Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Announcer: Where entrepreneurs come to grow it's passage to profit with Richard and Elizabeth Gearhart.
[00:00:06] Elizabeth Gearhart: We're going to move on now to the other two members of the team who are here, Brandon Bellamy and Sam Desney. Now, Brandon, you're a licensed real estate broker at Titan. So I'm going to ask you the difference between a broker and a real estate agent for number one. And Sam, you're a licensed real estate person and also the AI software guy.
So let's start, Brandon, with my question. What's the difference between a broker and a real estate salesperson?
[00:00:31] Brandon Bellamy: Just the experience. As a licensed real estate salesperson, you have to kind of keep that title for two years and do a certain amount of deals before you qualify to be a broker. As a broker under New York state, I can open up my own brokerage and things like that. As a licensed real estate salesperson, you couldn't do that.
[00:00:47] Elizabeth Gearhart: Okay, and how long have you been with the company?
[00:00:49] Brandon Bellamy: I've been with Titan since Titan started. What's that, eight years?
[00:00:53] Elizabeth Gearhart: Okay, great. Okay. So Sam, what convinced you to go work at a real estate company?
[00:01:00] Samuel Desany: I'd like to say that I have a passion for real estate. There are people in my family who are in real estate or real estate adjacent, and I've always just had sort of a eye opening experience to these larger buildings. Like I have a few friends from high school who are in residential real estate, but the commercial sector I felt like nobody was talking about.
So I actually met with my advisor at school and he told me that the screening of season one of the real estate commission was going to be on campus that night. So I decided to tell all my friends, you know, not going to be able to see you guys tonight. And I went to the screening and I was talking with these guys here about everything that they do and was trying to just make as many connections and just learn as much as I could.
And later on that night, I sent a LinkedIn invite to Todd and he responded with his email and reached out to him. And for about, I'd say five months, we were talking back and forth. I came into their office, shadowed Todd a few times, and after that, Todd sent me an email saying, if you want to work here, the job is yours, Just get your real estate license.
So I did that. I got my real estate license during my spring semester of school and started two days after finals were over. And by my third day of working at Titan, Todd came in with his first of many ideas and came to me and said, you're young, you probably Know how to use AI, Right.
So that kind of started where I am right now, which is working and learning adjacent, kind of on a 50, 50 split of learning as much as I work.
[00:02:49] Elizabeth Gearhart: Excellent. Well, Brandon, you're also really good at using AI. Is that something, Todd, that you're looking for when you look at people as people that are able to find really creative ways to use AI?
[00:03:01] Todd Drowlette: I like people who are smart and are personable. Like, the AI thing is like a bonus, but it's not a. It's not a requirement. And I kind of have my gurus already. So anyone new who joined, if they. If they know it, great. If they don't, you know, I'm certainly not an expert on it by any stretch of the imagination. So you kind of need everybody.
[00:03:19] Elizabeth Gearhart: Brandon.
[00:03:20] Brandon Bellamy: I kind of wanted to, like, kind of say something right with and kind of bring everything full circle. We're talking about the entrepreneurial mind. We're talking about, you know, AI. We're talking about how Todd does things and how he's cheap sometimes. And I kind of gotta. Kind of gotta get my guys back real quick because when I started real estate, I mean, I started real estate before I came back with Todd. So I've only done real estate for about 20 years. Well, there wasn't any artificial intelligence. There wasn't even that much technology. The crexis, the loop nets to anything else that exists today didn't exist when I first started real estate. So I think that if you took all of those things away from me, if I didn't have AI, all I really need is a phone and a list of contacts to put some real estate deals together. And so I don't think it should be a requirement to, you know, be fluent in AI to start commercial real estate. I think that people who go about that way are very. Again, they're using it as a crutch. They're at a disadvantage because you don't know anything about the fundamentals. I did need that printer, though,
[00:04:13] Richard Gearhart: so.
So you're. You've been at this a long time and. Yes. You know, my mom sold real estate, right. And she
[00:04:20] Brandon Bellamy: had a 9x and a good personality.
[00:04:23] Richard Gearhart: And she had a good personality.
Hello. I'm looking at Elizabeth as I say that. Who cringe.
[00:04:29] Elizabeth Gearhart: Oh, she hated me.
[00:04:31] Richard Gearhart: But it is kind of a cutthroat business sometimes, right? Yeah,
[00:04:35] Brandon Bellamy: Yeah. A lot of ups and downs.
[00:04:37] Richard Gearhart: How do you survive for umpteen years in a wizard?
[00:04:41] Brandon Bellamy: Survive? I could be honest with you guys.
[00:04:42] Todd Drowlette: I cries a lot.
[00:04:43] Brandon Bellamy: Oh, my gosh. I joined a Run club last week. So, like, I'm doing 5Ks twice a week. I work out. Sometimes I have like, my own stall in the bathroom where I cry a little bit. You know, Todd has a poker face. I don't know how he does it. Our office are right next door to each other. I'll come in there and shed some tears and get right back to it. But I do think that, you know, you have to have, like, real tough skin to make it in real estate. It's cool to have one good year, but you got to do it again. If I'm depending on, you know, this deal to go through for, you know, real life changes, buying homes, you know, taking care of my. My. My family, you know, kind of setting that solid foundation on a career that isn't really that solid at any point in time. Of course, you get personally invested. I get personally invested. I act like I'm not, but I hurt my feelings sometimes when these deals don't go through.
[00:05:28] Richard Gearhart: Right, right.
Do you ever feel like the deal went south because of something you did?
[00:05:34] Brandon Bellamy: Even if it did, I can't hold on to that. That goes back into that, getting over it. You know, Todd will give me 10, 20 minutes, and when he's too busy, I go to my stall and I'll take my five minutes and I get back to it.
