My Two Journeys

What’s better: accomplishment or transformation?

Two things set me on my path to real estate: my own homebuying experience and my job in financial services.

I worked in financial services for over 3 years. During that time I saw how much useless and inaccurate advice was being doled out by realtors and lenders. I saw how poorly potential homebuyers were being served and how much they still didn’t know about the process.

Around the same time, my own homebuying experience was a nightmare. My husband and I didn’t know which questions to ask. We closed without really knowing what we just signed.

It was just terrible.

At work I recognized that our customers deserved better. Outside of work, as a buyer, I deserved better. My family deserved better. I realized, most of all, that I could deliver better.

That’s when I decided to get a real estate license and began a new journey in my professional life. I was going to be the realtor who slept peacefully through the night knowing that I gave people the information they needed to make the right decisions for them. I was going to be the realtor whose clients slept peacefully through the night because they had someone on their team who educated them and supported them in pursuing their dreams.

I delivered on these two points. I was that realtor. I had those clients. I did extremely well in my market. I made more money than I ever could as a financial advisor. I was, by all accounts, successful. I accomplished my goals.

I was also miserable.

I was distracted from my family. My children had to ask me questions multiple times because my face was constantly in my phone. I missed out on extracurricular activities. I created distance from my husband. I was working hard in all the wrong ways.

Then I met Grant.

I was on the verge of tears during our first phone call. “I made more money last year than I ever thought was possible,” I said. “My clients are happy, but this just isn’t sustainable.”

I knew I couldn’t do this for 5 years, let alone as a career. Beyond that, I had no idea how I could grow my business. I had no idea how I was going to help more people when I couldn’t even keep up with the people I was already working with. I was overwhelmed.

Our phone call didn’t go well at first. It didn’t go well because I didn’t want to admit that there was one glaring problem in my business: me. I was the problem.

He asked me to take out a sheet of paper and list 100 problems in my business. I got to number 19 and crumbled up that piece of paper. I remember thinking to myself, “I don’t have time for this!”

That was his point. I was literally wasting precious time by doing everything myself instead of delegating work to other people. I was wasting time by not having systems and processes in place that would allow my business to continue operating should I ever step out of it.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I had been building a fragile business; a house of cards that collapsed anytime I took a moment off. If I didn’t answer the phone, then no one answered the phone. If I didn’t respond to an email, then no one responded to an email. If I wasn’t meeting everyone’s needs, then no one’s needs were being met.

I had to understand I was putting limitations on myself and I had to understand I was the problem in my business. I had to transform if I was going to live a different, more sustainable, happier life.

This is where Grant put me to work.

He helped me understand that I needed permanent solutions to the problems I was experiencing. He helped me understand that I needed a solid business foundation; and that turned out to be the difference between hating my job and being able to do more business in the first three months of the year than I did all of the year before.

Grant’s programs taught me many things: how to generate more leads; how to run campaigns on Facebook; how to get the most out of masterminding with colleagues; the importance of video in your business…all of these are true.

What I learned most from Grant, however, is that my professional life is not about real estate. It’s about business. It’s about scaling up. It’s about systems and processes. It’s about organization. It’s about understanding communication. It’s about putting the right people in place. It’s about implementing permanent solutions to recurring problems.

Business is business. I just happen to know about real estate. My goal is the same as any other business owner’s goal should be regardless of industry: build your business in such a way that you can use it as an engine to build the life you want to live.

How have I done this? How have I put myself of the path to transformation instead of accomplishment?

Easy. It’s called Savvy Homes Portal.

Savvy is a streamlined, easy-to-use, platform that facilitates house hunting for buyers via virtual reality. They can preview homes on their time, at their leisure, and from anywhere. Not only does this save agents and buyers time by reducing the number of showings needed to sell the home, it also adds vendors to the mix so that documents are kept in a space where they are accessible to everyone on the team.
Savvy also facilitates oversight. We created brief videos for agents to help explain to clients what some of the issues at hand might be and to help standardize the process.

Best of all, the Portal allowed me to scale my business, build my client base, step out of my business, and take back my time.

Through Grant’s programs, I learned how to understand business differently. I learned how to identify key problems in my business and create permanent solutions to those problems.

I got my time back. I can now walk away from my business and still serve my clients. I can walk away from my business and spend time with my family. I have freedom; and because of that freedom I was able to take the time I needed to create unique, innovative solutions to my problems. I was able to launch Savvy.

After working with Grant, I stopped being a real estate agent. I became a business owner. Now I have freedom. Now I have a life.

And it all started with a phone call.