The Probate Pro: Building a National Probate Practice, with Darren Findling

0:00 Welcome to Probate Weekly I'm Bill Gross at Bill Gross probate and you know I have the email address the LA Probate Expert because I have tried to become the expert of LA county in particular court confirmed sales is my a expertise and I one day came across a guy who markets himself as the probate Pro and you know I'm a little well that's pretty Bold and the more research I found out poof he is the probate Pro really excited to have back on the program dur fining from Michigan Darren thank you so much for joining us today it's great to be here Bill and enjoy doing this podcast with you looking forward to where this conversation may take us and more importantly this is a nationwide business you have a nationwide area of expertise you have as a probate Pro so talk a little bit you know I talked to attorneys who get into probate for various reasons but where do you get the vision to create a national platform of probate Services excellent so I started here in the state of Michigan and grew it and then expanded Ed into other states and then I had a vision of going National with the model and so I had written a white paper a concept and tested it out and like many Visionaries you want to test out your ideas and I immediately understood that the idea that I had was a great need within the larger community and was going to add Great Value so my vision ultimately became a reality and we've executed it such that we became a national probate firm not just a state-based firm I've always been entrepreneurial always had visions of what niches or needs would be Wanted within the marketplace and of course like any great entrepreneur you're testing Concepts out some work some don't the ones that work Double Down triple down go for it so in some ways it's a similar concept to me when I started in Probate I saw that LA county is a huge County by population and area and that nobody was able to specialize in the entire County not only

2:05 That often times you would get probates outside the county or in D Northern California and there's nobody who could really properly service Estates that had those properties well and that's why I built my business the way that I did I imagine similarly you must have looked at the probate space and whatever part you were in and realize there's certain problems or inefficiencies outside of the I'm sure there's hundreds of attorneys in Detroit or you know theor areas what were the problems that you saw need fixing that you said about to fix with your probate Pro platform absolutely and that is exactly what a great entrepreneur does is they recognize the needs the areas that great Improvement can occur and in my particular case when I started here in Michigan I saw that most lawyers were very slow to respond slow to file it would take them weeks before they were willing to file things within the courthouse they weren't calling clients back they weren't providing White Glove services to the clientele so we wanted to flip all of those paradigms on their head so we said we're going to receive our information from our clients and then file actually the next morning throughout the state really changing the way in which probate Services were going to be delivered also we're going to call our clients back within 24 hours we're call back is there a rule against out with the bar association exactly what we know that one of the greatest critiques of lawyers is that they don't call their clients back they're really good at calling them back when they're ready to be hired but once you paid the money and they're off and running they just don't want to call people back it's a real problem within this industry so we said well we're going to change that we're g to actually call everyone back call them back within 24 hours respond to their needs and make sure that they're taken care of and give them that level of white glove service expertise and specialization that is needed and that's how we transformed

4:10 This from a small little business into the national business that we are we're probably the largest probate practice in the state of Michigan, I'm sorry, in the country so from starting off as a small little Enterprise into a real large Enterprise by really changing the way in which the services were going to be delivered and so for those who are listening who are real estate agents who get frustrated and they hitting on point and I don't mean insult attorneys I mean they have their schedule and they got in the business to run the business the way we want to so I'm not really judging them but I do think there's a difference between Realtor® time and attorney time right Realtors® you call me and I'm not that fast I might not get back for a couple hours I'll always get back within the day I'll send you a text hey I' tied up I'll get you tomorrow attorneys I'll call attorney on Monday and the following Tuesday they'll call me back say hey bu phone call and I'm like what did I call you about last I can't remember anymore and for turn it's okay now part of is they go into trial where they're unavailable oftentimes they're kind of onean banned maybe with an assistant and so it's a different world but our customers they don't care they just want service and so what Darren is doing and I've tried to do my business differently try to bridge the gap between the attorney and the customer and Darren's actually taking the attorney and bridging Gap at the point of service which is fantastic so those you watching just know it's a different world yeah bill I think you're dead on I think the point here is that we have to think about the perspective of the client not the perspective of the lawyer the client may need the communication immediately they may not be have the time to wait and they deserve to be called back and I really don't care about lawyers who are in trial or lawyers that are busy because here's why you simply can call somebody back and say or have an assistant call back and simply say listen Darren's in trial this week he's going to get back to you or we're going to schedule a time to talk we have a competitive advantage and that is call people back it's basic

