June 25, 2026
305: If We're All Selling the Same Thing, Why Do Top Broker's Win More?
EPISODE DESCRIPTION
In this episode, I share how mortgage brokers can stand out by mastering storytelling, asking the right questions, and building custom proposals that truly address client needs. Elevating your client interactions will build trust and differentiate yourself in a competitive market.
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00:00:06 Ryan Wiley
Welcome to the mortgage game. I truly, truly believe that building a mortgage business, a successful one is like playing a game. There's winners, there's losers. There's certain things you try. Some of us are playing checkers while others are playing chess. I've had the ability to coach and mentor hundreds of mortgage brokers. I myself built a very nice business. So now I want to distill all that information, all the things I've learned from that and bring it directly to you in a simple to understand way. I hope you enjoy.
00:00:37 Ryan Wiley
All right. Welcome to the mortgage game podcast. West coast, Wiley coming to you from the Dodge Ram studio. This is an evening version. Yes. An evening version. Kid is in flag football practice. And so I can actually see him play as I'm sitting here. I'm like, I might as well record a podcast. I have some things to talk about. And so let's just get into it. This is an important one. I think a lot of this, we're talking about talk over, gets skirted over, doesn't get enough attention, not nearly enough attention. And it really is what is the difference between you being a good broker and you being a good broker with a lot of money. It comes down to this. Imagine this. So you're a mortgage broker and let's say there's 10 of us in a room and we all have the same products to offer. Like this is literally our industry. So we all have the same products to offer. Now let's just say our, it's a purchase, an insured purchase. And it's like, Why would I work with you versus this person? Like, how do you stand out from the competition? Now, granted, it's a lot more rare to have competition actually with the broker in the moment, but it's more people are out there going, who should I work with? I know this person, I know this person, who should I work with? But how do you actually stand out? So this is a couple things I want to go through here. And same on social media. Like, why is one person's social media take off and not another? A couple of reasons, but there's like one overarching theme, why someone gets more traction on social than another person. You can both make the same amount of videos, talk about the same topic. And so what does it come down to? What's the differentiator? What's the differentiator between average mortgage brokers and really good mortgage brokers? It's not that they know more stuff because on the average file, you only need to know so much. You only need to know. I don't know, like some of this is just basic stuff and you're just aligning with a product you have. Like it's not like you're running through stated income files and you're structuring ad backs and coming up with strategic ways to do this and that and these advanced strategies. Like most brokers don't have any that are doing it. There's a lot of files you work on where it's a straight purchase, a straight refi, a straight renewal, a straight buy and sell, a straight buy and investment property. Like how do you stand out from the next person and how do you believe even more important? It was the competition. It's less about that. It's more about how do you actually believe you stand out? So you go into the market with confidence and you hit that discovery call with confidence and you explain your value adds. And so why are some people really good on discovery calls and other people not so much? Why do other people have a higher funding ratio than others? Why do people have more success on social media than others? And they might not even be working as hard or putting in the same hours or anything, but there's other people who are doing really well. So why is that? Well, can't change my mind on this. This is like, there's certain things I hold strong opinions loosely, but not this one. This one is a non -negotiable and it's something you have to work on over time. But if you get it right, you unlock the key to whatever you want. It doesn't matter if it's mortgages, it just could be anything. But whoever's the best storyteller, right? I say the best marketer. Well, being the best marketer is being a really good storyteller. How do you take the same old boring ass mortgage stuff? How do you take that and tell a story around it to the client? Specific example exactly to the client. So when you're marketing on social media, it's how do you captivate people's attention? How do you get their attention? Well, if you're a really good storyteller, that's how you get it. Okay. If you're dealing with someone in the moment and they're like, hey, I'm going to work with you for 20 more basis points or 30 more basis points, I can get over here. Why would they work with you? So you could switch your game and you could go into a niche where you're going to pick cash jam or offset or reverse mortgages or BFS. And you can only focus on that. And you do really well if you only focus on that. But what if you just want to do all the regular stuff because you enjoy it? Or what if you even want us to do the advanced strategies, the storytelling? And what better way to tell a story than through numbers? I made it my mantra early in my mortgage career to let the numbers do the talking. I would find problem. that the client had, I would make them repeat it back. This is a big error that a lot of mortgage brokers make because they just can't wait to tell the client all the things they do. I do this and I'm first point of contact. I'm only point of contact and I work evenings and weekends and you've heard me talk about this a million times. And I do all these things. I've never actually figured out if any of that is important to you. Like, why would I go say all that stuff? Because I want to hear the sound of my voice. where I actually don't believe any of it. So I'm just trying to throw shit at the wall. It's like, I really need to understand what's important to you. I need to get that. And when I do, then I can explain my value add. And then I'm going to build you. This is what I did early in my career. Once again, you've heard me talk about a lot is I build a custom proposal. And I was basically just showing them their situation through numbers. I have simple Google sheet budgets. Sorry, I was yawning there. It's nighttime. I'm getting tired here. Simple budget. And I just walk them through. And sometimes they can't meet with 10 % down. And I'm like, okay, I could be an order taker and just go, yeah, you're pre -approved for this and this and this. Or I go, what if you put five? Here's some more money in the bank. Payments are a little bit higher, but not as much as you thought. I just wanted to show you this option. I wanted to show you 15 % down. The insurance premium goes down a little bit because we got to 85 % loan to value. And your payment, same thing, but we have to take away some of your rainy day funds. But what if we got to 20 %? What if you got a gift from someone or what if we got you an unsecured line? I factored in 30 ,000 on the unsecured line, which we could go and get from a lot of banks, if not the one we're going to put you with. And I factored in the minimum payments on that already in our ongoing monthly budget. I want to show you, you came in with 10. I'm going to show you 5, 15, and 20. I'm going to lay it all over. Like, that's a story. Now they're like, oh, because if they just come to me and they want, show me 10 % down, it's what I have. Well, I'm going to go like, I'm always going to ask the question, why