CHAPTER 4
PEOPLE WHO EARN MORE
Right after I closed that seven-figure deal with June Shen I thought I was the shit. So, I convinced my friend Matt who works in commercial real estate to get me a meeting with a big-time real estate developer named Gordon Murray, who owned buildings all over Manhattan and South America. Even though I had only made one big sale, I honestly believed I could be a huge asset to him. âSurely, I can handle a 200-unit sell-out on the Upper West Side, Gordy boy!â
As I was riding the subway uptown, packed in with the rush hour crowd, I imagined that I could soon kiss the subway goodbye forever. When I arrived at Gordonâs office in Times Square, I sat in an expensive-looking chair, buzzing with excitement about all the great opportunities this meeting could bring. When Gordonâs assistant told me he was ready for me, I took a deep breath and said to myself, You are awesome.
When I entered Gordonâs office, I shook his hand and he gestured to a chair across from him. He was tapping his pen on a legal pad. âSo, Ryan, what do you think about the plans for Hudson Yards? Think Related will be able to pull it off given the current state of the retail market?â
I felt my complexion start to shift from white to bright pink. Shit. I have no idea what you are talking about, I thought. âIt sounds really cool and I think theyâll do great,â I said.
Gordon pushed his legal pad and pen to the side. âHow about HFZâs planned conversion of 344 West 72nd? And what do you think about the rezoning challenges in Hudson Square and Gowanusâwhat are your thoughts on how the lobbyistsâ efforts will affect the resi landscape in the next five to ten?â Fuckity Fuckerstein. I still didnât know what he was talking about, so I launched into a super-enthusiastic, passionate speech all about my one big sale to June Shen. I didnât stop to think about how I didnât really answer any of his questions, or that being unprepared would now mean that Iâd have nothing to really talk about, which led me to go on and on about myself. Thinking back on this meeting makes me want to throw up. Gordon looked at his watch. âOkay, I have another meeting in a second. Thanks for coming in, kid.â
Despite my total lack of preparation and Gordonâs obvious disinterest in an arrogant âkidâ who had made one deal, I somehow left that meeting thinking I had nailed it. I donât know why, but as I walked back to my office I had visions of depositing even bigger checks due to my newfound awesome connection with mega-developer Gordon Murrayâ$50,000 checks? Shit, $75,000, $100,000 ⊠Thatâs huge!
A few days later, I connected with my friend Matt who had gotten me the meeting. âLike, tell me what he said about me, man,â I said. I was anxious to hear what Gordon thought. But then there was an awkward silence before Matt spoke: âSorry, man. He said you seemed like a nice kid, but you have a long way to go.â What?????
Is it possible it didnât go as well as I thought it did?!1 I had walked into Gordon Murrayâs office thinking I was the best real estate broker in the universe ⊠and to hear that I didnât come off well was soul crushing. And âa long way to goâ? Oh my God, I couldnât imagine spending the next five, ten years renting and selling cheap apartments. How could I land those bigger projects and make millions if I came off as amateurish? The meeting only lasted fifteen minutes or soâand in that short of a time he assessed that I had no idea what I was doing. I felt like such a JERK.
In the brutal lens that retrospect provides, I can see that I was all swagger and no substance, and those qualities were not going to get me access to higher-paying jobs.
I walked into Gordon Murrayâs office unprepared and made the conversation all about meâthat is disrespectful and basically screams that Iâm not ready to graduate to bigger gigs. I was oozing BULLSHIT MONEY ENERGY out of every single pore, and there is nothing that makes a person less likeable. Why would someone with BME like Gordon want to work with a snotty little fuck like me?
BULLSHIT MONEY ENERGY: DONâT STEP IN IT
Weâve all encountered someone with Bullshit Money Energyâthey are ego-driven, self-centered name droppers who do things like bark out ridiculous demands and think that acting like a dick makes them powerful. This is the polar opposite of BME. If you are NOT a certified genius on the level of Steve Jobsâwho has reinvented the entire world and so it doesnât matter whether or not youâre enjoyable to be aroundâthen you canât act horribly and still experience great success. If you want to make a lot of money, people actually have to like working with you.