6:13 Basic stuff call people back they want to be heard they want to communicate they're actually paying your bill not the other way around they're paying your bill be available for them well I want try to explain to attorneys is it may not be the customer needs the phone call legally but they may need it emotionally they may need it to tell their heir to avoid some sort of a flip out and now you have an objection and another the problem and so needs sometimes don't go by you know the legal procedures Le needs sometimes are based on what your customers perceive that as and then again for those who are listening I think Darren setting up an opportunity for you as an agent I try to play that role myself where I'll say the attorney look I can give the customer status on the case I know the status of the probate case I know where the documents are and they appreciate that phone call so for those of us here are you know pay attention to what Darren's doing and either you can work with this firm which is part of it and also you can emulate his best practices and put that in your business and try to feel that need on behalf of our of the attorneys so let's talk about what you know the probate Pro what percentage of your business is consumers coming into you they Google search and find you or referral by somebody to find you versus I know that you work with major referral sources Major law fir firms and other vendors so can you give us kind a breakdown of where your business comes from absolutely I'm happy to share that with you and I think you touched upon something that I as a young lawyer was struggling with which is how am I going to get the phone to ring how am I going to get business acquiring a new client acquiring a new relationship is challenging and I figured early on that acquiring a referral relationship would have tremendous value would be like an anity it would keep paying over and over for years and years to come versus going direct to Consumer where you're trying to one at a time get a new relationship and a new client it's very time consuming it's very expensive and it's not nearly as efficient as creating a

8:16 Funnel of opportunity from other professionals so to answer your question we about 9010 90% covering from lawyers and other professionals around the country sending us work and then about 10% based on our own brand strength within this community within the communities that we serve based on people searching on Google or AI or getting direct referrals those direct to Consumer are about 10% 90% from other professionals now I'm Bas in California and as a result probably about two-thirds of my listeners attorneys and Realtors® are in California is your business active in California which I think we're a little bit different though I do think we're similar to Michigan in terms of the makeup of probate and the amount of bureaucracy involved is very similar I think to California do you do California business and do you do much of it yeah so our business model allows us to do two different aspects of probate related Services we're directly providing legal services in particular States upon which I as the business owner of the probate Pro have lawyers and then we're also coordinating probates in every state and what that means is that we're handing probate matters off to all States including those within California so again our model is both directly providing Legal Services as well as coordinating probates all over the country to assist people through that process and so how do obviously one of things I think is underrated of course I'm a Realtor® and that's why I'm passionate about this Niche is I find the attorneys allow the customer so often to pick Realtor® and the Realtor® may be just a good local Realtor® who knows that neighborhood knows nothing about the probate and in many cases that works but once you have erors fighting and somebody has to communicate with multiple attorneys I think that also not being part of the team but just being the Realtor® is a missed

10:18 Opportunity for the attorney that's why I try to sell them on how do how do the majority of homes that need to be sold get to the Realtor®'s hands are you involved in that process and referral is the Realtor® bringing deals to you and it comes pre-assigned or is it kind happen I just know you're big enough operation where you must have some system in place that controls that yeah it's all of the above we have some families who come to us with their relative their neighbor their friend their relationship and their Realtor® we have some who are Desperately Seeking our guidance to refer them to a professional that we are comfortable with so we see it all and so there's no one size fits all we're willing to work within both I think the point though bill is that establishing a relationship with like a firm like ours other professionals is a really good strategy because there are clients who will come to us who don't know a real estate agent or don't have a competent agent that they're comfortable with maybe there's a family member and they just want to distance themselves from that particular family member and they want our Independence in it so we'll refer them to people that we trust we're not referring them to our friends we're referring to them we're referring them to those professionals that we've had experience with who are going to do great work who understand the holistic probate process because probate is unique there's some unique aspects to that process that we want them to understand the language around yeah you know California we have a very structured real estate contract and system I think and to my knowledge it's the only state that has any Statewide addendums that outlin that in other states I would imagine the attorney or in your case The Firm must have some templates for very like State specific templates or like how does that even happen how do you even get a case where there's a rare Court confirmation estate but there's no addendum do you write the addendum you know custom for

