The Power of Habits in Life & Real Estate

Working out 30 minutes, five days a week is totally doable with respect to new business development. If you're not used to making contacts and tracking that part of your business, make a commitment to do it. But start out with like, I'm gonna have five meaningful conversations Monday through Friday for the next four weeks and then get used to that, right? So you can build up this muscle over time. And you will have days where it all hits the fan, the dog poops overnight and that sets the whole thing off. Wrong way. Or you get called into the principal's office for one of your kids and that kind of sets you off or whatever. You will miss the mark. But don't give yourself permission just to like, oh, screw it, you know, I missed a Monday. I might as well just throw the whole week away. Starting up a new habit is way harder than maintaining a habit.

The real estate industry has failed to create a clear path to time and money freedom. Having helped over 5,000 families in my real estate career and coached thousands of agents to scale, scale their businesses, I know what works and what doesn't. And my goal on this podcast is to share it all with you. The good, bad and ugly of building a highly lucrative lifestyle business so you can focus on what truly matters in life. You won't find any hype or fluff on this show, just real world tactics.

And strategies that get results. You just gotta do the work. All right, welcome real estate business builders. Today I'm excited for something I'm super passionate about. If you have not read the book Atomic Habits by James Clear, that's going to be the backdrop of, of this training here and, or depending on how you're consuming it, it could be on the podcast and the, the conversation around habits. I want to tailor this around. I'll give lots of personal examples that'll drive the point home. But most folks struggle putting the right habits in place to get them where they want to go. Most people hear the word habits and it's like you're thinking of like, okay, good habits when it comes to eating or, you know, fiscal discipline, you know, saving those, you know, working out those kinds of things we don't think of, you know, habits can be good and bad, you know, so when, when you, when you look at where you are in any area of your life, most often, I would say pretty much all the time, unless there's some extenuating circumstance, which is completely possible. So what, I don't want to minimize that, that fact that, you know, everyone has stuff going on that maybe takes them out of a zone in a certain area of their life. But most often we are where we are because of the habits that we've employed along the way. So I, I will be the first to admit that I am really low, low empathy. So on the scale of, you know, a 10 out of 10 is like super empathetic and I can always see things from others point of view and always give them grace and one is like suck it up. It's all excuses, you know, get after it make happen. I will probably fall in like the 2 to 3 range if I'm being completely honest. So I'm going to do the best I can to temper that and maybe bring it in the middle where I, I don't want to let, I never really let myself off the hook and I, I hold myself accountable. But at the same time, if you err toward, you know, you've got a lot of excuses about why you're not succeeding in real estate or in your relationships or you know, why you're not physically fit or all of those things. I don't want to just let you live in that world of like everything is just happening to me. So I do want to empower you through this conversation. I've got some notes here that I'm going to go through. I've got seven points that I will bring out from, from the, the book. I recommend everyone read this book, Atomic Habits. I probably, well listen to it maybe four or five times. I'm going to bring all of the examples as relatable as possible with respect to knowing that you're in real estate and likely you're married, likely you have kids, likely you're trying to maintain physical, your physical body or a connection with your creator, have a hobby, have some friends. You know, we have so much going on in real estate. And if you're a busy real estate agent, you're probably losing your mind just in the drama of the transactions you're involved in, let alone all the fear, uncertainty and doubt that's to going, coming down in our industry as it relates to the settlement with NAR and the implications of all that. So let me get in this, into this and I'm entitling this, you know, Atomic Habits for real estate agents. The first thing, and this is like a harsh reality, unless there's some like legit extenuating circumstance, you are a lagging measure of your habits. So what does that mean? So in, you know, business there's leading indicators and lagging indicators, like a leading indicator in business. Business is, you know, My ability to have 25 meaningful conversations a day, Monday through Friday. That's a leading indicator of my successes as a real estate agent. The lagging indicator is my bank account. So I can't, I can't produce a transaction, I can't comm. Produce a commission check today unless I did some activity 60, 90, 120, 365 days ago. Right? So