Ep013: Free Book – How to Become a Home Selling Genius

Laci LeBlanc: Hello and welcome back to the All Things Real Estate Podcast. I’m Laci LeBlanc, and today we’re talking about a brand new book from Chris McAllister and the real estate professionals at ROOST Real Estate Company.

The book is called Your Guide to Becoming a Home Selling Genius: The Eight MindsetsThat Make the Difference Between Home Selling Success and Disappointment. Chris, first off, congratulations. Well, 

Chris McAllister: thank you very much. How are you today? 

Laci LeBlanc: I’m great. How are you? 

Chris McAllister: I’m doing all right. I’m, uh – 

Laci LeBlanc: Excited? 

Chris McAllister: Yeah. I, I, I’m excited about this book because I think it solves a, you know, a real problem, right?

Or helps people solve a real problem. Selling a home is one of the biggest financial decisions most people ever make. I think it’s actually bigger than buying the home the first time, right? But a lot of sellers don’t go into it with, with hope. Uh, a, a lot of sellers go into with a whole bunch of hope, right, that they, they, that, that things are gonna work out in their favor, but they tend not to go in with a strategy.

And this book is designed to change that. Uh, you know, I guess it comes down to hope is not a strategy, so we’re gonna help you put one together. 

Laci LeBlanc: Well, that’s a pretty big claim, especially for me that selling your home for the first time or the fifth time is a bigger thing than buying your home as we all know the anxiety that I went through when buying my home.

So let’s start there. Um, why, why is that the case and why did you decide to write this book now? 

Chris McAllister: Well, obviously when you buy a home, you wanna buy it right, right? Nobody wants to overpay, you know, you, you wanna pay whatever fair market value is or, you know, sometimes you get lucky and you can do better than that.

But by the same token, people, people know they have equity in their home, but they may not know exactly how much. And it’s, it’s big a disappointment to, you know, not harvest all of that equity. And, and it’s one thing not to harvest all the equity and know it. It’s another thing not to harvest all that equity and not know it.

A strategy is gonna allow you to make sure you get every dollar that is owed to you based on how you’ve managed that property, you know, uh, how it’s appreciated, how you bought it, how you’ve maintained it and so forth. But – 

Laci LeBlanc: I guess that’s true, right? So if you make the purchase and you pay too much, right, you don’t, as long as you can make your monthly payments and you can, you know, do the upkeep and the maintenance and the utilities, you don’t really realize that you’ve paid too much or, you know, how, how you’ve done, you don’t know how you’ve done on buying your house until you go to sell it.

I hadn’t really though of it that way. 

Chris McAllister: Yeah. You really, you really don’t know. And there’s so many things that the seller pays for, right, when they go to sell a house that comes out of their side of the, the closing equation. It’s just important to know what the house is truly worth, you know, wh- what the costs are and so forth.

And, and that’s what we’re gonna get into here. But, you know, I actually wrote this book once before back in 2019 and, you know, uh, that, that’s, that’s seven years ago now. So, you know, we’ve learned a lot at ROOST. Our agents have learned a lot. I’ve learned a lot. And that, but that version of the book was, was a scorecard book.

It was where sellers could basically fill out a scorecard and gauge their current skill and knowledge level relative to, uh, what, what was working well in the market at that time. And the fact is the market has changed dramatically since then in the last seven years. You know, COVID happened and, and moreover the last, uh, almost seven years, a lot of, um, a lot of the advice that people still hear is outdated even though the world changed so dramatically, you know, in the four times before COVID and, and after.

So even here in, uh, April of 2026, the, your strategy’s probably gonna be a little bit different than it was even just a few months ago and certainly different than it was back in 2019. You know, the rules have changed, buyer expectations have changed, technology has changed, you know, interest rates are much, much higher than they were in 2019, and all of that has changed the psychology of the market.

So sellers need a better strategy, they need a smarter roadmap, and they need it now. So we at ROOST wanted to create something that was practical, current, and honest that would help people understand what actually matters when you go to sell your home and what is just noise. And that’s really the heart of the book.