12:20 Each that's got to be very expensive yeah there's no one size fits all here and as you are expressing probate is disparate which means different from state to State there's no one sit that's all and in fact in some states there are counties in which have their own processes and local rules so there's no one-size fits-all and those Estates those files that require Court approval there's going to be documentation that's created there's going to be an approval process that goes through the probate court but again I want to be careful here because I don't want somebody in New Jersey hearing this differently than California or Michigan they may have unique laws as it relates to that process and in some circumstances as you know bill there's no probic court required at all in certain circumstances and some states so it's not one sites fits all and the goal is to meet the client within the state and within their circumstances to most efficiently get them through the process are there particular states that you're growing and that you're looking for attorney referrals that will fit your program and what kind of attorney would fit into your profile to work with in some Most states yes so we're always looking for lawyers because we are growing so we're always looking for lawyers that are interested in doing great work and I emphasize great work we don't want the lousy lawyers of old we want those who are progressiv minded who are efficient who return people's calls who are out there understanding that they have to fit the culture that we're providing so we are always seeking lawyers in all states we have a lot of volume that comes in to the probate Pro so we're always seeking lawyers if there's a lawyer out there listening in reach out to us we'll connect you to our program it's really a win-win situation and that's how we like to do business a win-win so that both parties benefit from it let see me there's attorneys who I meet who are maybe really good attorneys but they're just not motivating the business development

14:23 They just they don't like social media they're uncomfortable nobody trained them on it you know it's a big a big lift to get started especially if you're a so proprietor it just seems like could be natural for that person to talk to an organization like yours to say hey I can do this part of the work you do that part of the work and let's find some way to split the revenue yeah absolutely and Bill you touched upon something that I know that any lawyer out there listening can appreciate when you go through law school you learn very little to nothing about the business of law how to grow a practice how to acquire new clients how to grow and scale a business how to hire employ employees how to fire employees all of these things so we've been very fortunate to be implemented by one of the famous most famous implementers in the country by the name of Gino Wickman he wrote a book called traction famous very famous book a detroiter very fortunate that he still implements my business very proud of that he's a g true genius and for anybody out there that wants to understand the ABC's of business they should really read traction they should probably also read the book good to great and they should also probably read the book eth The entrepreneurial myth the idea that you're going to have to spend time working on your business not just in your business because there's a lot of great lawyers out there who do really good technical work but don't put enough time and energy in working on their business and I would say the same probably hold true for real estate agents who may be listening in they're really good at Selling Houses they're really good at their relationship art but they haven't put a lot of energy into thinking about how to improve their business to work on the business not just in the business 100% well emth is just for me one of the lifechanging books now I know they've since written individual books on emth for attorneys they've written one for Emil emth for real estate agents and you know it's like one guy who buy an emth and I think explains his implementation do you recommend The E-Myth book for attorneys for attorneys or more the eth

16:25 And Gino Wickman as far as specifics for marketing well when I was a young lawyer a friend of mine turned me on to the Michael Gerber book The E-Myth and it was a really great book for me to read because I was so deeply involved in the business and you know some of these Concepts now have become so universally understood that you need to spend a percentage of your day working on your business not just in your business so Michael Gerber kind of created that concept I think that traction by Gino Wickman gives you a great model a great framework upon which to operate a business whether you're in law real estate or any business I know that EOS is widely understood around the country as a really good entrepreneurial operating system and so I'm a big fan of it I've been using it but it may not be for everybody but for those that operate I can promise you this if you follow the EOS system you will be better off than those that don't that doesn't mean you're going to be more successful but it's no different than if you drink water in the morning exercise eat healthy during the day meditate once go to bed on time wake up on time and don't drink alcohol or smoke you're going to be better off than those people that are not you know it's so funny if you've been following me I've lost weight I've lost about 40 pounds here in the last six months I saw my doctor yesterday he says what are you doing OIC I said no I said to be honest I'm just eating less I have two meals a day inste have three and I changed my day to where I walk four miles every day you know at a minimum like whatever else I do that gets done and he goes wow that sounds simple because yeah it's just I got to do it every day and you know it's yeah you're better off I don't care what you do if you walk four miles a day you're gonna feel better there's almost no way around it and if you eat two males instead have three males I think you're gonna lose weight because you're eating less food not complicated and I think like you say EOS and the Michael Gerber system in particular you know if you follow a format a system your business is gonna you know improve and be better and more on point of what you want it to be too I think like for me this is my business I'm talking to you

18:28 Like I ask my wife I say I get paid to do this stand here I get to buy stuff from my desk and I get to talk to great people around the country I get paid for this how's that work and Bill first of all congratulations on all that lifechanging work that you've done there's a there's also a great Harvard Review article written by Ronald Heifetz I think is the name about the Adaptive change theory and the idea being that when you're confronted with a problem you can simply ask for the pill the quick fix the technical change but most change the greatest effect for change to occur is an Adaptive change in which you've done which is changing your lifestyle it's more difficult to do but it will be a better change and cause greater opportunities by doing adaptive changes so we're a subscriber of that concept and congratulations to you on your lifestyle changes there's one other thing I want to mention when we're talking about business growth because I really am passionate about scaling and growing a business so I heard a speaker recently talk about the African Lion Dog which I've got a little stuffed animal here I've got a whole bunch of stuffed animals that I like to use as demonstratives the African lion dog is a really interesting very effective hunter in Africa the lion kills at like I don't know 40% kind of weights strikes kills the African lion dog day after day hour after hour is pursuing their prey and has a kill rate of over 90% very effective and it's a competitive Advantage called competitive stamina and something that I am a big believer in is I will always outwork everyone else around me I'm I have a competitive Advantage because I'm probably gonna be working harder and longer than anybody else within my industry and everything in life did not come with a quick strike like the lion it came like the African