there's leading and lagging. So, so what I'm trying to say here is that you, every part of you, for the most part, is a lagging measure of your habits. So I, I'll give a personal example. My, my weight. I tend to yo, yo in my weight. I tend to gain weight and lose weight. And when I can string, you know, 90, 180 days together where I'm disciplined, I'm using my meal tracking app. I'm, you know, wearing my whoop tracker. I'm using my, you know, Apple watch to track my workouts. I'm all in. I do that for six months and I'm at the weight I want to be. I'm physically, you know, I have energy and all that good stuff. When I, when I let go of some of those things, specifically around my diet, I gained 20, 25 pounds and I'm sluggish and I'm not feeling good about myself physically. So that's just an obvious example that chances are 99% of the time that the lagging measure, your weight, is a lagging measure of your diet from the last year, two, three years. In business, the lagging measure is your bank account. So you, your bank account is exactly what it should be based on the habits you employed, you know, 60, 90, 180, you know, every day, right? Carving out time for new business development, follow ups, you know, 25 meaningful conversations every day. That leading measure or that leading indicator would have you in a better place financially with a lagging measure around your bank account. So it's, it's just to own this fact, I think is really comforting regardless of any changes that might happen on the, you know, with the, the NAR settlement and, you know, with interest rates with low inventory, like, none of that stuff really matters. When you take complete 100% ownership of, you know, where you could be in the future starting today, you look back and like, okay, the lagging measure is exactly where I'm supposed to be based on all of the habits, you know, I employed along the way. So that's, that's just a brutal, brutal fact. We can't get around it. For the most part, the Second thing here, I want to go in, and James Clear goes into this in the book, is that we need to work backward from magic or from this ideal vision of what you want your business, your bank account, your physical body, your relationships to look like in the future. And in line with you can't take it all on, so you can't be. And you may have to, based on what's important to you may have to prioritize as well. So a good example of this is if, if you have a, your marriage is not in a position of strength and you decide that you want your marriage to be in a better place three or six months from now. And then you also decide that you know you're going to work 80 hours a week because financially you're not in the right place. Those may not be in alignment. So, so the vision, the magic that you want to create in the future has to be within the context of what's important to you. So I'm not going to harp on this one too much. I mean, inside real estate B school, we have a process called the three year vision. And then we break it down into one year plan. Then we work 90 days at a time and it's really getting clear on what your priorities are. That's the key point here, is that you have to get clear on what your priorities are so that you can make sure you're achieving in the areas of life that truly matter. So that's number two, number three. And it's a direct quote from the book. You are what you repeatedly do. And then this, this whole concept of falling in love with boredom and marrying the process and not the result. So what does it mean? You are what you repeatedly do? Personal example, I've, I give it, I gave it before. If you eat, you know, lean protein and a couple salads a day and you drink two to three liters of water and you just do that repeatedly, you will be in a good place in your physical body. You take the right supplements and you have the proper fats and all that. Right? Simple example. And you'd probably eliminate, you know, any kind of low energy or some disease you can eliminate through diet, not all. So you are what you repeatedly do in real estate. You, you are what you repeatedly do. If you repeatedly commit to and have no less than 20 meaningful conversations a day, 25 meaningful conversations a day, you will be the busiest real estate agent. You know, you will figure out in the time blocks that you set aside every day that, that you will become busy and then you become the Thing, right? So you become an agent that starts their day focusing on new business development. You become an agent that is going to honor then the time blocks they set out for different activities that are important. Right. For your long term viable financial success. I wish I could paint a more glorious, you know, picture of my journey in real estate. I was just willing to do the reason I was able to sell 27 homes my first 10 months in real estate. It was super boring. One lead source, one script and then I just signed buyers and it was very, very simple. I, I didn't love all the parts of it and it was pretty, pretty boring though. And I time blocked 12 to 15 hours a week. I would not, sometimes I move them, but I would never just not do them because I knew that was the lifeblood of the business. My ability to sit down and focus on having conversations with people that I knew or leads that I was generating was the only way that I could create the kind of financial freedom that I wanted for myself. It created like massive issues, you know, and new problems, good problems that I had to solve in terms of working too much. And you know, I sold 44 homes my first full year in real estate and then 58 and then kind of spiraled out of control. 