Turn Your Passion into Business with Ciprian Dumitrascu

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Interview Transcription

ADRIENNE: 
Welcome back. And thanks for listening to the Team Lally Real Estate show home of the guaranteed sold program. Oh well buy it. I’m Adrienne and I’m Attilio. And if you have any questions, you can reach us at 7999596. Or check us out on the web at Teamlally.com.

ATTILIO: 
Our guest today is the founder and CEO of Soare Productions. He was born and raised in Romania and immigrated with his family to Canada at the age of 13.

ADRIENNE: 
Since he was young, he already had his passion for photography and filmmaking. He started Soare Productions in Toronto, and after a decade of hard work, he achieved his goal of expanding to the US where he launched his company’s first US location, Soare Hawaii, in 2021. Please welcome our guest, Ciprian Dumitrascu. Did we say it right? 

CIPRIAN: 
I mean, honestly, it’s a it’s a great it’s a great attempt. It’s Dumitrascu, but that was really good.

ADRIENNE: 
Yeah, thank you we’re practicing.

ATTILIO: 
Of course, because Adrienne said it her way but then the way you said you sounded like Drago from, from the Apollo, you know from the Rocky series, I must break you. I will break whenever you meet with your clients. So we’re gonna make a video that will break you. But

ADRIENNE: 
so Okay, so

CIPRIAN:
pretty much that’s pretty much it that will break the internet.

ADRIENNE: 
So speaking of videos, we had, we had you and your team come out and help us with our, with our new listing or $25 million listing estateoahu.com Yeah, and you guys did just such an awesome job. You went above and beyond for this, this shoot and the videos that we wanted to share, we wanted to share our

ATTILIO: 
experience because I felt like we were on the set of MTV Cribs. I thought it was gonna pop out somewhere Snoop Dogg was gonna call Hey

CIPRIAN:
exactly what

we should have, he would have loved to be part of our production, I think actually, yeah.

ATTILIO: 
Anyway, we had Snoop Adrienne, she was on set. But it worked. So talk about this business because, you know, why is it important for any type of companies to have this type of digital?

ADRIENNE: 
Presence? Yeah.

CIPRIAN:
Yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s changed everything. And we’ve helped quite quite a few amount of people being able to kind of transition almost a little bit more in towards towards the social media space. Because one thing that we’ve done different, right, within the real estate space was always like, we almost start backwards, where we think about like, okay, who’s our target audience? And how are we going to produce content that will generate as much exposure as possible on Instagram, on Tiktok, on Facebook and YouTube. So that’s, that’s one approach that I think changes a lot because then you have to think about the way you can make the content, it has to be creative, it has to be engaging, and just like we did on the, you know, 25 property, let’s say 10 years ago, what will you do to come in and create almost like a 20 minute video, where you’re showing every room showing every bathroom everything, and nobody’s gonna see that now. So what we decided to do, it’s like, Okay, we’re gonna do this like one minute video, we’re gonna have you guys jumping in a pool and doing yoga and just having a great time enjoying the lifestyle of this incredible property because I gotta say, it’s gotta be He, I listen, I think $40 million properties out in LA and nothing gave me the shock value to this property. As soon as I stepped on the on the lot, I was just like, wow, this is a home. So I think that’s really what it is you have to really understand that, like, getting that exposure online can tremendously help your business tremendously. And it makes, yeah, it makes. And we make it really easy, right? We deliver everything in 24 hours, and we just like, you know, we make Can we just say

ADRIENNE: 
that again? We deliver everything? And how quickly? Go ahead.

CIPRIAN:
24 hours? Yeah.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, I think the main thing too, is you said it earlier, we’re not making these 20 minute mini documentaries. Yeah, you’re doing them for one minute. Because, you know, because think about it, you know, everybody’s watching TV. And I’m not a video producer or anything like that. But we you know, everybody with an iPhone everybody thinks they are. But one of the things that that that I notice, if you when you’re watching just watch any TV series, any movie, anything on TV and count how many seconds is between each shot? Like when they go to a different camera? It’s about three seconds. Wow. So your jump cuts and all of that, and the music and the timing of it. It you know, you’re we’re realizing that today we are what we call it. Everyone’s an attention merchant, we’re trying to grab somebody’s attention and that way. It’s not 20 minutes. It’s 30 seconds, 15 seconds, one minute, minute and a half.