20:33 Wild dog day after day disciplined work about growing and scaling the business most people think because they're watching Instagram and Tik Tok that people get struck by lightning and have great success and there are a few people out there that do that but most entrepreneurs most people who have built great businesses are day after day hour after hour putting in more time and energy than all of their competitors well and quite frankly that's why I restar my business was about me learning and being better as an agent than my competitor rather than 9% of the marketing advice to real estate agencies will buy the database and then just cold call and tell people how great you are well what if you're not great how great are you and I thought you know I when I when I set out in La I realized I could be the expert in LA county court sales if I just went to court for 30 days tracked every sale nobody's doing that now six years later have a database of six years worth of data nobody has three days worth and for all the Realtors® I often talk about find your niche in the field and be the expert in that little Micro Niche it's way more valuable than coin because coin the next you have to get up in Co call G you can't scale that versus if you're the expert then you can leverage other people to help you grow your business so thank you for the for the focus and the reminder in the metaphor of the African Lion Dog what is yeah the African Lion Dog here's my stuffed animal I got them I think at Ikea I got a whole bunch of stuffed animals that I like to use in meetings to kind of Express Concepts this is my latest one because I was so inspired by the presentation I had learned about competitive stamina so I'm a big fan and you got the stuff animal to teach other people it's not because you have some kind of attachment to stuffed animals you did this to I probably was really attached to stuffed animals when I was a kid I don't know I don't know if you can see I got I got a whole bunch of stuffed animals around you see the I don't know if you can see the yellow octopus in the corner really an

22:37 Expression of adaptability and creativity the octopus is one of the most extraordinary creatures planet Earth they're adaptable they change they're extraordinary and we really want to always think of ourselves as adapting and growing and evolving you're either evolving or you're dying that is a mindset about growth because you have to constantly try to within your circumstances adapt to the circumstances of that situation and the octopus does a great job of it so I got a whole bunch of stuffed animals around here not because I'm a stuffed animal fanatic but I bring them into meetings I like to use them for teaching they're demonstratives and I think they're an effective way of conveying Frameworks and Concepts I kind of do the same thing minor inanimate over my shoulder I have a crystal ball it doesn't really work but it's a metaphor for the crystal ball doesn't really work and then I have Rock and sakam robots which is like a marketing metaphor that you just constantly be at it yeah and you know I think from a marketing point of view you have to do something that you're doing repetitively over and over and over again and getting good at otherwise you're just Another hack who tries some sort of magic pill and that's not so it's very similar to your Concepts let me just take a quick break and do some housekeeping explain to people who we are really fortunate today to have the probate Pro they're in Finland from well he's based in Michigan but it's an actal company that services probates around the country he's licensed in certain States the states are not the coordinate and so I believe they have 50 state coverage either between active probate Administration and or referral and really a pro and has some fantastic YouTube content definely worth watching on his social media he's a past guest on our Pro program as well and then this is oops wrong spot this is Probate Weekly and we do this every Thursday relas new content and this interview format mostly with attorneys but often times the vendors to help us learn to be better at servicing our customers as well as to find new people who need our help to refer to or get

24:40 Referrals from we have a Facebook group with over 4,000 members you're welcome to go in there not only to learn and see the content but post your probate content to get some additional views so I have mine in there as of course but trying to see who else post stuff here from time to time we get Kevin Bemo posts this was a great one on M protection and so feel free to put your content there so we can work together and help get make our Market more effective if you want get reminders you can register at Probate Weekly.com just go and put your email address you get email reminders if you want text reminders put your phone number in you don't need to and if you scroll down we have the podcast in the various audio formats Spotify and apple and all that stuff and then the YouTube link is for the past episodes of the program as well if you want to see past interviews and things we do like that so and thanks again to Darren who's our guest from probate the probate pro.com so let's talk a little bit about changes I mean if there's one thing that's true about all business in America Le in my from my perspective is things keep seem to be changing so quickly I know you're not based in California though I do you're active in our state have you been involved with the has the fires affected you have any Estates and or clients that were affected maybe the property waiting to them burn down or now all of a sudden they have appropriate situation and how do you see that affecting your business here in the next few months few years yeah so first of all my heart to all those people that have been affected by the tragedies and within my industry because I'm opening up matters with the Probate Court after somebody has died I'm really in a sensitive space so it's always a little bit awkward to speak about growth on the heels of tragedies that have occurred but quite often when tragedies have occurred where there's been lots of people who have passed away or because of the pandemic or maybe because of a mass tort like a