not five, why not 15, why not 20? You need to ask the question, but I'm still going to show you the numbers and I'm going to let the numbers do the talking. If you come to me and you say, hey, we're selling our home and buying, I'm going to be like, great. I'm going to get into it. And I go, do you understand the flow of funds? Do you understand the bridge financing? How long of a bridge do we need? What are you thinking here? How much funds do you think we're going to have? Most time, clients just want to put all the money from the sale over. And I'm like, but why? Why do we think that? I want to do a little mortgage payment. Cool. Well, I'm going to do a deeper analysis. I'm going to look at your situation. And if I see something that pops off the page on me, I'm going to build it into the proposal. Okay, I'm going to build you a custom proposal. And so sometimes it comes that way. And sometimes we're holding out $140 ,000 to buy a rental property because I knew that they wanted to buy a rental property sometime. And then I show them selling that rental property in 15 years, paying capital gains and exit costs at a 2 % or 3 % appreciation of mortgage paid out. We take that leverage investment. We're getting leverage onto $140 ,000, right? We could go buy a $675 ,000. property with 20 % down with closing costs for 140 and just show you like there's $350 ,000 there. And I looked at your AM schedule on this property we're buying now. And in 15 years, you're going to owe 350. So instead of a 25 -year mortgage you want to do where we sell, take all the equity takeout and just put it in the next thing, I'm just showing you another way where you can be mortgaged for in 15 years. And then I'm going to layer in now because I have this in my toolkit, like me personally and my skillset, I'm going to layer in an offset. I know you have $2 ,000 left over every month. I'm going to go, what if you only have $400? What would that mean? Just money sitting there that you've ignored, you don't even know what you're doing with, and it just sits there and gets to work for you. What if we did that over the 15 years? Well, now we can shave off another two years. So now you're down to 13 years. See where I'm going? They came to me with this simple thing, which I'm going to build out that proposal. But then I'm going to show, but what if? I'm going to show these. So I became extremely good working thousands of these different scenarios up on storytelling. That was my value rat. How am I going to tell you the story? And some brokers now do it really well and others not so much. I am baffled. And if this is you, it's okay. But I'm telling you, you need to write the shit. I'm baffled at how many mortgage brokers don't run numbers just on closing costs. Or they get one thing, but they don't show them like X, Y, and Z options. Like the 5, the 10, the 15, the 20, the 25, the 30 -year. All the different nuances you could have based on the client situation. Like if you're not doing that, how are you differentiating yourself? You're just lining them up with a monoline or jamming them into Scotiabank or TD and like trying to find a good rate and then buy down a bit to get there and then complain when they fucking leave you. Well, what did you do? You answered your phone? Oh, well, I hope so. You got back like in a time where you mattered. Well, I really hope you did. That's being an adult and a business owner, an entrepreneur. Like the bar is so low here. Like, come on, what else are we doing? Like show them outside the box. Don't be an order taker. It drives me crazy when you go to a restaurant and they come up. And when I served, it was like, I tried to create an experience. I wanted to earn 25, 30 % tip off you. And I was like, you're paying me 18, 20%. And I'm just taking drink orders and putting in the machine and clearing your plates. Like, what the fuck? That's where we're at. Like, is that? No, that's not me. I'm not going to do that. Like, what am I doing then? Why should I tip you 18%, 20 %? What have you done? You didn't even talk to me. You didn't even ask questions. You didn't even seem like you care. Same thing here. Your easy, low -hanging fruit value add is understanding the situation they're in, all the things they don't know, right? Five things a first -time home buyer should know. You can ask ChatGPT that and it's going to crush you in the answers. Stop with that. Stop with the plain Jane boring ass shit. where that's out there. It's been repurposed a thousand ways. Stand out with something. And you stand out by asking the right questions, right? A lot of you just aren't asking the right questions. You're going through the answers you think you want because you're trying to check employment and try to see if they qualify. But that's different. You have to ask those questions. Of course you have to ask. Do you file your taxes? Did you blah, blah, blah? What's the plan here? Is it guaranteed work? Do you have a contractor? Like you have to ask that. But that's like... That's the baseline stuff. I want to understand what I'm going to present to you. How can I tell a story through that? That's just me taking orders and making sure I can qualify you. And then I go, you're pre -approved, go out and shop. Like, oh, thank you. And why am I working with you again? Like, what's the thing? So I showed people numbers. So I'll give you an example of what we're building is we're just going, hey, we're going to take a big mistake I made in my career was, and this happened twice. You thought I would have learned the first time, but I didn't. I already knew this is, one was a 1 .4, one was a 1 .7. So I lost like $35 ,000 because I didn't do this correctly. Clients would come to me and I would go, and I skipped the middle part of helping them understand why we were doing what we were doing. And I just gave them the answer. I knew we were always going to get to, but I didn't include them in the journey. And so I go, yeah, here you go. And we're going to Scotia or wherever I was taking them. And they're like, yeah, Ryan, we're going with RBC now. And I'm like, what? highly referred in, great conversation, hours of work. Like I knocked out of the park. I knocked out of the park for their friends. They're like, we felt like you just pushed us in a corner and didn't tell us why or give us options. And I was like, oh, it's because I knew that was the answer, but I didn't actually include you in on that. And I was like, damn it. And I did it one more time. I was like, damn it. And then I never did it again. I always gave options. So what if you gave people, people come to you and they're like, Hey, we're with TD. And you're like, cool, here's the TD option. Here's the Scotia option. Here's the MCAP option. And these are the pros and cons of all. And I showed you a 10 % and a 5 and a 15 for these. And then I showed you all the pros and cons of each lender. The bona fide sales clause, the right of survivorship, free payment privileges, portability. Is there a home equity line of credit available or not? Or is there one in the future? Is there a bridge financing available? I laid it all out for you. Potential penalty, low, medium, or high. And you just map it out below the budget. So then they can start seeing like, oh, now you have stuff to talk about. Now you have stuff that they didn't have a clue. And this might be such basic stuff to you, but the average client does not have a clue. They don't know what they don't know. And you doing that will drastically stand out from everybody else. Just that alone, this prolongs the runway until you need a niche. You're just becoming a good storyteller with the stuff you're already dealing with, the products and the type of clients you already have. by mapping out options and slowly dwindling it down until you have one option. And then when you have one option, you