ADRIENNE: 
So So I want to I want to talk about how did you get into this industry into this business? I mean, you’re a young guy, but you’ve been doing this for a long time. So let’s, let’s let’s start in the beginning here.

CIPRIAN:
Yeah, it was really interesting. Because like I, you know, I was 16 years old, I had, you know, at this time I was in Canada for about two to three years, kind of, you know, learning the scope. But what I realized this all my good friends in high school, they were all getting jobs, right? And you know, the mentality in Romania very much, you actually don’t get a job until you finish university and you’re ready to like, get a proper career, you know, let’s say a dentist, a lawyer, things like that. And engineer like, you know, that’s that’s really the mentality. But in Canada, I realized that all of my friends are 16. I’m like, why is this working? And they’re like, What do you mean? Don’t you want to like fun and like, have money for the weekend. So then we’re going to work after school. Yeah, we make some money, and then we enjoy it. And that mentality was new to me. So then I literally realized I was like, wait a minute, I really want to have a job as well. But I’ve always had a passion for cameras. I mean, this has been maybe again from like, my dad’s always like film or vacations and things like that. And I had access to actually his DSLR camera. So I took his camera, and I decided to put an ad out, you know, on what is called Kijiji, it’s like the Canadian Craigslist is not around anymore, but it was back then. And I put an ad out there. And I copied what everybody else was offering on that site. So if I thought they offered weddings, I will do weddings, birthdays, all sorts of events, I’ll film anything, music videos. And so I did that and myself thought everything on YouTube, I go to YouTube and teach myself how to film how to edit everything. And as soon as I had that pat up within, I want to say really a couple of days, I was already getting calls from people wanting to at least meet with me to see if they want to work with me. And it just it kind of snowballed from there.

ATTILIO:
You know, the key is, is everybody can get all this equipment nowadays. But if I mean we can get that equipment, but the reason why we hired you is that you know how to use it, you know how to use I mean, because anybody can shoot B roll, you know, you just go you hit start and you don’t hit stop until five minutes later.

ADRIENNE: 
What are you gonna do and all of that. He’s mastered, he’s at a mastery level,

ATTILIO: 
I think you’ve mastered the because Adrienne and I have done tons and tons of videos we’ve gone to we’ve we’ve paid for professional production up to, you know, like movie quality stuff, and in New York City and Barbara Corcoran on commercials on, you know, broadcast quality type stuff. And so we have a lot of comparative knowledge and what I say what’s the key to, to working with you is that you know how to I don’t want his call but maybe like storyboard the shots that you’re getting. It’s not like random shooting, you’re you’re you’re very intentional. You’re storyboarding in the sequence from the beginning to the middle to the end, and it draws people in and they want to continue to watch so that’s what I what I noticed comparative knowledge is and is that what you guys do with these videos.

ADRIENNE: 
And I just want to comment that, um, you know, like, just being so passionate and curious, you know, he just mastered this and did not, did not go to college or film school. This was just like something that was

ATTILIO:
really good, you know, so. So for you and Adrienne’s I would say I thought it was Cip but she’s saying is Chip, what do you go by?

CIPRIAN:
It is so My full name is Ciprian. But everybody actually calls me Chip. But in Romanian, the CI, you create that ch noise right versus in English. It’s just it.

ATTILIO: 
Okay, gotcha. So it’s Chip Chip. Okay, there we go off the old block anyway. So for for for you Chip the what I wanted to to, you know, let you know, you know, Keller Williams, we’re all about coming from contribution. Most agents if they had somebody like you with your caliber, they wouldn’t tell anybody. But we are secretly telling all the realtors should use him and all the people that are listening to us. Guys, you call Chip.