You know, it was updated because the process has changed and sellers need a guide that reflects today’s market reality, not yesterday’s or back in 2019. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, so who’s gonna benefit the most from this book, seller-wise? We keep saying sellers, but what kind of sellers are gonna benefit the most from this book?

Chris McAllister: As I was writing the outline for the book and putting it together, I really felt that my primary audience was the first time home seller, but it’s really any homeowner who has not sold a home in a long time and feels unsure about what they’re stepping into. Again, it’s a big deal to buy a house, but it’s just a big a deal and probably more of a deal to sell a house.

Selling the house is where you actually harvest, you know, the money you made, harvest the equity on that property, whether to put it into another home, downsize whatever you’re gonna do. So selling matters. You know, a lot of people think that selling is just putting the home on the market, waiting for offers and picking the highest one, and that’s not how smart selling works.

This book is for people who want some clarity, confidence, and a process. It’s for people who want to understand not, not just what to do, but how to think about, again, you know, working through one of the most valuable, uh, financial transactions of your life. 

Laci LeBlanc: So it feels like you’re saying to me that you shouldn’t just hire an agent and leave it all up to them, that it’s important that you kind of understand the process yourself, which tracks for, you know, the way that I, the way that I was born and raised and lived my life.

But, um, I think there’s something to be said that you don’t just wanna hire an agent and, you know, let them take the wheel necessarily. They’re, they’re definitely the best person for the job, but you wanna understand the process while it’s happening, um, and be a part of it as opposed to letting it happen to you.

Chris McAllister: That’s right. That’s absolutely right. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah. So, um, the subtitle of this book uses the phrase eight mindsets. We love a mindset around here, but why focus on mindsets, which is kind of, again, we, we’ve called them a little bit touchy-feely, um, but that doesn’t make them any less important. But why focus on mindsets instead of just, like, checklists, tactics, the scorecard that you mentioned earlier?

Chris McAllister: Well, mindsets tend to be constant, right? Mi- minds- mindsets stick around. Mindsets, you know, are, are things that you carry with you. They travel. But tactics, they change. And tactics can change, you know, year to year, even month to month, especially in a dynamic market like we’re in now. A checklist is useful, but a mindset is what helps you make decisions when the market shifts, right?

When feedback comes in, when offers aren’t exactly what you hoped for or when emotions start to, to creep in. You know, the best sellers are not the ones with the fanciest house. They’re the ones who learn how to think strategically, stay calm, and respond intelligently. You know, i- it’s not about the house, right?

It’s truly about the seller and the seller’s mindset. And that’s what separates success from disappointment. I want this book to help people become smarter decision makers, not just better box checkers. 

Laci LeBlanc: So what do you think is the biggest mistake that sellers make then? 

Chris McAllister: Probably thinking emotionally when they need to be thinking strategically.

And this shows up in a lot of ways, you know, overpricing because they love their house and their house is special is, is you know, always something that, you know, we counsel people to avoid, you know, ignoring repairs that, uh, or having deferred maintenance on things that maybe they, you know, as a, as living there every day, you become accustomed to, but I guarantee you buyers are going to notice, you know, assuming that the market is so strong that it’s just gonna rescue, you know, a weak presentation, right, or fixating on a, on a list price and getting a certain top line price instead of focusing on what the net seller proceeds are, the true bottom dollar that you’re gonna walk away with from closing.

You know, sellers can leave a ton of money on the table, not because the market was bad, but because their thinking was off. And one of the core messages in this book is that you’re not just selling your home, you’re managing an asset in a competitive marketplace. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, it’s part of that, that fe – that feels like part of the preparation that you talk so much about.

Why is this preparation such a big deal when it comes to selling your house? ‘Cause 

Chris McAllister: preparation changes everything. It, it, it, you know, when you prepare your home for sale, it changes how buyers feel about the home, it changes how it photographs, how it shows, how quickly it sells, what it sells for. You know, a lot of people assume getting ready for the market means a massive reserva – uh, renovation.

You know, there’s two extremes, right? You have people who don’t wanna do anything or don’t think they have to do anything, and then you have people who go to the other, other extreme, right? And, and people who think they have to go through a massive reser – renovation to sell their house or to get top dollar, it’s usually not the case.