get on your final strategy call and you walk through it. And maybe they want to see option number two again. Maybe they want to see a 30 or 25. Maybe they want to see the B versus the A, but the B gets some more money, but it comes with 1 % fee and a 50 % premium on the rate. And you show that. And you do it in the moment on that call on the Zoom call. If you're not doing that, I don't know what you're doing. And if you're losing files, probably a decent reason why is because you're not showing them all. And I know some of you are already doing all this and good for you. But I also go, well, of course you should. You should be doing. This is like 101 broker. You need to map out the options for them. And the more you can do it live allows them to be part of the process and removes the friction of going back and forth through email. Like, okay, let me know. Cool, I'll get back to you in two days, in three days. It gives them more time to talk to the peanut gallery. It gives them more time to talk to their bank. Whoever else, their co -workers, their friends, their realtor, their whoever. Quicker you can do that, you handle all the objections on the spot and you make them feel like they're part of the process. So we're building this out where it has the pros and cons of each lender. You can speak to it and then you can move and shake and go, here's the flow of funds and here's what the bridge loan is going to cost you. Here's the per diem. Let's just assume you're doing a 20 or 30 day bridge. This is what that's going to cost, a prime plus five with a $500 admin fee. We're going to throw that in there and then we have adjustments on closing and you explain what that is and we have legal fees here and maybe you change those because you got a deal or maybe they're a little higher because you're working with a certain lender. It's where you map it all out. It's where you map it all out. And this becomes... a value add that I hung my hat on for so many, so many, so many years was just showing you the numbers. And I just called it a custom proposal. I'm going to build you a custom proposal. If we decide to partner together, after I get your application documents, I'm going to build you a custom proposal. I'm going to show you things you probably did not realize as well. And then I'm going to go into me personally, I'm talking to myself here. I'm going to go into my tickle trunk of skillset and tools. I'm going to pick out all the things that apply to them. If they told me that they are on a contract right now, don't know if it's going to renew, or if they told me they're employed, but they want to go and try their hand at being self -employed and run a consulting business, but that's coming, so we're going to go get this mortgage. I'm probably going to set it up so that I put a big chunk in a HELOC to give them interest -only payments. I'm going to present it to them. It doesn't mean we're going to do it, but I'm going to go here. We keep your cash flow super high because your payment's low. Sure, we're not paying down principal, but... That's not your priority right now. Your priority is changing your quality of life and being happier and starting a business and taking a bit of a risk. So I'm removing the stress of an $800 payment that comes with a principal pay down. I just wanted to show you this as an option. Nobody's fucking showed them this because they didn't ask the right question, right? So those types of things. That's why I love the offset so much because we can tweak, move and shake it to so many different situations. We can morph it in to... Back up the story we want to tell based on the original discovery call and us asking all the questions. And so this is an art form. How do you learn? Well, talk to people who are already doing. Ask the questions they're asking. Ask what they're presenting. Don't try and figure this out on yourself because you don't need to do that. There's already a ton of mortgage brokers crushing it with this mentality and this philosophy and this part of the process. Go and find the people you trust and start asking them the questions and taking them for coffee, taking them for lunch and peel their brain. I'll tell you this. Most mortgage brokers are so proud. There's always the nerds. They want to keep everything in their chest. They think the world's, it's a conspiracy theory and they want to go in a bomb shelter. And they're like, fuck, I'm not giving you my scripts. I've worked so hard on their fucking scripts. Like, you know, like, but they don't, I'm not giving you my process. It's like, there's always going to be those people in every facet of life. But there are other mortgage brokers who are. don't have a scarcity mentality and that are so proud of what they built that they want to show it to you. If anything, it's just for them to kind of present what they do. And they're so proud. I love when I get in with those people on a call because I'm like, oh, you can just feel the passion. You can see it. And then you're like, I'm taking my notes and I'm taking my influence from it. And I'm learning from that. And I'm like, oh my God. And they're, they turn into like coaching and teaching you. And it's a nice thing to see. So go and find the people that are doing that because that's how you become a phenomenal storyteller. There's going to be a world where there's just less, less, less paperwork, less, less heavy handholding of certain things in our industry. There's a lot of those friction points are going to go away with AI. Storytelling will always be there. So it's like, what are the tools? What are the questions? How are you presenting to clients something? You could spitball a voice memo onto Google Docs, then copy and paste, or you can voice memo into ChatGPT, the scenario, the output, and go, make me a one -page presentation. Like, you could just do that. Just don't write an email out in like eight paragraphs of all the numbers crunched. Like it's 2026. People are going to Mars. Like get past that part. You're better than that. We can do better than that. There's so many budgeting softwares. There's so many things out there that you can go build. I like to compare my lender thing where I get to morph because there's really, there's a refinance. There's a purchase. There's a debt console, which is really a refi of the debt console. There's a buy and sell. There's buy a rental property. There's only so many situations. So go and figure that out. There's tools out there you can purchase and use. You can go build your own. I personally like building my own. I can customize and whatnot with them. And I can put in what I know about certain lenders here and there and there. And then I can toggle on and off things, pros and cons about the lenders that suit the narrative for the story I want to tell. And don't worry about trying to tell all angles of the story. And you might be like, Ryan, what does that mean? I'm going to tell you in a sec. This podcast is brought to you by... Gatorade zero, pink. What I mean is, I'll give you an example on the offset. There's sometimes like in the proposal tools I built, we have net effective rate in there. If you don't know what that is, look it up. There's sometimes net effective rate is lower based on the offset and there's sometimes it's a little bit higher. Depending on the deficit we're at interest rate wise and the amortization left on property, the client might have a 399 and my net effective rate might be 407. But they're mortgage -free six years faster. And so I'm not going to put the 406 on the sheet because now it opens up a can of worms of like, oh, but even net effect is higher. And it's like, I need the clients to get out of their own way a lot of times. I know them working with me. They're better off. I know them using this strategy. They're better off. So I don't want them to get caught