I'm not the kind of person

to just sit around and do nothing

if I'm traveling. Yeah, really?

Sunday mornings at what? Like 3:30.

Look, if I'm traveling

the world having fun,

I go into parties and events.

That's fine.

But just sitting around, I just

I just cannot do that, so

I want continue to grow my business.

And that's one thing

that I decided many years ago.

I see I know a lot agents

and make a huge amount of money,

but they have no life.

And some of the top,

top producers in Beverly Hills,

they're not married.

They have no significant other.

Their clients become their family.

That's not my way of being.

To me, I'd rather make

a little bit less money

and have a life that I can control

and enjoy that life.

You know, be able to take naps

when I want to and have a day off.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's just me personally.

It's not about the money.

I'd like more money.

Of course everybody does,

but have a nice life, so it's just more

the balance is important to me.

Yeah.

Well, Christophe, we're going to ask you

our last question.

OK, the question that stumped

most of our guests.

Oh, I'm really curious

to hear this from you.

Excited some of your guests.

OK, Christophe

if it's your last meal on Earth,

what is it going to be?

And you're a big foodie.

So this is going to be a challenge.

Pizza, really? Yeah.

Well, we talked about pizza

all the way up here.

Pizza with meat on a pizza

is my favorite thing in the world.

It's homemade.

You're going to our homemade no, I mean,

there's a lot of different

pizzas that I like. I like Chicago.

I mean, a certain places

where we'll go, where do you go?

You like, I'm hankering for pizza.

I don't really eat pizza anymore.

I mean, occasionally

it's been like a number of months.

Next door to my office

is a pizzeria called Mulberry Street

Pizzeria from New York.

They have the best flat,

you know, thin crust pizzas anywhere

and easy to get in there. Like this?

Pick a sausage, pepperoni mushroom

and I would eat half the

pizza myself in one sitting.

Valero, another restaurant down

down in my building.

They have wonderful, smaller pizzas.

They're delicious.

And then Spago in Beverly

Hills has smoked

salmon pizza, which I love.

Pizza would be my last meal pizza

and then probably really great champagne.

That would be the balance.

Yeah. Who knew?

Great Christophe Cheesy

side, I look like.

Who knew that your

secret pizza connoisseur pizza?

Yeah, I love it.

So, yeah, I mean, that's one thing

that if I could eat pizza every day,

I would eat pizza every day.

I really would. Do you like pizza?

I do. I like pizza.

Yeah, yeah, I'm a fan. Yeah.

Well, Chris, if we want to say

thank you so much

for sharing your time with us,

we know how incredibly valuable it is.

We love watching you on social media,

the evolution of what you become,

what thank you for your success,

and we wish you just even more success

in the years to come. Well, thank you.

Thank you so much.

And I'm very honored

that you two of you asked me

because I've been following you guys

and you guys are amazing.

Both of you are very

different in what you do,

but really amazing.

I mean, your tick tok stuff

and all that is just beyond

and your motivation stuff

and your videos are very graphically due

to them yourself.

I have an editor, OK,

because they're very graphically cool

and unique, and I'm like,

I would like to do more like that,

and I don't so anyways.

But thank you for having me.

And we're here together in Dallas.

We can have a nice lunch

now and enjoy and be here for a little

of tomorrow and champion.

Well, thank you again for sounds good.

Thank you.