I was twenty-six years old when I was cast on Million Dollar Listing New York, and I had not yet learned the lesson that being authentic, kind, and likeable is an important component to success. I wasnât a barbarian by any means; my parents raised us to have manners and to be polite, but I was on a TV show watched by millions of people where acting crazy, loud, and outrageous (and frankly, some of my behavior was downright disrespectful) brought more attention. I will never, ever forget the first time I was recognized by someone for being on TV. I was rushing to the subway one morning when I heard a woman say, âHey, are you the guy on that show?â I was in a hurry, but I stopped because after an entire year of being on MDLNY, no one had ever said anything! I couldnât believe it! When I turned to say, âYes! Itâs me!â the woman looked at me like I had kidnapped her little sister and burned down her grandmotherâs home. Disgust radiated from her eyes like laser beams, and thatâs when she shouted out: âYOUâRE SUCH A JERK!â
At the time that stung, a lot, but now I understand why she said it. I might not have been a total jerk in real life (I swear I wasnât! ask my friends! ask my mom!), but the qualities I projected in the early seasons of the show didnât exactly make me seem like the kind of guy youâd want to invite to your birthday party.2 If you want to really hear the honest truth about what youâre like as a person, try going on TV to be judged by millions of people around the globe. And those millions of people made it very clear to me: I was full of Bullshit Money Energy.
Being on reality TV is like living your life under a powerful microscope. I AM NOT COMPLAINING! Being on MDLNY has been great for my career and itâs really fun! But imagine what it would be like if an entire year of your life was edited down towards your most dramatic (and sometimes ugliest) moments, and then broadcast to the world. Like that time you flipped out because you burned your grilled cheese, or when you lost your temper and cussed like a sailor on the street because you spilled coffee all over yourself on the way to an important meeting. Or that time you were on a date and got a liâl drunk. If that was shown as the story of your life, you might end up looking bananas. I agreed to have my life filmed (and potentially look bananas on TV), so I was definitely opening myself up to being called a jerk by a total stranger. But after that encounter I started getting noticed in public more often, and then before I knew it, it felt like every other person on the street knew who I was. I had no idea how many people watched the show, and it was pretty weird! It felt like half of the population really liked me and the other half really, really didnât. Random guys would shout out to me on the street: âHey, Ryan! Youâre the man!â Me? Oh, I assure you I am not THE MAN. But this made me thinkâhow did people see me? And was this how I really wanted to be seen? Itâs one thing to be disliked for being on a reality television show, but itâs another to be disliked in real life. Was what I believed to be a charming Ryan Reynoldsâstyle banter actually making me seem like an asshole? When Million Dollar Listing New York started, I wasnât thinking about being likedâI wanted to be a successful broker with a big personality. I didnât understand that those two things were very closely related. How could I make a lot of money in my field if people hated me? You donât hire someone you think is a jerk to sell your home or find you a new place to raise your children! If I wanted to be the best real estate broker in the universe, and make millions doing that, I needed to care more about how I came off to people. I needed to be more comfortable showing my real self and get rid of the overdramatized cartoon of a twenty-something bachelor who acts like itâs funny to forget the names of women he dated, or to take off his shirt and jump in the pool at his colleagueâs open house.
Bullshit Audit
Aside from a handful of exceptions (mainly geniuses), you will not experience massive success if you arenât self-aware. Now that Iâm in a position to build a company and hire people, I can tell you Iâve seen some things. Iâve had brokers who mistakenly think that over-the-top saccharine sweetness or empty invites to their home in the Hamptons is how you endear yourself to a client and land the expensive listings.
It comes off as fake and people see right through that kind of insincerity.
There was a really smart member of my team who had a lot to contribute who had no idea that his colleagues viewed him as standoffish and unhelpful. This definitely could have prevented him from getting ahead and increasing his earning potential.