up in these little pieces. And now as soon as we start overcoming all these objections and having all these things, it no longer seems simple. And they want a big fucking red easy button to press. Just go simple, which is why a lot of people just take an interest rate. They sign here, press hard on the written letter. So I'm going to take that part out. Same on the offset. There are sometimes when the interest paid is a little bit higher. It's rare, but it's sometimes depending on the client situation. So if I know every bone in my body believes this is a good situation for them, I'll just toggle those off and I'll take them away. I'll take them out of the story, right? You're the author. You don't need to tell the same story to each client. I'm going to tailor it. If I know someone is retiring five years, I'm going to talk about the writer survivorship, that God forbid something happens in your family and someone passes away. Well, with the lender here, you're going to have to recall for the mortgage and you're not going to. So they're going to call the mortgage in. Whereas this lender, that's not the case. And this lender, I can get you this type of insurance and this lender, right? I'm going to lean into that. I'm going to lean into all that stuff. I'm going to lean in the lenders that give us higher market rents for rental properties if I'm trying to show them how to build a rental portfolio. I'm going to show them, well, we get more money over here. I need you to refi this property. I need us to go into the TD variable because it locks in the payment because in 18 months, we are going to pull money out and qualify for a rental. So I need the payment on paper to be as low as possible over here to qualify for the maximum amount on the rental we need. And then I'm also going to, we're going to put the rental over this lender here because we get market rents or we get an EVM in market rents or their rental offset helps us. So I'm going to show that through the story and I'm going to tell it. And for us to be able to pull this all off, there's three parts to it. Here's part one, part two, part three. This is why I'm structuring it this way. And there you go, right? I'm not going to get into the prepayment privileges with Scotia and with TD and with the, because it's not relevant. It doesn't matter. for their situation there. I've already come to terms. That doesn't matter. They're not going to take advantage of the prepayment privileges. So why the fuck am I going to show them that? Right? And we used to jam this down people's throats for so long. You know, this was an old way of brokering. Tell them, like, if we go to Scotia, we get 20 -20 if you request it. And you're only 10 -10 over here. How many clients do you know that actually took advantage of prepayment privileges? It's like less than 1%. Yet we talk about it like we're saving them from something. the big bad wolf. And like, my lender has this. It's like, nobody fucking cares. So like, I'm going to ask them, like, where are we doing the extra money? Are we investing? Are we doing here? Like, I'm not going to show you that. So I'm going to leave that off my proposal. It's just wasted space. It's telling a story that doesn't add value because I know it's not true. They're not going to take advantage of it. So if you actually map out all these different scenarios I just talked about, I gave you like so many different scenarios. That's how you start. And that's like, how do I tell this story? Well, less is always more. The more you talk, the less people listen. Remember that,
00:22:33 Ryan Wiley
right? Give them what they want to give them the solution to the problem they had that you identified or uncovered. Show them an outside the box thing that was off the menu and then shut up and then ask a question. What do you think about this? Is there something I showed you that you don't understand? Is there something here that you're surprised you could actually execute on? Was there something else you would have liked me to show you? Like, and you shut up and you go there. You don't give them the nine things you do when they only care about one or two. It's just you talking to hear the sound of your voice, which a lot of mortgage brokers love to do. They're just rambling on, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And the client's sitting there rolling their eyes going, what the fuck? Like. I got a babysitter for this, or I got a kid over here I got to deal with. Like, this is my problem. Talk about the problem. Identify the problem on the discovery call. And then talk about it. Throw some vinegar in it. I don't know why I chose vinegar, but something that makes the pain go. Throw something in there, in the cut, in the wound. Talk about it more. What happened? So, okay, I can sense you're stressed out. I can feel it through the phone. You said cash is tight. Is there something you used to do that you can't do anymore? Like, are there family things? Are there promises you've been made that you just couldn't fulfill because you were being cautious with the family budget? I want to understand these things. Because guess what? When I'm presenting my custom proposal, I'm going to reiterate it again because I'm going to take kick -ass notes. I'm going to record every call. And I'm going to come back and be like, hey, remember when you said this? Well, this alleviates that. And this should help you sleep better at night. Now you can do Johnny's hockey. Or I just wanted to give you a situation that maybe opens up the opportunity to take another family vacation every year without going backwards in your mortgage. I hope you can appreciate that. Right? I'm setting this mortgage up for you how I would for me and my own family. I'd like to protect you guys. I'd like to set you up for future growth. Because you said that was important. Like I'm going to bring that back. See how I'm tying it all in together? See how this is an art form? See how I'm just telling a story? But if I don't ask the right questions, I can't tell a story. And if I don't have a tool or a way to present all this, I don't. But it's literally you building it out on whatever you do. And I used to copy and paste Google Sheets and manipulate them. And I got them down to where I could build them in two, three, four minutes. And then I just did a video over it. And it would be a four to six minute video. And if it was a little more advanced, it'd be sort of a seven to eight minute video. And I'd walk them through everything. And I keep referencing back to our initial call, the problems we're solving. And I would stay in my lane. I would not talk about anything else. I would not get into land transfer tax. It's outlined on there. And they had an understanding on the call. I could tell. I'm not going to get into the legal fees. It's there. I'm not going to spend 27 seconds explaining legal fees. It's there. It's right there on the note. I'm going to spend the time talking about the pain they were in and how I'm trying to help them. Okay. So I want to bring this up. This was a long, okay. That's a good podcast. That's it, kids. I want to show you that the best storyteller. Always wins. And here's the cool part. Once you figure this out and you get your rep set and you find the person that tells good stories and you learn what they're doing and you mimic it in your own flavor, this starts to bleed into all the other areas. Your discovery call gets better. Your closing call, your strategy call, trust gets built and your social media gets way better because you learn how to tell stories. So that's a skill set that I would put a lot of energy in is how can I portray that? How can I think outside the box? What am I showing them? There you go. That's storytelling. Okay, that's it, kids. I really appreciate the support. Thank you. Chat later. Have a good night.
