The Toughest Part of Achieving Your Dream

Foreign welcome back to Real Estate team builders. Lars Hedinborg here, the founder of Real Estate B School. And I want to have a conversation today around, I think the toughest part of, of achieving a dream is this conversation around your why and commitment and goals. And like nothing new, we've all heard of it. But for those that actually execute on it, what does it look like actually? What does it look like when you, when you write some goals down and you make some commitments and you're clear on your why and you have a vision. And so I want to do this as a follow on to a really impactful conversation I had with Justin Ford on the last episode. Go back and check out that episode if, if you missed it and I'm going to share my screen and if you want to jump over to YouTube and check out the YouTube version because I want to use the backdrop of this conversation, my 2010 business plan. And so, you know, Justin spoke about, you know, knowing your why, choosing your hard and being committed and having no plan B. And so when I realized that real estate was really freaking hard, like I got into real Estate in March 2007. I sold 27 homes in 10 months and then 44 homes in 2008, my first full year, 2009, I sold 58 homes. And it was all sorts of chaos, completely out of bounds. And there was no normalcy, there was no ability to show up as, you know, the husband and dad that I wanted to. And that was the motivation behind, very selfish, in fact. And there was challenges that sort of came to light as a result of my motivation. Initially I figured it out in terms of serving rather than being served. But the motivation was like, how do I continue to grow and not lose my marriage and not be an absent dad? My background similar to Justin's. My parents divorced when I was four. Alcoholic dad, just like Justin's story. And a lot of chaos that came as a result of that. And so in business I wanted to, to play the game at a high level so I can make the kind of money that I want to make. But I wanted to more importantly be able to show up as a good husband, a good dad and sort of break the chains that both of my parents had with their parents and with their parents. So multi generational, not having a focus on a loving, giving family and putting the family first. So that's really, I wanted to kind of, kind of break out of that, out of that mold. So, you know, my, my why. So this, this plan and you can email me, I'm giving out my email address pretty regularly. It's my personal email address if you want a copy of this plan to, to print out and read through. Because I think it reveals some of the mindsets that I had back in those early days and how, you know, I not only committed to, to this path of growth, but I was clear on my why. And I put numbers and things I needed to do on, on paper and so just send me an email. Lars at realestate B school. The B is for business if you haven't figured it out yet. Lars@realestate b school.com so the, the plan that I put together and I remember obsessing over this plan ultimately I had this plan laminated probably 20 different times in different sizes. I had like 11 by 17 versions of this. I had 8 and a half by 11 double sided and I even had these little mini versions like they were like eight and a half by five, you know, so basically half the size of a normal eight and a half by 11 because I would have them everywhere. You know, once I committed like this is what it's going to look like. I had these everywhere. And so the more important side of this, you know, the front part is the business side and I'll go through some of that. But keep in mind I'm coming off a year where I hadn't formally launched the team yet. I had an administrator, but I'm creating this plan in late 2009 and I hadn't really launched the business the team yet. I was still, you know, sort of fumbling through some of this. But I was clear on the why and also what I wanted to tell myself every day, that the wake up thought was God has given me another awesome day in which I will use to move toward achieving all my goals and really realizing all my dreams. I will positively impact the lives of everyone I touch today. And then the why am I doing this? Which was the first thing and Justin went back to time and time again people don't know their whys and as a result of not knowing your whys, you're not going to be able to make commitments and stick through, stick with those commitments when things get hard, right? So the why that I had back then and it has changed a little bit over the years, but it was this. God gave me the tools and presented me with the opportunity to make a huge difference in this world. I have the ability to be the best at what I do because I understand it, I have a major passion for it, I am a student of it and I have Absolute and utter belief in myself and my team to positively impact the lives of everyone I touch, especially those whom I love the most. I want my children, my wife, and all my family to have total freedom of choice to do what they want to do. I want to give back to those who love me, support me and believe in me so that they may live a life they never thought was possible. My wife also didn't grow up in any kind of stable household and any kind of privilege or financial stability. Very unstable childhood. I want to create positive change