But what, what the mindset has to be is about being intentional. And, and as far as home preparation, you know, that means a deep cleaning, right? You know, a real spring cleaning. You know, you get the windows, you get the baseboards, you, you, you, you just do all the stuff that, um, you know, I guess the spring cleaning entails, but most of us don’t do even on a yearly basis, right?

So deep cleaning, fix the obvious stuff. If it, if, if there’s a light switch that doesn’t work, fix it, you know? If, if the, if the paint’s peeling, uh, well, hopefully it’s not peeling, peeling, but, but that’s a different issue. But if the paint needs touched up, touch it up. If the room needs painted, paint it, right?

Then most of all, declutter, right? It is so easy to, you know, wake up one day and realize how much stuff you’ve accumulated in your house, you know, so you wanna get rid of that when it comes time to sell. Put it in storage, have a garage sale, um, you know, whatever you wanna do. But you wanna be very, very intentional about preparation and making sure that your home is, is poised, basically, to make a, a great first impression with a seller.

You know, buyers, it’s funny, you know, buyers decide emotionally if they wanna buy a house, uh, but they, they justify it logically, right? So buyers decide, I don’t know how to put this exactly, right? But w- w – the. I guess a seller’s favorite buyer is a buyer who reacts emotionally if the house is set up perfectly.

But what it comes down to is if a home feels cared for, right? If you walk into a home, you just have a feeling, and, you know, I’m not all that great a feelings, Laci, as you know, but you, you know when you walk into a house if it, if it’s been cared for, right? You know immediately if it’s move-in ready. If you, if you get that first impression from the moment you drive by, you know, uh, you know, get out of the car, walk up to the front door and so forth, there’s a certain amount of momentum that gets created and it all starts with, you know, driving up.

I’ll say honestly, it all starts when they, when they first see the property on, uh, Zillow or Realtor.com or whatever. By the same token, if you walk up to a house and it feels tired, it’s unfinished or neglected, I guarantee you, whether they’re conscious of it or not or thinking logically, buyers emotionally are gonna start discounting it immediately.

And that’s why preparation matters so much and, and I really feel the book lays that out in detail. 

Laci LeBlanc: And I feel like everybody who’s listening is probably, I, and I know I just did, just relived driving up to the house that they currently live in. 

Chris McAllister: Yeah. 

Laci LeBlanc: Whether you’re renting, whether you bought it, whether, you know, this is your first house or your 15th house, I feel like people are reliving, that’s what I did.

I relived the experience of driving up to my house, seeing it for the first time and the feeling that I had. So I think you’re right, buyers do decide things emotionally and then they have to go back and justify it logically. 

Chris McAllister: Right. And as a seller, you kind of have to put yourself back into the mind space that you had when you first saw the house that you wanted to buy and how excited you were and, and emotional you were.

Now, yes, you know, you, you got so excited that you, you know, made an offer and, and maybe that o – i- i – and hopefully that offer was made, um, very logically, right, based on what houses and neighborhood were selling for, you know, how much you can afford, how much your pre-approval was. But it is an e – an emotional thing, right?

You’re not gonna, you’re not gonna make the effort to try to buy that house if you don’t have an, an emotional connection when you, when you, you know, first see it, whether that’s online or in person. And as a seller, you know, you’ve gotta put yourself back in that mindset of, of, of a buyer, um, you know, and let that form every decision you make.

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, just, I think you hear so much when you talk about buying and selling properties about taking the emotion out of it, but it’s really not that at all. It is an emotional experience. No. It’s gonna be an emotional experience. You just have to know how to compartmentalize that emotion and, and know what role it’s supposed to play so that you don’t let it take the, take the wheel.

Chris McAllister: As a seller, you wanna insight emotion in a buyer. But also as a seller, you wanna keep your emotions tamped down, right? Because this is the time when you can’t be emotional. You have to be, you know, you, you have to be calculating, you have to be strategic because your goal is to maximize your return on that sale so you can go have money to put down on the next house that you do get emotionally excited about that you have to have.