Welcome to the mortgage game. I truly, truly believe that building a mortgage business, a successful one is like playing a game. There's winners, there's losers. There's certain things you try. Some of us are playing checkers while others are playing chess. I've had the ability to coach and mentor hundreds of mortgage brokers. I myself built a very nice business. So now I want to distill all that information, all the things I've learned from that and bring it directly to you in a simple to understand way. I hope you enjoy.
00:00:37 Ryan Wiley
All right. Welcome to the mortgage game podcast. West coast, Wiley coming to you from the Dodge Ram studio. This is an evening version. Yes. An evening version. Kid is in flag football practice. And so I can actually see him play as I'm sitting here. I'm like, I might as well record a podcast. I have some things to talk about. And so let's just get into it. This is an important one. I think a lot of this, we're talking about talk over, gets skirted over, doesn't get enough attention, not nearly enough attention. And it really is what is the difference between you being a good broker and you being a good broker with a lot of money. It comes down to this. Imagine this. So you're a mortgage broker and let's say there's 10 of us in a room and we all have the same products to offer. Like this is literally our industry. So we all have the same products to offer. Now let's just say our, it's a purchase, an insured purchase. And it's like, Why would I work with you versus this person? Like, how do you stand out from the competition? Now, granted, it's a lot more rare to have competition actually with the broker in the moment, but it's more people are out there going, who should I work with? I know this person, I know this person, who should I work with? But how do you actually stand out? So this is a couple things I want to go through here. And same on social media. Like, why is one person's social media take off and not another? A couple of reasons, but there's like one overarching theme, why someone gets more traction on social than another person. You can both make the same amount of videos, talk about the same topic. And so what does it come down to? What's the differentiator? What's the differentiator between average mortgage brokers and really good mortgage brokers? It's not that they know more stuff because on the average file, you only need to know so much. You only need to know. I don't know, like some of this is just basic stuff and you're just aligning with a product you have. Like it's not like you're running through stated income files and you're structuring ad backs and coming up with strategic ways to do this and that and these advanced strategies. Like most brokers don't have any that are doing it. There's a lot of files you work on where it's a straight purchase, a straight refi, a straight renewal, a straight buy and sell, a straight buy and investment property. Like how do you stand out from the next person and how do you believe even more important? It was the competition. It's less about that. It's more about how do you actually believe you stand out? So you go into the market with confidence and you hit that discovery call with confidence and you explain your value adds. And so why are some people really good on discovery calls and other people not so much? Why do other people have a higher funding ratio than others? Why do people have more success on social media than others? And they might not even be working as hard or putting in the same hours or anything, but there's other people who are doing really well. So why is that? Well, can't change my mind on this. This is like, there's certain things I hold strong opinions loosely, but not this one. This one is a non -negotiable and it's something you have to work on over time. But if you get it right, you unlock the key to whatever you want. It doesn't matter if it's mortgages, it just could be anything. But whoever's the best storyteller, right? I say the best marketer. Well, being the best marketer is being a really good storyteller. How do you take the same old boring ass mortgage stuff? How do you take that and tell a story around it to the client? Specific example exactly to the client. So when you're marketing on social media, it's how do you captivate people's attention? How do you get their attention? Well, if you're a really good storyteller, that's how you get it. Okay. If you're dealing with someone in the moment and they're like, hey, I'm going to work with you for 20 more basis points or 30 more basis points, I can get over here. Why would they work with you? So you could switch your game and you could go into a niche where you're going to pick cash jam or offset or reverse mortgages or BFS. And you can only focus on that. And you do really well if you only focus on that. But what if you just want to do all the regular stuff because you enjoy it? Or what if you even want us to do the advanced strategies, the storytelling? And what better way to tell a story than through numbers? I made it my mantra early in my mortgage career to let the numbers do the talking. I would find problem. that the client had, I would make them repeat it back. This is a big error that a lot of mortgage brokers make because they just can't wait to tell the client all the things they do. I do this and I'm first point of contact. I'm only point of contact and I work evenings and weekends and you've heard me talk about this a million times. And I do all these things. I've never actually figured out if any of that is important to you. Like, why would I go say all that stuff? Because I want to hear the sound of my voice. where I actually don't believe any of it. So I'm just trying to throw shit at the wall. It's like, I really need to understand what's important to you. I need to get that. And when I do, then I can explain my value add. And then I'm going to build you. This is what I did early in my career. Once again, you've heard me talk about a lot is I build a custom proposal. And I was basically just showing them their situation through numbers. I have simple Google sheet budgets. Sorry, I was yawning there. It's nighttime. I'm getting tired here. Simple budget. And I just walk them through. And sometimes they can't meet with 10 % down. And I'm like, okay, I could be an order taker and just go, yeah, you're pre -approved for this and this and this. Or I go, what if you put five? Here's some more money in the bank. Payments are a little bit higher, but not as much as you thought. I just wanted to show you this option. I wanted to show you 15 % down. The insurance premium goes down a little bit because we got to 85 % loan to value. And your payment, same thing, but we have to take away some of your rainy day funds. But what if we got to 20 %? What if you got a gift from someone or what if we got you an unsecured line? I factored in 30 ,000 on the unsecured line, which we could go and get from a lot of banks, if not the one we're going to put you with. And I factored in the minimum payments on that already in our ongoing monthly budget. I want to show you, you came in with 10. I'm going to show you 5, 15, and 20. I'm going to lay it all over. Like, that's a story. Now they're like, oh, because if they just come to me and they want, show me 10 % down, it's what I have. Well, I'm going to go like, I'm always going to ask the question, why not five, why not 15, why not 20? You need to ask the question, but I'm still going to show you the numbers and I'm going to let the numbers do the talking. If you come to me and you say, hey, we're selling our home and buying, I'm going to be like, great. I'm going to get into it. And I go, do you understand the flow of funds? Do you