CIPRIAN:
I really appreciate that. It means a lot. Yeah.

ADRIENNE: 
He’s got a great team.

CIPRIAN:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s definitely not just me, it’s definitely the team. That’s why we can deliver everything so fast and, you know, talented editors and everybody that really we all understand division, right? And we all have, we create goal setting and we grow as a team. And that’s one of the biggest impacts because I used to, like, work nonstop without sleeping before I had a team because it was, you know, so busy. So after, you know, you join a team, it’s like, you join forces and you grow together. And it’s been, yeah, it’s been a journey. It’s been incredible, honestly, and connecting with so many amazing people here in the community in Hawaii. It’s kind of changed my life to be honest, like I’ve, I’ve almost like, I’ve always I’ve always been very grateful and very appreciative. But ever since coming out here, everything like, you know, my house is better my stress level, like non existent my positivity, like everything, everything was

ATTILIO: 
How’s your protein intake.

CIPRIAN:
It’s getting better. Ever since you you. Yeah, it’s definitely following it closely. And it’s, it’s only getting higher, obviously, it’s a work in progress. But definitely the health journey has been incredible. The past six months. Yeah,

ATTILIO: 
I’ll tell you my personal experience with Chip is that he like we took a hike took you on a hike with us on property. And we nobody, we never been on this site. We didn’t know what it was. But it was a hard night, this hill to this ridge line above this property. And you made it all the way to the top. As part of our secret interview, no, it wasn’t it was just we’re like what the heck is about like, and Kevin, our guy, he’s like, we’re almost there. I’m like, are you punking us, you said that like five times already. We almost there. It’s right up over here. It was like half an hour later on top. Yeah. But that was fun.

CIPRIAN:
It was so fun. And I do want to be surrounded by a team that’s just like willing to go and just like rage, like it was like it was not like, it’s like every day walking paths. So

ATTILIO: 
it was a hike where you’re just you’re mentally going through? Do I have all my affairs in order?

ADRIENNE: 
So Chip I know what you know, we touched on the the team concept, as you know, like, you know, we’re a team. So we really appreciate that you also operate as a team concept. Let’s

ATTILIO: 
important. Yeah, let’s

ADRIENNE: 
touch on that. I know earlier. We were talking and you have a whole process, depending on the region and where the work is being done. Let’s break that down a little.

CIPRIAN:
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, my team changed absolutely everything. You know, I brought on my first team member who I still work to this day, my photo editor, his name is Ben. And we’ve been working together for seven years now. And he now has a team of his own right, he built his own photo editing team, employing now over 10 photo editors that work for us. And it’s changed everything because you know, we work in all sorts of different time zones, right? We have a team in Toronto, we have a team in LA as well as, you know, the Philippines, Vietnam, as well as the US in the US. We have people here in Hawaii, Seattle, as well as people in New York. So we’re spread all over. Luckily for us with technology, we’re constantly able to connect, using, you know, all sorts of apps and zooms and everything. And then we also still we get together for for team events as well. But basically, the team changed everything because that’s how we can do that 24 hour turnaround. So basically, based on the timezone, we have the editors that are working, what would be overnight for us, but it’s actually during their daytime, and they’re there, they’re able to finish everything and then we can deliver all the content the following morning to the client, which is huge, because real estate still moves pretty quick, regardless of where you are, you know, it’s important to be able to market a property as soon as possible. And that’s a that’s a big aspect as well as just, you know, to learn from different markets, right? So we get creative, like if we do something in LA, they’re like, whoa, like, that was really awesome how that do in Hawaii, how that does in Toronto. So it’s very cool to have people spread around that are all very, very creative. And then we get together and again we just kind of grow grow as a team. So it’s it’s a it’s awesome. I’m so grateful to my team they are absolutely incredible people. And yeah, I wouldn’t be here without them. That’s for sure. Okay.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, one of the things too, I want to compliment you on is that you not only shoot the video, edit the video and give it to us, but you’re doing it with the end use in mind, because I noticed you will talk to our social media guys, are you talking about the lens for real for Instagram reels? And I’m, you know, age, I’ll let you talk about that stuff. Because I’m not on any social media. I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about. But I heard those words. I heard the words, I don’t know what they mean. But Adrienne?