Laci LeBlanc: That’s so funny. It’s just so funny because nobody talks about it that way. Um, but what the, what you emphasize a lot in the book and what everybody talks about a lot is pricing. Um, so you say that pricing is a strategy and not just a number. Can you talk to me about that a little bit? 

Chris McAllister: Yeah. Price is not a label.

It’s a positioning decision in the, in the market, right? It’s, it’s marketing. You know, pricing determines whether buyers will even look at your home in the first place. A lot of sellers still think that they can price high and see what happens. And usually what happens is nothing. Worse, the house sits, it gets stale, and then it sells for less after, uh, you know, the momentum is gone.

It, it, it’s been like this really since the beginning of real estate. If you overprice your house at the start, it will likely sell for less than it would’ve sold for if you would’ve priced it at or near market value at the beginning. It’s just a fact of life and every realtor who’s been around for a while can show you on paper with numbers and statistics, you know, why that’s true.

So, you know, pricing is absolutely critical and many times it’s, it’s more art than science, and that’s a conversation that you need to have with your listing agent, right? This, the, the, the market, you know, sort of gives you a launch win- window, right, when you’re, when you’re listing first hits, right? The moment that your agent, you know, hits go on the MLS and that, and you’re listening, your house goes out to, you know, every place on the internet, that’s, that’s your launch window.

And if you don’t have great pictures, if you don’t have great presentation, if you don’t have the price right, sharp as a tack that you’ve got it as, as close to perfect as it can be so that you can generate, you know, hopefully multiple offers, you know, all that has to happen the moment that launch window opens.

If you waste that window with the wrong price, you’re gonna do yourself some real long-term damage, right? Now, if it turns out you’re too high, you know, that’s not necessarily end of the world. It may be a disappointment, but as long as you react to what the market is or isn’t telling you in the first couple of weeks and adjust the price accordingly, you’re gonna be fine.

But that goes back to the whole point of this mindset is, you know, pricing, pricing, uh, uh, is a strategy. It’s not a static number, right? It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s what the market will bear, but it is still, you know, as much art as science. But smart pricing is about creating attention, creating urgency, and hopefully creating competition.

It can’t be about your ego or what emotionally you want to see happen with your very special house. This, this whole thing is ultimately about outcomes. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, and you mentioned a few other, you, you talked about how pricing is marketing, and then you mentioned a few other things in there. Um, in the book, you also make a point that marketing has changed.

So in addition to price, what does good home marketing look like right now? 

Chris McAllister: Well, today, marketing starts long before the first showing. You know, the first showing is online. Buyers see your home on their phones first, right? Scrolling through ZillowRealtor.com and all the rest. They don’t see your home in person at first.

I, I think it’s one in a million these days that somebody’s just driving through a neighborhood, sees a house on a for sale sign, they fall in love and buy that house. Everything happens like everything else in, in life these days that happens online. And that is way more true now after coming through COVID than it was in 2019 when we first wrote this book.

So great photography matters, video matters, um, or the, you know, the 3D house plan, uh, uh, tools matter. Story matters, right? Presentation and, and, and yes, exposure matter too. You know, your l – your agent, just like we do at ROOST, you gotta make sure that the listings are, are visible and where serious buyers are actually searching.

So again, that’s, that’s the MLS, it’s Zillow, it’s realtor.com, and all the rest. You’re gonna be far more successful if you’re casting a wide net to every portal in the, in the, in the world, quite frankly, and, and, you know, including, uh, competitive brokerages, right? You want your house to show up on RE/MAX or, you know, Coldwell Banker or Real, what, you know, whatever’s in the market.

You want as much visibility as possible. But visibility alone is not gonna be enough, you know? The real question is, like we said, is where, whether or not that listing connects, and does that listing connect emotionally with, with, with a, with a buyer? You know, does that, does that home, you know, as it, as it shows up on Zillow, does it make the buyer stop scrolling?

Does it help them, you know, picture a life there? You know, and good marketing’s not about posting a, a single posting for a listing, it’s about launching the marketing strategy. And, and that, I think, is a theme that carries out all the way through the eight mindsets in the book. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, I mean, if you’re a buyer, if you’re working with a buyer’s agent, they’re still gonna send you a link before.