as much as I can and make the world a better place. I will always strive to be the very best I can be. I want my family to be proud of who I am. I want to set us financially free so that we may lead an incredible, fulfilled and happy life. And then it goes on to break down my personal life into more than just business, where I had daily affirmations and key actions, you know, in all the areas of life that mattered to me, that I was clear from an early timeframe. And Justin really went deep on this in his episode as well. But I didn't want to just succeed in business, right. And so I've broken down these, these different life areas in terms of our mind, which is emotions and learning and reading and focus and the body, right. You know, in terms of energy, health, vital exercise, fitness and wellness, my spirit, you know, my relationship with God, being present, you know, meditation and those sorts of things. And then family and fun. Family, friends, traveling, celebrating, you know, enjoying the ride. Wealth is money, savings and physical possessions. And then profession was just one of the areas. So one of six areas was, you know, my profession, which was real estate ultimately, then coaching and now building a massive opportunity to partner at exp realty. But my profession was, was just one of six things. I now have 12 life areas. And my mission, I call it now, instead of my profession, it's my mission. It's only one of the 12. And so a lot of times we get so hyper focused on the one thing. I'm going to read you one of these just so you get an idea of how I thought through. Let's pick wealth. No. Yeah, let's pick wealth. Just because it's kind of easy. I think everyone can relate to it. So this was my sort of the statement. And I would read these on a regular basis. And I wasn't financially independent, I wasn't debt free. But it went like this. I'm financially independent, I live debt free. I have all the resources I need to create a net worth of $20 million or more. I have absolute certainty, certainty in my ability to generate any amount of income I desire. I use my wealth and prosperity wisely. And then the key actions and goals that I committed to the first one was I will earn over 400,000. That was take home for me. I will have over $300,000 in liquid assets and 700,000 in net worth by year end. And I did not have those numbers right. My business will generate 40,000 average monthly net income this year. Julie will. My wife was working five days, but Julie will only work three days per week. By year end. I wanted her to get out of the rat race of being in the hospital. She had an awesome position as a certified registered cr, certified registered nurse anesthetist. So she was essentially an anesthesia person in a hospital. But it was a grind, it was really hard. We will invest 12,000 minimum annually in children's college fund. 24,000 into a SEP IRA. And I've changed some of these tactics as well. And 12,000 into Julie's 401k. Now we're saving like you know, systematically over $30,000 a month. And it's even more than that when I consider some of the other investments that we're making. So that's an example of like how I viewed wealth and what needed to happen to get there. I mentioned, you know that my three year vision for the real estate business was 240 sides in 2012 I actually did 248. And this was saying that I was, I would do listings only which you know, would imply I do over a hundred listings when I wrote this plan. But I did one listing, you know, so I really made, took massive steps toward exiting the business in just a three year period. And then it goes on to have five year goals and ten year goals. And on the front it has all the, the sort of focus areas of the business and even my guiding statement for the year. And this goes to the why and commitment and the power of words and vision and all of this. It was my 2010 business goal. Keep in mind I was coming off a year where I did 58 transactions. I hired a buyer agent late in that year but only did around four transactions. So how me and my team will nail 160 plus sales in 2010 for 960 of gross commission income and 50% net margin. And I said first this is a done deal. That said this is going to take laser focus and pig headed discipline. This next year will be the most incredible stretching and growth year of my life. I will exceed my goals and expectations. I will close 100 sides personally and 160 plus sides total with average commission in excess of thousand dollars. I will accomplish this by focusing on key personal personal growth areas and business impact zones. And I was coaching with Kinder Reese at the time. And so that term business impact zones was something that they, they didn't prescribe the business impact zones but that was a term that I kind of swapped or swiped from them rather. And then you can kind of, you know, people preparation plans, practice and potential. And I just detailed this thing out where there was no question about where going and how I was going to get there. And I feel like when I talk to people that have at least they're saying the words like I want to grow, I want to, but they never actually take the time to write down what it's going to look like and what it will take to get there. You know, Justin said, you know, choose your hard and it's something that's easy to hear like who hasn't heard