understand the bridge financing? How long of a bridge do we need? What are you thinking here? How much funds do you think we're going to have? Most time, clients just want to put all the money from the sale over. And I'm like, but why? Why do we think that? I want to do a little mortgage payment. Cool. Well, I'm going to do a deeper analysis. I'm going to look at your situation. And if I see something that pops off the page on me, I'm going to build it into the proposal. Okay, I'm going to build you a custom proposal. And so sometimes it comes that way. And sometimes we're holding out $140 ,000 to buy a rental property because I knew that they wanted to buy a rental property sometime. And then I show them selling that rental property in 15 years, paying capital gains and exit costs at a 2 % or 3 % appreciation of mortgage paid out. We take that leverage investment. We're getting leverage onto $140 ,000, right? We could go buy a $675 ,000. property with 20 % down with closing costs for 140 and just show you like there's $350 ,000 there. And I looked at your AM schedule on this property we're buying now. And in 15 years, you're going to owe 350. So instead of a 25 -year mortgage you want to do where we sell, take all the equity takeout and just put it in the next thing, I'm just showing you another way where you can be mortgaged for in 15 years. And then I'm going to layer in now because I have this in my toolkit, like me personally and my skillset, I'm going to layer in an offset. I know you have $2 ,000 left over every month. I'm going to go, what if you only have $400? What would that mean? Just money sitting there that you've ignored, you don't even know what you're doing with, and it just sits there and gets to work for you. What if we did that over the 15 years? Well, now we can shave off another two years. So now you're down to 13 years. See where I'm going? They came to me with this simple thing, which I'm going to build out that proposal. But then I'm going to show, but what if? I'm going to show these. So I became extremely good working thousands of these different scenarios up on storytelling. That was my value rat. How am I going to tell you the story? And some brokers now do it really well and others not so much. I am baffled. And if this is you, it's okay. But I'm telling you, you need to write the shit. I'm baffled at how many mortgage brokers don't run numbers just on closing costs. Or they get one thing, but they don't show them like X, Y, and Z options. Like the 5, the 10, the 15, the 20, the 25, the 30 -year. All the different nuances you could have based on the client situation. Like if you're not doing that, how are you differentiating yourself? You're just lining them up with a monoline or jamming them into Scotiabank or TD and like trying to find a good rate and then buy down a bit to get there and then complain when they fucking leave you. Well, what did you do? You answered your phone? Oh, well, I hope so. You got back like in a time where you mattered. Well, I really hope you did. That's being an adult and a business owner, an entrepreneur. Like the bar is so low here. Like, come on, what else are we doing? Like show them outside the box. Don't be an order taker. It drives me crazy when you go to a restaurant and they come up. And when I served, it was like, I tried to create an experience. I wanted to earn 25, 30 % tip off you. And I was like, you're paying me 18, 20%. And I'm just taking drink orders and putting in the machine and clearing your plates. Like, what the fuck? That's where we're at. Like, is that? No, that's not me. I'm not going to do that. Like, what am I doing then? Why should I tip you 18%, 20 %? What have you done? You didn't even talk to me. You didn't even ask questions. You didn't even seem like you care. Same thing here. Your easy, low -hanging fruit value add is understanding the situation they're in, all the things they don't know, right? Five things a first -time home buyer should know. You can ask ChatGPT that and it's going to crush you in the answers. Stop with that. Stop with the plain Jane boring ass shit. where that's out there. It's been repurposed a thousand ways. Stand out with something. And you stand out by asking the right questions, right? A lot of you just aren't asking the right questions. You're going through the answers you think you want because you're trying to check employment and try to see if they qualify. But that's different. You have to ask those questions. Of course you have to ask. Do you file your taxes? Did you blah, blah, blah? What's the plan here? Is it guaranteed work? Do you have a contractor? Like you have to ask that. But that's like... That's the baseline stuff. I want to understand what I'm going to present to you. How can I tell a story through that? That's just me taking orders and making sure I can qualify you. And then I go, you're pre -approved, go out and shop. Like, oh, thank you. And why am I working with you again? Like, what's the thing? So I showed people numbers. So I'll give you an example of what we're building is we're just going, hey, we're going to take a big mistake I made in my career was, and this happened twice. You thought I would have learned the first time, but I didn't. I already knew this is, one was a 1 .4, one was a 1 .7. So I lost like $35 ,000 because I didn't do this correctly. Clients would come to me and I would go, and I skipped the middle part of helping them understand why we were doing what we were doing. And I just gave them the answer. I knew we were always going to get to, but I didn't include them in the journey. And so I go, yeah, here you go. And we're going to Scotia or wherever I was taking them. And they're like, yeah, Ryan, we're going with RBC now. And I'm like, what? highly referred in, great conversation, hours of work. Like I knocked out of the park. I knocked out of the park for their friends. They're like, we felt like you just pushed us in a corner and didn't tell us why or give us options. And I was like, oh, it's because I knew that was the answer, but I didn't actually include you in on that. And I was like, damn it. And I did it one more time. I was like, damn it. And then I never did it again. I always gave options. So what if you gave people, people come to you and they're like, Hey, we're with TD. And you're like, cool, here's the TD option. Here's the Scotia option. Here's the MCAP option. And these are the pros and cons of all. And I showed you a 10 % and a 5 and a 15 for these. And then I showed you all the pros and cons of each lender. The bona fide sales clause, the right of survivorship, free payment privileges, portability. Is there a home equity line of credit available or not? Or is there one in the future? Is there a bridge financing available? I laid it all out for you. Potential penalty, low, medium, or high. And you just map it out below the budget. So then they can start seeing like, oh, now you have stuff to talk about. Now you have stuff that they didn't have a clue. And this might be such basic stuff to you, but the average client does not have a clue. They don't know what they don't know. And you doing that will drastically stand out from everybody else. Just that alone, this prolongs the runway until you need a niche. You're just becoming a good storyteller with the stuff you're already dealing with, the products and the type of clients you already have. by mapping out options and slowly dwindling it down until you have one option. And then when you have one option, you get on your final strategy call and you walk through it. And maybe they want to see option number two again. Maybe they want to see a 30 or 25. Maybe they want to see the B versus the A, but the B gets some more money, but it