26:43 Pharmaceutical that has caused a lot of people to have died those are drivers of our business but we don't you know we're careful about being mindful of the seriousness of the fact that people have lost loved ones in these circumstances and we're available there to be ready to help and support them through that process afterwards so you know change I just want to talk about change we are we've always viewed ourselves as adaptable and as a business we're always trying to figure out what is coming in from various stimuli maybe it's AI that's going to change our business maybe it's competition that's going to change our business we always have to be looking at that and being adaptable and able to adapt to the circumstances want to add one more thing bill I talk about social media for a moment social media which is a fairly New Concept I'm just encouraging everybody out there to go for it let me let me let's think of it from this vantage point I'm going to give you a free television show a free opportunity to post and publish your content it's free I wouldn't you take the opportunity to do it and you should do it in an authentic way you don't have to be like anybody else you don't have to be perfect you don't even have to be all that eloquent but why not take the opportunity to communicate that which you're doing and I'm of the belief that more is better than perfect get it out there get lots of content out there you'll get better as time goes on but utilize those platforms your Realtors® who are out there that are not posting on social media I think it's a mess I think there's lots of things to talk about and you can post once a day five times a

28:48 Day it's just a mess from my vantage point free television station free opportunity to spread your brand and let others know who you are so we take a lot we take advantage of this we post a lot communicate a lot teach a lot long form videos short form videos we're out there posting and communicating to prospective perspective clients and perspective referral sources I the step right there I think it's the great greatest question why would you not you know I my nature I'm a really shy guy you know my favorite hobbies are reading books and I swim on a swim team but you're swimming underwater you don't talk to anybody I'm fine I have a wife I have a daughter who's married with two grandkids if I don't talk to another human being I'm okay but I love talking about business I love talking about these topics and so that's what we talk about and for those who watching me I'll just share with you may know I have a podcast on real estate I have this one on probate and we're actually launching to we're starting to record on estate planning which I call avoiding probate and reverse mortgages which tie into a big part of the business that I deal with and why would I not launch two more podcasts I'm just talking to people all day long anyhow why not record it and put up there and what's amazing is you know Dar and I are going to talk today for you know I don't know 30 40 50 minutes and you know 200 people will see it so it's like it's like we're sitting in a room and we have 200 people they're not all GNA pay attention they're not all going to be there the whole time but how often would you stand in front of a room of 200 people and talk and the answer is I would do it all day long if I could do it for my home office why would I not yeah and Bill not everyone's going to become the next breakout internet inst star that's not what this is about and in fact you don't have to act or behave in that manner just authentically be yourself and share a listing share what you're doing create a brand so that people can understand what you're doing it's a missed opportunity I don't know if it's laziness or just simply shyness which often is the case fear of how

30:52 You're going to be viewed or perceived but you're out there every day meeting with people and they're perceiving you why not simply broadcast it to a larger population through social media missed opportunity we take full advantage of it takes time to figure it out but I encourage everyone to go for it I'll tell you funny story is I'm a bit of Technology net myself I say my hobby is technology so I started this I actually I was wearing a headset like this and then I bought some really fancy kind of over the ear and they went behind my back so you couldn't see them and I got a microphone that I S teaching place out of sight and my best client said how can we have the headset anymore and I saidwell I thought it looks better goes no it looks more authentic when you headset on so yeah exactly so the only reason I wear this is because it you know it is you know on brand and I don't have a fancy background why because I'm a roast agent like I actually there's a there's a there's a lock box if you know what I'm doing there's a for sale sign there's the books you actually read that's my brand now that's not everybody and you know you're look you're National figure you're talking at conventions you're an attorney not a Realtor® so your brand is different I think you have to think about what do I want people to perceive me as and be authentic to that and so I really worked at trying to be authentic there times my daughter will walk in my grandson and put her in my arms and people say oh aren't you embarrassed that she interrupted your show I'm like no if you don't like that you're not gonna like me because I rather hold my grandkid than talk to almost anybody Bill exactly and I think that what we understand from social media is that as much as there's Glitz and bling people want authenticity the authentic conversations generally resonate really well now look at me I'm a lawyer owning a law firm with 120 people I'm wearing a hoodie I'm not wearing a suit I'm not standing with a bunch of books behind me like this not very loyally there Darren not very loyally but this is who I am this is what I wear this is my clothing so this is authentically who I am and I want to as try to stay true to