[00:05:43] Richard Gearhart: Yeah.
[00:05:44] Elizabeth Gearhart: So do you work 24, 7 pretty much? No.
[00:05:48] Brandon Bellamy: No. I work a lot when I'm working, but, like, I've learned the hard way that you have to. You gotta cut it off sometimes.
[00:05:55] Elizabeth Gearhart: Do you. But do you do showings at night? And
[00:05:58] Brandon Bellamy: I have this weird thing where I don't want to show property on the weekends because I haven't had a deal happen after you show property on the weekends. But
[00:06:04] Todd Drowlette: commercial is very different than residential. Like, if you're not.
If you're running a business or you're. If it's not important enough for you to see it during the work week, you're not really serious about buying that thing or moving or whatever. Be like, oh, I want to see it on Sunday at 4pm why? Because you have nothing else to do. It's very different than people buying and selling houses.
[00:06:23] Elizabeth Gearhart: That's the drink, because. So we have this podcast studio, and it's not the same thing, but I'm finding, like, I don't want to do evenings and weekends. And I think you're right. If you're not a serious business person that can do things for your business during the regular work week, then you're not serious.
[00:06:40] Richard Gearhart: Secondary as a Secondary pursuit,
[00:06:43] Todd Drowlette: not to quote Dirty Dancing, but nobody puts Baby in a corner. It's like if you don't want to come during these times and be here, then it's not serious enough and I'm not working with you.
[00:06:52] Elizabeth Gearhart: So how do you do you guys get your clients? How do you find them,
[00:06:56] Todd Drowlette: your TV shows?
[00:06:59] Brandon Bellamy: One way?
[00:06:59] Elizabeth Gearhart: Yeah.
[00:07:00] Brandon Bellamy: Basically one good deal turns into two good deals. Two good deals turns into four good deals.
[00:07:04] Elizabeth Gearhart: So you think it's client referrals or.
Yeah.
[00:07:08] Brandon Bellamy: And constantly grinding, finding new people.
[00:07:10] Richard Gearhart: So how do you do that?
[00:07:11] Brandon Bellamy: They don't make nine X's anymore. But you know, if I have a, let's say I have a retail space on a street that doesn't have a Laundromat, I'm going to Google Laundromat operators in the area and I'm going to reach out to them directly. I think that, you know, sometimes again we rely on that, you know, AI and artificial intelligence when we are intelligent as hell ourselves, which is our brains.
[00:07:33] Richard Gearhart: So how do you see your future evolving as a real estate professional?
[00:07:37] Brandon Bellamy: I don't want to say, I don't know. Whatever is ahead of me is going to have, is going to be very commercial real estate adjacent.
I am inspired following Todd around. I swear, like he discounts how these things come about. Like one day it's like TV crews walk into the office, another day it's kind of like, you know, we're taking over the Internet. So I'm motivated by those things. But as of right now, I don't know the next big thing for me. But I do know that I'm going to be at that office every day about 8:45.
[00:08:05] Richard Gearhart: And Sam, what about you? I mean you, what are your aspirations for the future?
[00:08:09] Samuel Desany: Yeah, I, I, I have, you know, one month goals, three month, six month year, all the way up to the next 30 years, all, you know, in a Google Doc form, you know, on my computer. But I really think that with a bunch of the things that we're doing now with real estate and different software systems that Todd and I are working on, I think that they can do very well.
And my goals are just for the immediate future just to keep learning and just to keep working. Because right now, and people say you never work a day in your life if you love what you do. And I think that that's so true. I go to bed every night and I, I brainstorm things on my phone and on my laptop and it's like, it's hard to go to bed because my, my brain is always moving. I'm always thinking about stuff that, that I could be doing. And whether I'm in the office or I'm in my dorm room at school, I feel like I'm always thinking about stuff that I could be doing with Titan or stuff that I could be doing with Todd.
[00:09:10] Richard Gearhart: That's great. I mean, we had a discussion before the show about different businesses that you were interested in. Software projects, new businesses.
So it seems like Titan is looking to expand in ways that touch on real estate, but are really different businesses. Right. So it seems like there's a lot of opportunity there.
[00:09:30] Elizabeth Gearhart: So, Todd, would you ever consider, I know you love Albany. Would you ever consider maybe sending one of these guys to another city to start a second branch of your business?
[00:09:40] Todd Drowlette: Possibly. It's funny you say that because we're doing residential spin off show called the Real Estate Commission New York and it's a docu series, but following around that. And part of that is actually we have a residential brokerage we're launching called the Real Estate Commission and the idea would be that we will open up in multiple cities and maybe there can be spinoff shows of the Real Estate Commission, Kansas City, the Real Estate Commission, San Diego, the Real Estate Commission, wherever. So yes, is that a possibility? And one of these guys features sooner than later. Yes.
[00:10:11] Elizabeth Gearhart: Oh, I love that. I'd
[00:10:12] Samuel Desany: love to go to San Diego.
[00:10:14] Elizabeth Gearhart: I was going to say do they get. Sounds
[00:10:15] Richard Gearhart: like an excuse to travel to
[00:10:17] Todd Drowlette: me. Sorry. The first one is the Real Estate Commission Anchorage.
[00:10:22] Brandon Bellamy: I got dibs on the Tampa location.
[00:10:25] Elizabeth Gearhart: Well, with that, thank you very much.
[00:10:27] Richard Gearhart: If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the podcast and leave a quick review.
Also, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and X and subscribe to our YouTube channel for bonus content.
[00:10:38] Announcer: Learn more at passagetoprofitshow.com.