Like gone are the days that you get, you meet at the realtor’s office, you get in the car, you follow them around, and they take you to, like, three or four or eight or 10 houses on a Saturday, right? Um, now it’s, “What do you think about these?” And there’s a link that gets sent sometimes. Um, so I think that, you know, it’s important to remember that people do still work with buyer’s agents, but that marketing has changed as well.

Um – 

Chris McAllister: But, you know, a buyer is gonna probably, you know, a buyer may look at 100 houses, click all the way through 100 houses online, and ultimately, they may drive past 10 of those 100, and they may only walk through three with an agent, uh, right? Because so much information is available online, but the, if your presentation isn’t dead on as good as it possibly can be at the start when people are scrolling, you, you’re just wasting that, that, that excitement of, of launch day.

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, because, I mean, at this point, now it’s, “Hey, agent, I wanna see these three houses,” right? And then they send the agent a link. Yeah. So it really is that – Exactly. It’s expanded, right? Not only do you have to reach individuals, you have to reach other agents, um, and it d – it used to be kind of a one of the, one of the other type of things.

So, um, i- if you’re a seller, right, the, a lot of sellers still think that the goal is to get the highest offer, but you talk in the book about kind of an alternative view. Can you tell me about that? 

Chris McAllister: Well, what you want is the offer that’s not necessarily the highest offer. You want that, the offer that’s gonna net you the most money at the, at the end of the day, what the bottom line is.

And, and this is a great example of where people get tripped up. The highest offer isn’t always the best offer. What matters is the net, the terms, the likelihood of closing, you know, the financing strength, the contingencies, the timeline, the amount of risk, you know sometimes you may have a, a, a very, very high offer and the, the seller is asking for so much, you know, that they need so much help with closing costs, et cetera, that, you know, your net is less than an offer that might be a little, little lower top line, but the, uh, buyer doesn’t need as, as much help, right?

You may also have an offer that is too good to be true you know? And even with the pre-qualification letter from a bank, uh, hopefully a reputable bank, that too good to be true offer may end up not closing or maybe it won’t appraise, and then you’ve lost 30 to 45 days on the market. So there, there, there’s a cost there.

The, the, it doesn’t mean that your first offer isn’t, isn’t gonna be your best offer. It very well may be, but people need to be very, very discerning, especially in a situation where there’s multiple offers, right? You know, a lower offer with stronger terms that work for you, the seller, can absolutely be a better deal.

And sometimes it’s a better deal even if the, it turns out that you’re putting, you know, a few hundred or even a, a few thousand dollars less in your pocket than you might otherwise, right? If the terms work for you, it, it, it, it, it’s a better offer for you. So, you know, I want sellers to stop thinking like gamblers.

Again, hope is not a strategy and start thinking like a decision maker. And I hope this book helps people think that way and, and teach them how to compare offers intelligently instead of emotionally. Again, this is really about being, you know, I want you to be cold and analytical about your own asset here and, uh, you know, put the emotion aside and, and get the best possible price you can.

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah. I mean, I think about something as simple as if you can stay in your home for 30 days after closing, right? If that’s a contingency that you need, and then that could save you a couple of thousand dollars on, uh, you know, renting another place or putting your stuff in storage or having to, you know, hire movers versus maybe yourself – Having to 

Chris McAllister: live with mom and dad for a month, right?

I mean, 

Laci LeBlanc: what – Right emotional distress is that?s does have a cost, right? So you think about something like that, and that’s the difference. A couple thousand dollars in an offer could make if you could stay in your home for 30 days or, you know, vice versa. So I, I do think that this is one of those times when, um, you really have to take the emotion out of it.

Um, and, and, you know, does it hurt to have a seasoned real estate agent who, who can look at these things from an unbiased point of view and kind of relate, um, the pros and cons of each offer back to you. But, um, you also talk about, speaking of, you know, working with an agent, the changes to the rules around, um, compensation.