ADRIENNE:
Oh, yeah. It’s amazing. I know that our social media team is very grateful to be able to collaborate with you Chip and your team, with the content that you’ve been able to help us to create. You know, I know that we had talked about just like that concept of collaboration you have your teams that you collaborate with, and all your different time zones, but then also the clients that you work with, it’s like, you’re kind of like a, like, an unofficial team member. Yeah. Because we’re all working together to get to get the job done.

CIPRIAN:
So Exactly. And that’s how it is, yeah, we’re an extensive off of the team,

ATTILIO: 
besides our property estateoahu.com that blew your mind, what some other maybe not even real estate related, but what some other interesting shoots that you’ve been on, that you can talk about, and you wouldn’t have to kill us. If you told us.

CIPRIAN:
There is a few that I definitely wish I could talk about that I know I can’t, of course, there’s a few that I could, I will say in terms of your property has to be one of the most unique properties I have ever seen. And it was absolutely incredible. Another thing that has been really interesting is, you know, being able to connect with some of the homeowners of these properties, right? Like you, you get to your world gets to open it kind of opened my mentality to like, anything’s possible, because I’ve heard stories from certain homeowners who are now extremely, extremely successful, you know, some of them, you know, billionaires, heads of companies, and you hear their stories and their upbringing and you’re like, Whoa, like, it really just like opened your eyes. So my like, most interesting fact is, like, all the incredible people that I’ve met from different industries that came from absolute nothing, and made themselves to now they’re, they’re sitting in a $40 million property. And they’re, you know, they’re, they’re, they’re quite, they’re quite successful. So that’s definitely been life changing, because I take that as a lesson to the whole anything is possible mentality. So that’s, that’s always really nice. In terms of properties, there’s been some crazy ones. I mean, yeah, there was there was there was definitely one in LA, I think, I don’t know, I think at the listing are sold for somewhere in the $50 million mark, but like, the kinds of things that were in this property, I mean, I can’t even like the underground garage. And like the gaudy sitting in the driveway, there’s just been like, really, really, really crazy stuff. And actually, one interesting one was in, in Toronto, who this developer he actually built it for himself and never went for sale. He just needed it for, you know, content for himself, because as a project, but he built it seven levels on the ground. So the property from the front looks like nothing, it looks like a regular, very nice home. But then seven levels on the ground number he had one level it was the spa being the second level 30 car parking, the fourth level, it was a full course basketball court, full size basketball court, it was seven levels, and when you take the elevator, it will go three levels up and seven levels. Now I have never seen that. He told me that does not exist anywhere that he’s known. He was you know, he was very well known developer. And yeah, that was the craziest one. I would say,

ATTILIO: 
that was amazing. So not only is this home great for entertaining your friends and family, but it can withstand a 50 ton mega nuclear blast.

CIPRIAN:
So I think, oh, it took him seven years to build actually, it was pretty, pretty intense. And the driveway was all glass and underneath was the underground pool, like the indoor pool. That would be the driveway was the skylight it was just like yeah, it was truly something I’ve never seen before. That’s really

ATTILIO: 
up in the pool. And you’re like, Oh, looks like Joey’s just showed up. He’s always running late. We’re in the pool already. We just saw you came in.

CIPRIAN:
It’s quite quite a quite an interesting concept. That’s,

ATTILIO: 
well, that’s awesome. Because it’s one of the reasons why we do real estate. We’re like, hey, we get to meet you. Like you said, we get to see these properties and meet these people that we would not normally you’re not going to you could run into them at Costco but you don’t know that’s that weird over there buying you know, whatever he’s buying and you don’t know their story, but when you go to help them sell their home or you shoot these videos, right? Because you’re like, you’re the modern day the they’re called back in England or back in the mid medieval times of Bard, BARD and that’s like a storyteller. Yes, sir. Have a mandolin though. And just like a monk, you have video equipment to tell people we have 1000s of dollars of a video camera we got drones, we have an in house w two employee you have shoots. Why do we hire Chip and his crew because they got I don’t know, I don’t even know what this word means. But it popped in my head. They have the Genesis ACWA. That’s French for they put it all together, making it out. I heard the word.