453 homes, you know, just a handful of years later. But I was willing to do the things that was necessary to get myself busy, busy. And then I became a busy real estate agent because I was willing to have no less than a minimum number of meaningful conversations every day. So ask yourself, you know, what are you repeatedly doing on the daily and is that contributing to where you are? A good or bad habit? Right? Atomic habits can be good or bad. That's the thing around atomic habits. Are there things that you're doing getting on social media, you know, getting into the 24, 7 news cycle. What are the things that you're doing that aren't contributing to, to where you want to be successful in terms of your, your, the things that matter to you. Number four, I've got a hustle here. I want to keep this under 20 minutes to honor your guys time. I know you're busy. Number four, make it obvious, attractive, easy and satisfying. The best example I can give here is I don't love working out. Or at least I'll say I didn't love working out until I identified myself with someone that works out because I created a positive habit around it. But the one thing, the little system I put in place that made it like obvious, attractive, easy. I track all of my Workouts. I set a goal in the early part of the year. This year it's to have 150 strength training workouts and 100 hit high intensity interval training workouts. 250 workouts in the year. I track it on my Apple Apple watch and I have an app on my phone that I can just summarize exactly how many of each type of workout I've been doing. That's something that's, it makes it satisfying for me to sort of check the box. I'm a box checker and once I set a goal I could just check the box on it and I can, I can, I can get after it. So that's just a very obvious, very simple, not all that complicated. You know, it's only a 30 minute workout. I'm not committing to, you know, these two hour workout sessions and nothing like that. I just do a very intense, you know, high number. I have a peloton tread and I just do their hit workouts. 30 minute high intensity interval training twice a week and three times a week I'm doing my tonal and it's just a 30 minute workout. It's, it's, it'll take everything out of me to do it, but it's not like overly a big commitment on time. So that's number four and one. This kind of goes a little bit to number six here as well. But I also sleep in my gym clothes so I will sleep in my shorts and my shirt and sometimes I'll put my shoes next to the bed. And actually James Clear says this in the book. Actually I'm going to cover that one in number six because it's more of a system. Um, but anyway you've, you've got to make, make number four, make this obvious attractive, easy and satisfying. Really comes down to also making sure you don't over commit and because it's not going to be easy and satisfying when you've committed in like seven areas of your life, you know, to get after it and you just run out of time and you're super stressed. All right, number five is this realization that you will stray. Make sure you get back on track. There's a, there's a, a story around Jerry Seinfeld, the comedian where something like don't break the streak where he would write a joke every day and that that was his goal, was to write a joke every day and whatever you're trying to. And, and if he, because he didn't want to break the streak, you could look it up. Jerry Seinfeld actually I'm gonna Google it here, so I don't, I don't botch it. Jerry Seinfeld habit. Writing habits. Yeah, Painfully simple. Anyway, I, I can't find it, but basically you don't want. And he uses it for writing. But you want to commit to doing a thing and then just don't break the streak. Don't over commit. Like, I'm going to work two hours a day, seven days a week, and then you'll miss it and you'll, you know, but working out 30 minutes, five days a week is totally doable. With respect to new business development. If you're not used to making contacts and tracking that part of your business, make a commitment to do it. But start out with like, I'm going to have five meaningful conversations Monday through Friday for the next four weeks and then get used to that, right? So you can build up this muscle over time. And you will have days where it all hits the fan, the dog poops overnight and that sets the whole thing off. Wrong way. Or you get called into the principal's office for one of your kids and that kind of sets you off or whatever. You will miss the mark. But don't give yourself permission just to like, oh, screw it, you know, I missed a Monday. I might as well just throw the whole week away. Starting up a new habit is way harder than maintaining a habit. A friend of my wife's would, would kind of joke, you know, she'd be on a health plan and, and she'd like blow it out on a, on a Friday, you