So why was it so important to include that? Well, 

Chris McAllister: we’re coming up on two years in August when the whole compensation rules and clear cooperation changed. It’s hard to believe it’s been that long, and I still think there’s a lot of, uh, confusion and concern in the market over it. But from a seller perspective, sellers simply need to understand the, the real estate world and the, uh, that we’re operating in.

The structure around buyer-agent compensation has changed, not. It, it, it’s changed in real and meaningful ways, and I don’t wanna get deep into that today. We’ve done that in previous podcasts. But, and it’s not that it’s necessarily good or bad for a seller, but as a seller, you need to understand what changed and why, right?

So the structure around buyer-agent compensation, you know, the changes affect negotiations. They, they should impact your, your expectations, and they should also impact your, uh, your marketing strategy in terms of pricing and whatever concessions you may or may not want to offer either upfront or down the road once negotiations start.

You know, sellers, I don’t want any sellers to panic. It’s not like this is the end of the world for sellers. It’s a much tougher situation, I think, for buyers to get their heads around than it is for sellers. But I want sellers to have clarity. And one of the big goals in this book is to explain those changes that happened in August of 24, 2024 in plain English so that our sellers understand, you know, what actually affects their bottom line, what does it, what changed, what didn’t.

There’s just a lot of confusion out there in the market, and confusion can be expensive, right? So we do go into that in some detail in the book, and I think that’s gonna be helpful for people who haven’t sold a house, uh, you know, literally in the last couple of years when those changes happened. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, and even two years later, there just isn’t a lot of meaningful information out there that’s easy to consume, I think, uh, for folks who aren’t in the world of real estate.

So I think it’s a, a, an important part of this book and, and it makes it different from other books out there. There are some other things that make this book different from other real estate books or guides. Talk to me about those. 

Chris McAllister: Well, this is written from, you know, real world ex – real world experience, not theory.

And, you know, I want you to be working with a listing agent who’s also had a lot of significant real world experience and, and isn’t just, you know trying to, uh, uh, survive and thrive based on what they learned in their, uh, pre-real estate licensing course, right? You know, this, this isn’t the time to, you know, give your, give your s, your second cousin’s kid a break here.

You know, this is a time when you really want to be, uh, doing some solid interviewing, asking for referrals, and, and interviewing, uh, listing agents. And maybe you wanna give them a copy of this book, right? So you can give them a primer on what it is you expect from them. But the, but again, this book is, is, it is written from real world experience.

It’s not theory, and it’s a bit blunt, I think, where it needs to be blunt, but I also see it as, or I wanted it to come across as you be the judge of that, as, as practical and also, you know, reassuring. You know, the last thing we wanna do is try to overwhelm people with a bunch of jargon or impress them with, you know, realtor talk.

We’re, we’re, we’re just trying to help people get into the mindsets that are gonna allow them to make smarter decisions, right? So this book is built around, you know, the lived experience of myself and, and our agents at ROOST helping, you know, real sellers prepare, price, market, negotiate, and get to the closing table and, and, and ultimately to the bank.

You know, I, it’s grounded, it’s grounded, it’s real, it’s current, and I, I dare say that it, it, it’s gonna be useful for anybody thinking about selling their house this year. And the book also, you know, reflects, you know, our, our philosophy at ROOST Real Estate Company, which is educate first, sell second, and that matters to me and all the agents that, uh, work with us.

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah, I mean, I think that the, the goal is to help a seller become educated about the process so that, you know, again, the pro – it’s not just happening to them, they understand it the whole way through. Um, so when a seller reads this book, what do you hope they walk away with? We’re not asking them to, you know, for sale by owner, right?

Well, 

Chris McAllister: you 

Laci LeBlanc: know, if they wanna – What’s the end result you’re hoping for? 

Chris McAllister: If, if you wanna, if you wanna, if, if, if somebody wants to, to go the for sale by owner route, I, I hope it helps them, you know, going that way. Um, but I think it, I think it could help those folks who wanna do for sale by owner, but I also think it’s gonna help folks who wanna go out and hire a realtor.