32:57 Myself as much as possible that's really the goal and I think it resonates with people instead of trying to be someone else just be yourself and communicate in that manner even if you're shy or awkward it works people actually will lean into to those who are struggling a little bit to really be interested in who they are so give it a shot I just encourage everyone to do so take advantage of it you know I wear these shows because I can quickly put on a tie and coat if I'm on a court appearance about once a week maybe twice a week and so you go to court at least in La you have to look loyally using the My Cousin Vinnie's standard of LLY dress and it's funny because I always wonder what do judges do when they go yeah well we know we know what they do they've got their black they've got their black robe and right in the corner like I do I've got a shirt that button is down I've got a tie and I've got a sport coat and I put it on strategically when I need it and then it comes right up because you know what there's very few people in the world that enjoy wearing a tie there just aren't and again I don't mind it really but we know that the judges under the Rob are probably wearing very comfortable clothing yeah swimsuit or tank top or something okay so let's go back to maybe some of the mechanics of the business and again you have a large business disparate different states different counties different people some incoming from attorneys some from real very different but let's talk step back a little bit and talk about mechanics one of the biggest challenges for people to move forward if I had a customer referred to you to open a probate in some state is what's going to cost me to start the process and so one of things I've worked on is between probate advances loans to the Estates and or working with attorneys try to find a way to both take away that impediment to do business but also protect the attorney that the work is going to get paid for or not be abused so how do you kind of handle that fine line from a consumer point of view a great question and unfortunately I

35:00 Have to give a little bit of a confusing answer because each state handles this really differently some states there's a table on how lawyers get paid some states are time based some states the lawyer is fee based with a flat fee there's no one- size fits all and in terms of the lawyer's willingness to commence a matter the willingness because anytime you do work without getting paid you're loaning your time and you're loaning money so there's no one size fits all however many lawyers if they recognize that there's going to be an asset that just simply needs to be liquidated at some point and it'll be converted to cash and they're going to be protected may not require a large or maybe no money upfront to get in to begin the process our model usually has a no a barrier to entry or very little depending on the circumstances meaning you can work with our firm and often the monies will come later it's not always though so I want to be a little careful here to not oversell because I don't I want to call us and say hey I've got a you know a will contest case where you jump into this matter with no money up front so there and again as I just gave an example of a will contest case there are simple probates and then there are really ugly messy complicated probates right and so that's why there's no one size fits all but that is an area that I'm sure you focus on a lot meaning where appropriate where you can eliminate the initial cost barrier that's appropriate that's got be important whereas many attorneys I talked to them about that and it's almost like I'm telling them that I invented fire they've never heard of it before right but the maybe it's probate advances or loans or other ways of structuring things so imagine is that handle on the initial intake meaning you're going to find out the details of the probate case and then based on that make a recommendation not soit all or how do you how do you manage that with the customer yeah absolutely so our

37:02 Intake team understands the nature of the various types of matters that may get referred to our office and again as I stated most of them come in with no money up front and we're moving very quickly but there are calls that come in that we can't do it that way it just economically doesn't make sense maybe it's too risky maybe there's other circumstances that would prevent us from doing it but yes we've got a model to be able to deal with it also there's a difference between a director consumer who calls in just simply based on our brand strength who's reaching out to US versus a lawyer Law Firm that is constantly sending us work and we know the rhythm of how this may take place we've got a lot of data to support the fact that we're going to be appropriately paid for the circumstances that we're involved in so again you know I'm careful about you know creating a one-size fits-all because unfortunately in this industry just doesn't exist but we try to adapt based on the circumstances so that's the best I can do Bill that but you're right this is a real problem and there's a lot of lawyers that won't even touch won't take any risk they want all the money up front and they won't do anything without that money up front and they're unwilling to be creative really in terms of the payment process well I also think that you know there's a misunderstanding of the --th that might say no we should only pick one model it should either be no money up front for all those or it should be we charge every up front and you've emith the process of determining the right solution for that particular customer and I think you can emit that and have a process that varies based on the situation as long as you have a system that is duplicatable and delegatable right otherwise you don't you don't want the phone call every time Darren saying this guy wants it for free what can we do but you have an ink team and they're trained I'm sure they make mistakes and you correct them one way the other or you look at their conversion ratio and you correct that one with the other so again for by the call I think as Realtors® my job is to

