Ep 47: How to Originate $50 Million Teaching Agent Classes

Vince Kingston details how he built a $50M/year mortgage business without cold calling, door knocking, or manual agent follow-up — using only CE credit classes, a niche in first-time home buyers, and a 25-email automated drip. LOs who hate cold calling but want a systematic, scalable agent referral engine should listen to this episode.

Takeaways you can run this week

• Pick ONE borrower niche (Vince chose first-time home buyers) and make it your entire identity. Walk into every agent conversation and say: 'I serve first-time home buyers better than any other lender in this city.' Repeat it until it becomes your market reputation.
• Book your CE classes on a consistent recurring schedule using Eventbrite. Hold the same class in the same geographic sub-market on a regular rotation so Eventbrite's algorithm begins driving organic signups — Vince reports 20-30 organic registrations per event from Eventbrite alone.
• Segment your realtor database by geography (Vince uses county lines). Rotate which segment you invite to each class so no agent sees the same invitation too frequently and you expand reach across your tri-county area.
• Partner with a title company to certify and co-market your CE class. They handle CE certification; you add your own email outreach on top. Vince's split: title got 9-10 RSVPs, his own list added 25 more, turning a 10-person class into a 35-person class.
• Write a 25-email text-only drip (no images) in Constant Contact focused entirely on your niche topic. Load every agent who attends a class into that drip. Set it to recycle after email 25. Budget one intense week of writing (~20 hours) once, then let it run indefinitely.
• Run a low-cost Facebook branding ad (~$80/month) targeted by zip code, income, and age to every realtor in your market. Use it only to keep your face and niche top-of-mind — not to generate clicks. Measure success by agents saying 'I've seen you on Facebook' when they walk into your class.

The playbook

1. 1. Choose a hyper-specific niche (e.g., first-time home buyers or renovation financing) where fewer than 10 competing lenders in your market are certified or active.
2. 2. Identify 3-4 geographic sub-markets. Build a segmented realtor email list for each sub-market.
3. 3. Secure a title company partner to certify the class for CE credits and co-promote to their agent list.
4. 4. List the class on Eventbrite with a consistent recurring schedule. Rotate through your geographic segments so the same agents aren't invited back-to-back.
5. 5. Promote each class to the corresponding geographic segment of your realtor list via email, and run targeted Facebook branding ads to realtors in that zip code for ~$80/month.
6. 6. Teach the class. Focus every talking point on proving you are THE expert for that one borrower type — use program details, guideline nuances, and case studies.
7. 7. After the class, load all attendees into a 25-email niche-specific drip in Constant Contact. Emails are text-only with a simple CTA ('Call me to plan your next first-time home buyer closing'). Set to recycle after email 25.
8. 8. Scale by adding classes: Vince went from 1/quarter → 1/month → 2/month → 4/month → 6-9/month. Each doubling of classes produced ~40% more volume.
9. 9. At defined volume milestones (~$1.5M/month), hire a dedicated team member for a single function (pre-approvals only, or closings only) to free yourself for more classes.

Worth quoting

“I tell the homeless guy on the street: I serve first-time home buyers better than any other lender in the city.”

“My business plan the last three years, January 1st: double your classes. Volume went up 40 percent, three years in a row.”

Best for

LOs who are stuck cold calling agents and want a repeatable, no-chase system that positions them as a specialist and generates referrals at scale.