that expression before? But when you really think about it like is it hard to figure out a way to sell a lot of homes and build a leverage business? Is that hard? Or is it hard to be like a marginally successful real estate agent that has no exit strategy at all and is going to sell homes into their 60s and is stressed all the time. Working seven days a week doesn't take care of their physical body and as a result their physical body breaks down. They're not spending time with their creator, they're not sort of emotionally well, their marriage is strained. What's hard? What's hard? The path I chose was really, really hard. And in all of those challenges I constantly had to level up and show up in a bigger and bolder way and not just in the area of business where it was just totally one dimensional. So and then I go on to break it down in terms of quarterly and annual numbers. And so this, I talk a lot about 3190 it was born out of this thinking. At this time I was a three, five and ten year vision. We've kind of settled in on just a three year vision with all the chaos and changing. I don't think a five and a ten year is really realistic at this point. I know some people still do it but three year vision, a one year plan and then we break it down into quarterly focus areas or projects or rocks that we work on and that's still the cadence we use to this day. So it started back in late 2009, 13 years later, we're still using the same cadence. And I'll end with this thought. And it was a quote by Napoleon Hill. And looking back, it was a bit dramatic in terms of what the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve. Remember constantly, every day reading that quote, like, hey, I've conceived this plan very clearly what my business and my personal life is going to look like. And I believe it. So conceive, believe, achieve. The plan is on paper, it's scary, but it's doable. I totally believe it because I put enough thought and effort into it. And in that conceived belief, it's almost a done deal, right? Like I said in my annual sort of statement, first, this is a done deal. You know, so it's that level of confidence and also the commitment, you know, it is a no plan B. I left a multiple six figure corporate job to get into real estate. There wasn't a plan B. This was the plan to provide a life for my family that they never thought was possible by setting my business up in a way where it didn't, you know, enslave me. And it provided a level of freedom that is really, really uncommon in our industry. And so that is what I wanted to share about, you know, my journey. And if you, if you want to look at this, there's some really personal information on that plan. But it has really helped a lot of people kind of put their arms around, you know, a top producing agent making the commitment, knowing their why, and then sort of putting on paper what it's going to look like in, you know, every quarter year, three, five and 10 years. It might be a valuable exercise for you to get a copy of it. So email me@larsealestatebschool.com and I'll send it over. No obligation or anything like that. And I'll say this, and I'll end with this is y' all know that I've, I've made the pivot into EXP and I had all the junk around it, all the misconceptions and a lot of the misinformation that was going around even in my own mind around EXP and the platform that it is. If you're still in that mode of thinking like it's something that you really don't have firsthand knowledge of what it is. My only motivation really since 2013 in launching real Estate B school was to impact deeply, so deeply impact the lives of business minded, entrepreneurial, sort of spirited real estate agents, top agents and team builders. And that continues to be my obsession is now I just have a very elegant platform to allow you to get access to all everything I've ever built and to partner with me personally for me to take you through the process to grow a leveraged business that's super profitable and also to get all the access to the stuff at the eight other income pillars that exist at exp, which you just have to make sure you know what you're saying no to. So go to partnerwithrebs.com that's partner with rebs.com you can click on a button called Learn the truth and get my perspective on it, see a few videos that have been created. You can also see some of our case studies of folks that have been successful in real estate B school, the same systems that you'll be plugging into and you can also book in a call with me. So go to partnerwithrebs.com and we'll see you over there. Be good. Thanks for listening. Would you please take a minute to share the show with other team leaders who may be struggling? And if you love the podcast, please leave us a five star review on Apple Podcasts. If you want to learn step by step how to build a profitable real estate team that allows you to get out of the real estate grind and live the lifestyle you've been dreaming about, Visit us@joinrebs.com that's joinrebs.com Our coaching, training systems and support will help you get more high quality leads, increase your conversions and sales, improve your client experience experience and allow you to scale your real estate business, all while reducing the amount of hours you work and the stress you endure. Just go to joinrebs.com for more info now. See you on the next episode.