39:04 Try to help my attorneys be more effective on their conversions as well as customers and so referring somebody to Darren we have to be careful not to promise oh it's no cost UPF front all the time because there's different circumstances and I also try to tell agents try to vet the referral a little bit so when you give it over you know how many erors are there what city what state what county how many erors how many assets what are the assets do you think there are at least a starting point because when they'll tell you oh there's eight erors and they're all fighting no attorney is gonna take that one up front not charge something because that's not really a probate Mr that's really a litigation case no question and Bill I will let you know and those people who are listening in that I'm deeply involved in the intake process I'm on the phone all day long throughout the week talking to prospective clients also I'm part of that larger team so I have a real good pulse of the inflow that comes in to the probate Pro I also you had mentioned something else at the end of that comment you were talking about the fighting piece and we know that when a family member dies often there's stability right before death they were the glue that held this very problematic family together and all of a sudden that person dies and then you have a disharmonious family the glue that held them together everyone was waiting and then they that person dies and all hell breaks loose free-for all it's a freefor all we see that it's a real sad part of the industry that I'm in but it's a reality so when we speak to families we're always trying to gauge is the family in Harmony are they getting along are they communicating are they collaborating or is it really problematic contentious adversarial and they're going to go fight like those Rock sakam robots that you just mentioned if you want to fight it's expensive we know that it's expensive economically it's expensive emotionally and it's very time consuming but it's a

41:08 Reality of the business that I'm in there's going to be what we call procedural probates that move very smoothly and then there's going to be adversarial litigious probates that are going to go through the court system and take quite a bit of time to navigate the way through it my fantasy is if ever there's a reality TV show probate I get a chance to do that I like to be the guy in the back you know commenting on people but I've been in the middle of it like you have I'm sure and you know fists are flying and you go to court they're yelling at each other but to be able to do on television and do the play byplay that's kind of my fantasy one kind fun I think we got something there Bill Let's the show and all the wild things that happened I mean one of the beauties of this business is that it's never boring so we're standing in the shoes we come into a family's Liv often at the worst time of their life death grieving disharmony fractured relations and we're standing in the midst of their family as they as all of this is going on it's never boring I promise you that and a good lawyer a good probate lawyer knows how to navigate through that type of family circumstance I'll just put there in case anybody's listening my father was an attorney in Los Angeles in the early 60s and was he was spotted by a scout and did episodes of divorce court because he was a family law attorney and he loved it he it just the business didn't really worked for raising kids and he want to move to a suburb and all but it's just interesting how so if I could do probic Court just if you're watching this before ABC or NBC or somebody I'm cheap I'd be glad to do it be a lot of fun one of the things that I find that helps minimize the risk right when you take the deal in and there's five or six erors they're all getting along that day you know and I'm sure you do this on your intake and I do it in a sense I'm not doing the same intake you are but thinking about the real estate and getting involved you're walking along is that the key is speed to doing the right thing now I'm not talking

43:11 About closing doors of people's legal rights but I just find that when an attorney M makes mistakes and then the case gets continued two three four five six months it's kind of like leaving food in the refrigerator too long it might be Del icious day one but after two months it's rotten and becomes a problem and that's why it's I think for Realtor® it's so important that we get the case to the right attorney or legal service for our customers benefit like the best thing I can do as a Realtor® is help them avoid a mistake on the attorney what are some things and you mentioned in the beginning but I want to go back to that topic what are some of the things you do to be fast that you do to be quick because to me speed kills if you're done and you're approved you have authority you've made it a lot harder for objectors and if you're still jerking around with clearing probate notes three months later a you open the door for the objector and be the judge probably hates you by now and just ready to rule against your client so what are some things you do to effectuate the speed in your system excellent and Bill what's fascinating about what I'm about to tell you is I've been talking about this my whole career and it still amazes me how few lawyers still will move at the speed that we speed that it's unbelievable we talked about this before and you're right and I talked I'm sorry to cut you off but it is amazing how they me talk about this topic I'm sorry go ahead no it's just amazing to me and the reality is I go back to that competitive stamina I talk about outworking people it's a mindset our mindset is that we are thinking about the clients needs the client wants communication the client wants the letter of Administration letter of authority quickly they don't want to wait a month the client is nervous about the house that the house going into the winter the pipes May burst things bad may happen somebody needs to get evicted the client is concerned about how quickly they're going to be able to get