comes with 1 % fee and a 50 % premium on the rate. And you show that. And you do it in the moment on that call on the Zoom call. If you're not doing that, I don't know what you're doing. And if you're losing files, probably a decent reason why is because you're not showing them all. And I know some of you are already doing all this and good for you. But I also go, well, of course you should. You should be doing. This is like 101 broker. You need to map out the options for them. And the more you can do it live allows them to be part of the process and removes the friction of going back and forth through email. Like, okay, let me know. Cool, I'll get back to you in two days, in three days. It gives them more time to talk to the peanut gallery. It gives them more time to talk to their bank. Whoever else, their co -workers, their friends, their realtor, their whoever. Quicker you can do that, you handle all the objections on the spot and you make them feel like they're part of the process. So we're building this out where it has the pros and cons of each lender. You can speak to it and then you can move and shake and go, here's the flow of funds and here's what the bridge loan is going to cost you. Here's the per diem. Let's just assume you're doing a 20 or 30 day bridge. This is what that's going to cost, a prime plus five with a $500 admin fee. We're going to throw that in there and then we have adjustments on closing and you explain what that is and we have legal fees here and maybe you change those because you got a deal or maybe they're a little higher because you're working with a certain lender. It's where you map it all out. It's where you map it all out. And this becomes... a value add that I hung my hat on for so many, so many, so many years was just showing you the numbers. And I just called it a custom proposal. I'm going to build you a custom proposal. If we decide to partner together, after I get your application documents, I'm going to build you a custom proposal. I'm going to show you things you probably did not realize as well. And then I'm going to go into me personally, I'm talking to myself here. I'm going to go into my tickle trunk of skillset and tools. I'm going to pick out all the things that apply to them. If they told me that they are on a contract right now, don't know if it's going to renew, or if they told me they're employed, but they want to go and try their hand at being self -employed and run a consulting business, but that's coming, so we're going to go get this mortgage. I'm probably going to set it up so that I put a big chunk in a HELOC to give them interest -only payments. I'm going to present it to them. It doesn't mean we're going to do it, but I'm going to go here. We keep your cash flow super high because your payment's low. Sure, we're not paying down principal, but... That's not your priority right now. Your priority is changing your quality of life and being happier and starting a business and taking a bit of a risk. So I'm removing the stress of an $800 payment that comes with a principal pay down. I just wanted to show you this as an option. Nobody's fucking showed them this because they didn't ask the right question, right? So those types of things. That's why I love the offset so much because we can tweak, move and shake it to so many different situations. We can morph it in to... Back up the story we want to tell based on the original discovery call and us asking all the questions. And so this is an art form. How do you learn? Well, talk to people who are already doing. Ask the questions they're asking. Ask what they're presenting. Don't try and figure this out on yourself because you don't need to do that. There's already a ton of mortgage brokers crushing it with this mentality and this philosophy and this part of the process. Go and find the people you trust and start asking them the questions and taking them for coffee, taking them for lunch and peel their brain. I'll tell you this. Most mortgage brokers are so proud. There's always the nerds. They want to keep everything in their chest. They think the world's, it's a conspiracy theory and they want to go in a bomb shelter. And they're like, fuck, I'm not giving you my scripts. I've worked so hard on their fucking scripts. Like, you know, like, but they don't, I'm not giving you my process. It's like, there's always going to be those people in every facet of life. But there are other mortgage brokers who are. don't have a scarcity mentality and that are so proud of what they built that they want to show it to you. If anything, it's just for them to kind of present what they do. And they're so proud. I love when I get in with those people on a call because I'm like, oh, you can just feel the passion. You can see it. And then you're like, I'm taking my notes and I'm taking my influence from it. And I'm learning from that. And I'm like, oh my God. And they're, they turn into like coaching and teaching you. And it's a nice thing to see. So go and find the people that are doing that because that's how you become a phenomenal storyteller. There's going to be a world where there's just less, less, less paperwork, less, less heavy handholding of certain things in our industry. There's a lot of those friction points are going to go away with AI. Storytelling will always be there. So it's like, what are the tools? What are the questions? How are you presenting to clients something? You could spitball a voice memo onto Google Docs, then copy and paste, or you can voice memo into ChatGPT, the scenario, the output, and go, make me a one -page presentation. Like, you could just do that. Just don't write an email out in like eight paragraphs of all the numbers crunched. Like it's 2026. People are going to Mars. Like get past that part. You're better than that. We can do better than that. There's so many budgeting softwares. There's so many things out there that you can go build. I like to compare my lender thing where I get to morph because there's really, there's a refinance. There's a purchase. There's a debt console, which is really a refi of the debt console. There's a buy and sell. There's buy a rental property. There's only so many situations. So go and figure that out. There's tools out there you can purchase and use. You can go build your own. I personally like building my own. I can customize and whatnot with them. And I can put in what I know about certain lenders here and there and there. And then I can toggle on and off things, pros and cons about the lenders that suit the narrative for the story I want to tell. And don't worry about trying to tell all angles of the story. And you might be like, Ryan, what does that mean? I'm going to tell you in a sec. This podcast is brought to you by... Gatorade zero, pink. What I mean is, I'll give you an example on the offset. There's sometimes like in the proposal tools I built, we have net effective rate in there. If you don't know what that is, look it up. There's sometimes net effective rate is lower based on the offset and there's sometimes it's a little bit higher. Depending on the deficit we're at interest rate wise and the amortization left on property, the client might have a 399 and my net effective rate might be 407. But they're mortgage -free six years faster. And so I'm not going to put the 406 on the sheet because now it opens up a can of worms of like, oh, but even net effect is higher. And it's like, I need the clients to get out of their own way a lot of times. I know them working with me. They're better off. I know them using this strategy. They're better off. So I don't want them to get caught up in these little pieces. And now as soon as we start overcoming all these objections and having all these