And I think this book is gonna give them words to use when they, when they interview agents, right? But I, I, I think ultimately this book. I want this book to give sellers confidence, and not false confidence, but real confidence, the kind of confidence that comes from understanding the process, you know, anticipating what’s coming, knowing how to make smart decisions, right?

I want, I want people to feel I don’t want people just to feel like they’re in control. I want them to understand that they are in control, right? I, I, I want the sellers reading this book, you know, I want them to understand how to prepare their home for sale without overspending, how to price their home without guessing, how to market without wasting time, and how to negotiate a deal, you know, without losing your mind.

I mean, that’s a tall order. But ultimately, if you read this book and you finish it feeling calmer, sharper, better equipped, then I’m gonna feel like, um, this was a worthwhile endeavor. 

Laci LeBlanc: Yeah. I mean, they’re gonna be getting a lot of advice from a lot of different people and places, family members, friends.

Um, so I think that having that confidence and kind of knowing what makes sense and what doesn’t as people are spewing ideas at you is, is really helpful for folks. Um, what about the people who are thinking about selling but they’re not quite ready yet? What do you say to those folks? 

Chris McAllister: Those are my favorite sellers, right?

I mean, they’re clearly not acting on impulse, right? They’re, they’re ha – they’re having thoughts, they’re, they’re talking about it, you know, they’re considering, they’re, they’re doing some scrolling, whatever. So this is actually the perfect book for people in that situation to read and read now, right? The best sellers, the most successful sellers do not start preparing the week they list, right?

They, they start by getting educated. They start by understanding the market, the process, the pressure points and the decisions ahead. The more lead time, right, that you give yourself, the better your outcome tends to be. So even if you’re six months out or thinking about a move next year, this is exactly where I think you should start.

You know, I don’t want you to get all caught up in analysis paralysis and get scared to death and never put your house up to sale, but there is a happy medium between taking some time to get educated, do some interviewing, talk to people, do your own research, um, you know, before you’re, before you pull the trigger.

And I really believe this book will help, uh, folks do that. 

Laci LeBlanc: I agree. And I have one more question. Let’s tie it up in a pretty bow like we like to do. If you had to boil the whole message of the book down to one single idea, what would that be? 

Chris McAllister: I think you should, we could have a drinking game with this podcast and every time you say mindset, you have to take a shot, right?

But, you know, selling your home successfully is not about luck. It really is about mindset. It’s about preparation, strategy, and execution, right? It’s, it’s work. It’s, it, there’s some stuff there that you’ve got to do. And the sellers who do best, again, they’re not the ones with the fanciest home on the block, right?

The, you know, the best house. It’s not about the house in this case. They’re the ones, they’re the house specific, house specifically. It, they’re, the most successful sellers are the ones who think clearly, prepare ra – intentionally, rationally, and make decisions based on the facts. And that includes the facts about their situation and about the house they’re selling, right?

So it’s, it’s confidence, it’s not fear. And at the end of the day, you know, when, when you’re ready to, you know, talk to that agent or put that sign in the yard, sign the listing agreement, boy, that’s about the time when, uh, you start to feel like, “Well, you know what? Maybe I am a home selling genius, or maybe I can be a home selling genius.”

Laci LeBlanc: And that does it. That’s the bow I was looking for. So again, the book is Your Guide to Becoming a Home Selling Genius: The Eight Mindsets Thake the Difference Between Home Selling Success and Disappointment. Uh, if you’re thinking about selling your home and want a smarter, more strategic way to approach it, this book is for you.

You can get a copy at sellwithROOST.com. Just wait for the little pop-up or learnwithROOST.com. Chris, anything else for today? 

Chris McAllister: Nope. I think that does it. I appreciate you, uh, being my, uh, interviewer today. Thank you very much. 

Laci LeBlanc: That’s my favorite job. Uh, but, uh, to everybody else out there, thanks for listening to the All Things Real Estate Podcast.

If you’d like to learn more about Chris McAllister, ROOST Real Estate Company, or just get your hands on the book, uh, check the show notes, but also please feel free to reach out to us and stay tuned for our next episode. 

Chris McAllister: All right. Bye, Laci. Thank you. 

Laci LeBlanc: See you next time.