45:14 In to go and remove the contents from the house and then be able to list the house and sell the house that's the client's concern we're not focused on our concern Our concern is to meet the need of the client so it's a mindset our mindset is let's solve the client's problems and the way we do that is we commit our resources to move quickly so we use technology we don't wait somebody calls in we're on the phone gathering information electronically Gathering it's going out to our team to build documents and it's getting to those clients the same day or the next morning that's a mindset that's intentionality that doesn't happen without intentionality because we know that if we start acting that way we're going to be beating 99% of our competition so what happens other lawyers say wow they called me back they delivered they did it quickly they did what they say they were going to do and they got the problem solved correctly the next time I have a probate problem I'm going to send it to the probate Pro and that's how we built this business over the years delivering exceeding the expectations of the clients over and over and over again that's the mindset that I have to instill among my entire team because if we deliver that the business will just keep coming in to the probate Pro and everyone else will be scratching their heads wondering why are they successful we're successful not because we're smarter we're successful because we're meeting the needs of the clients we're creating a value proposition that clients want at an affordable rate and we're pro when we make a commitment we follow through on that commitment and we deliver that's the secret sauce it's not because we're smarter we may have a better understanding of those principles and we live and breathe them part of the culture of this organization so that's it there's no magic here the magic is delivering that which the client wants

47:19 We pay a lot of attention listening to what the client wants and then delivering that service yeah I'm in Los Angeles County primarily and even Riverside sanino and orange to us degree but La I see other states and other counties we have such a great system for probate notes I feel like the judge the judge's probate attorney or their clerk is like telling you hey you need just to fix these five things and we'll approve it but these are the five things you have to fix and I used to go to court every day and you know you I would try not to giggle when an attorney didn't know there was such a thing as propriate notes because literally the court is telling you here's the solution just do these five things I'm glad to I'm glad to never see you again because if you do these five things ahead of time we'll prove you before the hearing date and you even need to come and so as a practitioner I try to train my team members our job is to work with the attorney to follow the priate notes to make sure the customer knows that to make sure the attorney is on that and I tell the attorneys you got to turn that around as fast as possible because you might make another mistake that has to get fixed again at the risk of pissing them off some attorneys love that some don't love that okay we got the back I'm back to my lion dog or the African Lion whatever it's called the African lion dog day after day hour after hour over and over again keep going keep going keep going get it done get it done get it done and so if you want to be lazy be lazy your matter will be slower it won't achieve the same results if you get paid yeah listen it's that's that also right the great payout in all this now from our vantage point we of course want to get paid but the great payout is the fact that the client has been satisfied and then they're going to tell other people this business is growing and scaling because we've done it over and over and over again that's the

49:22 Goal well look it's been a pleasure it's always a pleasure I learned so much from you I'm mind the time here and now that you told me you do the intake as well I feel like I'm taking you off of some new business so I got to get you going for those who are watching again Darren fining is the probate Pro while based in Michigan it's a national probate service servicing states where they're licensed as attorneys servicing States they're not with referrals because they're they vast Network and he works with national companies and we don't really get into that so much this time but I know he works with national companies they have cas around the country that he is able to help them in their portfolio the probate pro.com you go on there's a phone number a tollfree toll-free number if you want to call them or you can click as well to set up a time with them Darren again thank you so much for your time today I really appreciate just the wealth of knowledge and thanks for being on our call and Bill I appreciate it always look forward to doing this with you're a true Pro yourself and it's great to talk about these subjects no I think I caught you after the Detroit Lions were out of the NFL playoffs we followed them though I'm in Los Angeles so I can't say I was really crying too much over that but I know things in Michigan pretty excited about Sports football and then the Wolverines I know won the national championship last year I think this year you guys kind of took off a little bit but you be Ohio state is that how it works so everything is worthwh as long as you know how to stay it four in a row and there'll be five next year Buckeyes get ready we're coming for number five well we can't afford to pay you on private weekly I'm glad to throw you the softball on the put down Ohio State again Darr thank you so much your time today really appreciate everything you do and look forward to talking to you again appreciate it Bill thanks so much thank you and for the rest of you this is Probate Weekly we get together every Thursday we're on YouTube LinkedIn Facebook I'm Bill Gross billg gross pro.com or at Bill G probate on social media billos pro.com if you want to get more information about the podcast you can sign up at the Probate Weekly.com put your email in you'll get reminders you don't have to put your

51:25 Phone number in you can if you want text reminders scroll down you can cat our podcast on audio formats YouTube has all of the past video formats as well and then continue conversation on Facebook we're on oops I lost my spot there on Probate Weekly we have over 4,000 people feel free to post your probate or state planning related content in the group ask for questions post for referrals if you're looking for attorneys or Realtors® around the country love to have you on again thank you so much and make it a great week thank you so much