ADRIENNE: 
But we definitely needed something a little different and special for this property outside of what we normally do.

ATTILIO:
Yeah, if you want to see a baller video, go to estateoahu.com Thanks to Chip and his crew. And it was fun, you know, you know, the, like I said, you know, you gotta have a doctor that is like the expert in what they do. Are they gonna have a terrible bedside manner? Which I could tell you, I could honestly tell you folks, when we were doing the shoot with him the lifestyle shoot, it was fun. And he kept up with us because we even went jogging scene and he was jogging.

CIPRIAN:
Running a marathon training was great.

ADRIENNE: 
That’s great. And he and congratulations, I heard that you completed that Hapalua half marathon last weekend. So

ATTILIO: 
you have some Malasadas

CIPRIAN:
Yeah, that was, that was no something else. It was amazing.

I mean, I I really wanted to get to the under two hours. We were just one minute short. So for sure. Next time, we’re definitely gonna get under two hours. But I’m very, very, super happy with the results for sure. Well, we’ll

ATTILIO: 
see you in December then doing the full one. Right.

CIPRIAN:
That’s the plan actually. That’s literally what I’m training for. So yeah.

ATTILIO:
All right. Yeah.

CIPRIAN:
But it’s it’s definitely you know, you mentioned fun, and I think that’s a huge reason to mine and my team’s perfect success. It’s the fact that we genuinely have so much fun in what we do. Like we It came as a passion. And you know, getting getting paid has been the bonus and that’s what it is. And I saw the exact same thing in you guys. I think that’s why we collaborated so well. I mean, you know, it was just you can tell when somebody’s so passionate and they’re just having such a good time. The results are just bound to be amazing. I mean, that’s that’s just holidays and yeah, it was it was so cool.

ATTILIO: 
I want to pique the interest of the viewer the listeners and say go check out that video because I tell you this video could have been for fine jewelry. It could have been for high end luxury cars, it could have been for the aesthetics. mafioso no I was a mafia. Yeah. But you know, a Netflix trailer whatever I mean, that’s that’s aesthetics and all those good things would you watch this video you really get a good sense of what it would be like to experience this this estate because because of your photography,

ADRIENNE: 
so go take a look at it and then also you know give Chip and his his crew a call. I know that you guys do the real estate videos, but you also that’s your focus but you do events you do all sorts of

ATTILIO: 
Beyonce if you if getting rid of Jay Z and you’re gonna get remarried let’s stay married. Stay but

CIPRIAN:
ya know, we, we definitely we cover multiple you know, we work with a lot of different brands and, you know, corporations as well. Real Estate, definitely a lot of fun. I think it’s just it’s yeah, it’s been a passion of mine for over 10 years now. So we, we got collaborating with people it’s a it’s definitely awesome.

ATTILIO:
Okay, well, we know we have one project that we told him that we’re going to do with him and that woman is going to be on I’m hesitant to say it because everybody’s so pissy nowadays, but we’re gonna do something on the top of China men’s hat. And I think like a combo lifestyle, real estate, James Bond, double O, seven kind of thing. So stay tuned, folks. Yeah,

CIPRIAN:
let’s just say I don’t think something really been done before. That’s all we should say for now.

ADRIENNE: 
Stay tuned, there’ll be more. And you guys should give them a call for your next event or your next listing. Yeah, they’re awesome. Go go to SoareHawaii.com. That’s Soarehawaii.com. Alright, thank you Chip for being our guest.

ATTILIO: 
The next hike and the next event, because the number one goal is the number one goal is have what? Okay, thanks. Thanks.

CIPRIAN:
Thank you so much, guys. Have a good one. Bye. Bye. Bye.

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