things, it no longer seems simple. And they want a big fucking red easy button to press. Just go simple, which is why a lot of people just take an interest rate. They sign here, press hard on the written letter. So I'm going to take that part out. Same on the offset. There are sometimes when the interest paid is a little bit higher. It's rare, but it's sometimes depending on the client situation. So if I know every bone in my body believes this is a good situation for them, I'll just toggle those off and I'll take them away. I'll take them out of the story, right? You're the author. You don't need to tell the same story to each client. I'm going to tailor it. If I know someone is retiring five years, I'm going to talk about the writer survivorship, that God forbid something happens in your family and someone passes away. Well, with the lender here, you're going to have to recall for the mortgage and you're not going to. So they're going to call the mortgage in. Whereas this lender, that's not the case. And this lender, I can get you this type of insurance and this lender, right? I'm going to lean into that. I'm going to lean into all that stuff. I'm going to lean in the lenders that give us higher market rents for rental properties if I'm trying to show them how to build a rental portfolio. I'm going to show them, well, we get more money over here. I need you to refi this property. I need us to go into the TD variable because it locks in the payment because in 18 months, we are going to pull money out and qualify for a rental. So I need the payment on paper to be as low as possible over here to qualify for the maximum amount on the rental we need. And then I'm also going to, we're going to put the rental over this lender here because we get market rents or we get an EVM in market rents or their rental offset helps us. So I'm going to show that through the story and I'm going to tell it. And for us to be able to pull this all off, there's three parts to it. Here's part one, part two, part three. This is why I'm structuring it this way. And there you go, right? I'm not going to get into the prepayment privileges with Scotia and with TD and with the, because it's not relevant. It doesn't matter. for their situation there. I've already come to terms. That doesn't matter. They're not going to take advantage of the prepayment privileges. So why the fuck am I going to show them that? Right? And we used to jam this down people's throats for so long. You know, this was an old way of brokering. Tell them, like, if we go to Scotia, we get 20 -20 if you request it. And you're only 10 -10 over here. How many clients do you know that actually took advantage of prepayment privileges? It's like less than 1%. Yet we talk about it like we're saving them from something. the big bad wolf. And like, my lender has this. It's like, nobody fucking cares. So like, I'm going to ask them, like, where are we doing the extra money? Are we investing? Are we doing here? Like, I'm not going to show you that. So I'm going to leave that off my proposal. It's just wasted space. It's telling a story that doesn't add value because I know it's not true. They're not going to take advantage of it. So if you actually map out all these different scenarios I just talked about, I gave you like so many different scenarios. That's how you start. And that's like, how do I tell this story? Well, less is always more. The more you talk, the less people listen. Remember that,
00:22:33 Ryan Wiley
right? Give them what they want to give them the solution to the problem they had that you identified or uncovered. Show them an outside the box thing that was off the menu and then shut up and then ask a question. What do you think about this? Is there something I showed you that you don't understand? Is there something here that you're surprised you could actually execute on? Was there something else you would have liked me to show you? Like, and you shut up and you go there. You don't give them the nine things you do when they only care about one or two. It's just you talking to hear the sound of your voice, which a lot of mortgage brokers love to do. They're just rambling on, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And the client's sitting there rolling their eyes going, what the fuck? Like. I got a babysitter for this, or I got a kid over here I got to deal with. Like, this is my problem. Talk about the problem. Identify the problem on the discovery call. And then talk about it. Throw some vinegar in it. I don't know why I chose vinegar, but something that makes the pain go. Throw something in there, in the cut, in the wound. Talk about it more. What happened? So, okay, I can sense you're stressed out. I can feel it through the phone. You said cash is tight. Is there something you used to do that you can't do anymore? Like, are there family things? Are there promises you've been made that you just couldn't fulfill because you were being cautious with the family budget? I want to understand these things. Because guess what? When I'm presenting my custom proposal, I'm going to reiterate it again because I'm going to take kick -ass notes. I'm going to record every call. And I'm going to come back and be like, hey, remember when you said this? Well, this alleviates that. And this should help you sleep better at night. Now you can do Johnny's hockey. Or I just wanted to give you a situation that maybe opens up the opportunity to take another family vacation every year without going backwards in your mortgage. I hope you can appreciate that. Right? I'm setting this mortgage up for you how I would for me and my own family. I'd like to protect you guys. I'd like to set you up for future growth. Because you said that was important. Like I'm going to bring that back. See how I'm tying it all in together? See how this is an art form? See how I'm just telling a story? But if I don't ask the right questions, I can't tell a story. And if I don't have a tool or a way to present all this, I don't. But it's literally you building it out on whatever you do. And I used to copy and paste Google Sheets and manipulate them. And I got them down to where I could build them in two, three, four minutes. And then I just did a video over it. And it would be a four to six minute video. And if it was a little more advanced, it'd be sort of a seven to eight minute video. And I'd walk them through everything. And I keep referencing back to our initial call, the problems we're solving. And I would stay in my lane. I would not talk about anything else. I would not get into land transfer tax. It's outlined on there. And they had an understanding on the call. I could tell. I'm not going to get into the legal fees. It's there. I'm not going to spend 27 seconds explaining legal fees. It's there. It's right there on the note. I'm going to spend the time talking about the pain they were in and how I'm trying to help them. Okay. So I want to bring this up. This was a long, okay. That's a good podcast. That's it, kids. I want to show you that the best storyteller. Always wins. And here's the cool part. Once you figure this out and you get your rep set and you find the person that tells good stories and you learn what they're doing and you mimic it in your own flavor, this starts to bleed into all the other areas. Your discovery call gets better. Your closing call, your strategy call, trust gets built and your social media gets way better because you learn how to tell stories. So that's a skill set that I would put a lot of energy in is how can I portray that? How can I think outside the box? What am I showing them? There you go. That's storytelling. Okay, that's it, kids. I really appreciate the support. Thank you. Chat later. Have a good night.