know, and she'd be like, wow, you know, the whole month is, is shot. I might as well just like, or, you know, I, I blew it on Friday, I might as well just take the weekend and just go all in, you know, and just eat like a pig Saturday and Sunday, since I, whatever, right? Don't do that. You will stray in that example of diet if you stray and you, you blew it for one meal. Just let it be that one meal. Not the whole day, right? Not the whole week, if that makes sense. Number six is probably the one I'm most passionate about is this concept of systems versus goals. You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems and explains, you know, that winners and losers have the same goals. You know, professionals stick to a schedule, amateurs let life get in the way. Gold B. Goal based success is momentary, process based progress is continuous. Systems come to your aid when you are at least, when, when you are at your least consistent and disciplined. And this is a con, a continuation really of marry the process, divorce the result, and trust the process. You know, you will get results when you commit to, you know, a 30 minute workout five days a week or you know, increasing your, your daily water intake, you know, to two liters a day if you don't drink any water, decreasing your caffeine, you know, from four cups a day to one cup a day before 10:00am, you know, honoring your time blocks and starting with small time blocks for new business development and setting aside the distractions, getting off social media or limiting social media to one hour per day. These are all systems that will allow you to put up the guardrails so you can focus on the things that matter, the things that are going to get you the results you actually want based on the things that really, truly matter in your life. Number seven is to focus on actions. It's funny, when my kids got old enough, you can see it here, get shit done. I have this coffee cup in my office. When they realize what it meant, it was just kind of a funny moment in my house. But this, this concept of doing the work and getting after it and you know, gsd, getting stuff done on a regular basis, it really does come down to that, you know, so when you, when you look at where you're spending your time and you know, are you really being honest with yourself? Did I really do the work today? Were there gaps in my day where I spent a little bit too much time on my phone and social media, where I could have been doubling down on new business development, you know, where I watched too much TV the night before, so I rationalized sleeping late in the morning and I missed my workout. You know, we do have to focus on the fact that we are, we are accountable to ourselves, being able to lead ourselves first before we lead our clients or our spouses or our children or, you know, taking some kind of influential position and not like a position position, but just being able to influence our communities or others around us starts with our ability to consistently take action in light of all the fear, uncertainty and doubt that's going on right now in the real estate industry. You do not want to find yourself in a position where you're just paralyzed and by the fear, uncertainty and doubt. You'll hear me talk a lot about fud. Fear, uncertainty and doubt. That will get the best of you. And so focus on the small things. The, the, the kind of, the, the, the tagline for the book here is tiny changes. Remarkable results. Tiny change. It's the little things done over time that, that will have you living a life that you couldn't possibly imagine. I didn't get to the point where, you know, I was working one day a week and I had 10 agents selling 450 plus homes in a single year. That didn't happen right away. It started with me learning how to become a good marketer, generating a lead, mastering a script and internalizing it. So it became a dialogue and then convincing people to meet with me and I just signed them up to a loyalty agreement. None of that. That's how it started with those simple things, you know, and then I just compounded on it. And then when agents joined my world, I just taught them some of these disciplines and time blocking and you know, tracking the meaningful conversations, getting good at scripts and tonality and dialogues and, and all of that and you know, not hiding the fact that the, the best sales professionals in every industry, they are obsessed with having as many conversations, meaningful conversations as possible and just to embrace that fact. So hopefully this was massively helpful. If you haven't read the book, I suggest you reading it also getting it on Audible. It's really good on Audible. I think James Clear himself does the Audible. If you are at the point in your journey where, you know there is a next step and you want to talk about it, what it would look like. Milliondollar agentmethod.com there's kind of a seven minute video on that page. Got a program that we've been, we've rolled out that is just absolutely crushing it. People are getting way better results than even our $40,000 GCI guaranteed. All I can offer you is a conversation. We call it a strategy session. So go to milliondollaragentmethod.com and I'll see you on the other side. Be good.