Iâve interviewed people for positions who walk into my office with bravado, only to throw themselves in a chair and sit there slumped over and looking sad. If Iâm thinking, Are you going to cry? Iâm definitely not going to hire you. Thereâs no way youâre going to earn big if youâre spending all your time searching for tissues to dab away at your tears.
Then there are the people who canât make eye contact. Theyâre staring at the space right above my left shoulder. What are they looking at? Is there a ghost standing behind me?
There are the quiet talkers, the loud talkers (I admit I fell into this category). Thereâs the limp handshake and its reverse, the vice-like death grip (a red flag for BSME, by the way).
You need to know how you come off to others if you want to succeed. Until I was broadcasted to 25 million people, I thought I knew myself, but I was very, very wrong. But Iâm about to tell you something very important, so listen closely. If youâre not getting what you want from life, if youâre not making as much money as you think you should, itâs entirely possible that itâs because of SOMETHING YOU ARE DOING THAT YOU DONâT EVEN KNOW YOU DO.
CODE #5
Insist on brutally honest feedback. Demand it! And appreciate how the short-term pain will promote long-term growth in YOU.
Figuring out whether or not you are likeable starts with being open to criticism. Criticism can be your very best friend. As someone who has opened themselves up to constant criticism by being on television and social mediaâI say bring it. If Iâm doing something that is off-putting, offends people, makes me sound dumb, or just drives people crazy, I WANT TO KNOW ABOUT IT. If Iâve been running around Manhattan all day in the July heat and I come back to the office and someone tells me that I smell, my reaction is not going to be âWhy are you so mean?â Itâs going to be âOh my God. I had no idea I was so pungent today. Thank you for bringing this to my attention before I went to my next listing pitch!â To be truly successful, you canât respond to feedback and criticism by being defensive. Thatâs what people with Bullshit Money Energy do. Be open to areas where you can be even better! And how will you really know what those are if you DONâT LISTEN TO CRITICISM?
After my failed meeting with Gordon Murray, I asked one of my good (and very honest) friends to give me a quick bullshit audit. How did I come off to people? What did people see when I walked into a room? Scott said, âRyan, your posture is terrible. Itâs like you donât even know that being tall is a good thing. You sit slouched over and that makes you look bored.â Really? I did not know this! But wait, he wasnât finished. Lucky me! âAnd you donât always look people in the eye when you talk to them either. You look at the ground. Why do you do that? Itâs strange.â I slowly sat up straight, growing about six inches in the process. Wow, heâs right. I had no idea that I was a sloucher who didnât make eye contact! Iâd never get the opportunity to work with big developers (where the potential to earn money was huge) if I looked bored, slouched over, and couldnât make eye contact. The picture I was presenting was not I WILL SELL THE SHIT OUT OF YOUR BUILDING AND MAKE YOU TONS OF MONEY; apparently it was Iâm bored and I want to go homeâand thatâs bullshit.
The best thing about a bullshit audit is that it can show you things about yourself that can easily be corrected. Ask a few people you trust what your best and worst qualities are. You can take it! What if you eat like an animal? What if youâre a loud chewer? Wouldnât you want to know about this before your next business lunch? You do not want to be THAT GIRL WHO CHEWS LOUD. These are small changes that can make a massive difference and greatly improve how you come off to people.
The feedback you get from a bullshit audit are directions for how to transform the raw material that is you into a better, more successful, richer version of yourself! I LOVE feedback and criticism, especially at work. I think of it as my customers literally telling me how I can make more money! Yes, tell me what I can do better!
People with BME pay attention to all of the feedback we get, and it goes into one of two categories. First, there are Valid Pointsâthese are comments that cause us to sit up and pay attention because we want to preserve our bottom line. When customers bring up valid points, we seriously consider if we need to change or alter our practices. For example, do you forget to do things your clients ask you to do? Do you come to meetings unprepared? Do you exaggerate? Do you bring negative energy into the office because it makes YO...