068 On A Mission To 70 Agents and Beyond with Team Peterson-Jackson

Less than three years ago, Team Peterson Jackson was a two agent domestic real estate team. Today they're at 74 agents and counting. And all along they've been on a mission to increase African American homeownership rates, to build generational wealth and to create productive and knowledgeable real estate agents. In this conversation, Tawana and Lashawn Peterson Jackson welcome you into their education based approach to expanding their business. How systems and support anchor their value proposition, their 12 week onboarding process in the mobile app that powers it, specific agent and client attraction, methods and leadership, challenges they faced and overcome along the way. It all started in Facebook groups and home buying seminars in Detroit and now it's expanding to multiple markets. Go inside Team Peterson Jackson with Lashawn and Tawana right now on Real Estate Team os. No matter where your business is today or where you want to take it, you'll get there faster and more profitably with an operating system. Welcome to Team os, your guide to starting, growing and optimizing a real estate team. Here's your host, Ethan Butte. Team Peterson Jackson, Lashawn Tawana. Welcome to Real Estate Team os.

Thank you so much for having us, Ethan. We are delighted to be here today.

Yeah, I love what you all are doing. I love the energy that you do it with. I'm looking forward to getting into understanding it better myself. But I'm going to start where we always start these conversations which is a must have characteristic of a high performing team. When I say that what comes to mind for you all?

Heart.

You gotta have heart to be a high performing team. You, you have to want to be in this for the right reasons.

For me, it's culture. You have to have culture.

I mean, I would assume that heart is an important part of your culture. And for you all, has culture been something that has been really, really intentional or has it been something that's just like this is who we are, this is how we carry ourselves. These are the types of people that we've attracted around us and that's the way the culture is carried. Or is it a little bit of both? Like is it intentional or is it just who you are or both?

I believe it's intentional. It's very much a part of how what we started Team Peterson Jackson to achieve and what we're very proud of is our culture and just attracting those to us that believe in it, know it and also want to continue it. So it's just, it all worked out for the good as I like to say.

It started out with Tawana and I, the culture that we had in our personal business. So we wanted to, we wanted the team to emulate that. So we didn't want to lose that. Going from a domestic team to a, you know, standard team. We didn't want to lose that. The culture of what we built. So we definitely made it a part of the team.

Awesome. Well, we'll probably get into. I'm not sure exactly where we're going to go because there's so many directions we go. But I think when we start getting into maybe kind of a recruiting, onboarding, training conversation, we'll maybe get a little bit more into how you're filtering some of that out and making sure that you're bringing the right people in so that the business grows in the way that you want it to. But I would love for you to each share and you can go in turn. I forget who started in the business first, but share a little bit about how you got into real estate and became real estate professionals in a domestic team. And then when did you decide to start bringing other people around you? What was the dawn of the team as we know it today?

You want to tell the story this time? I usually. You go ahead and do it. I love to hear her version.

Well, Tawana, first of all, I. Right, right where I'm sitting now, I can look out my window and see the office window where I worked for 23 years before becoming a full time real estate agent. Like, it's directly across the street. I work for a stock brokerage firm. I was a project manager and my office is directly here.

So how does that feel to look out and see that over there? Is it like, like, that's, that's like some of my professional roots or is that like a. I'm doing my own thing now and I'm, you know, created this separate space that reflects me in my life today. Like, is that, is it a good feeling? Is it a.

Like, it's a great feeling? Like, I want. I don't regret my career because I was able to give my children an amazing upbringing because of the stability that I had there. But I always knew it. Something greater out here for me. I knew I was meant to make a greater impact in life. And I didn't know at the time how I was going to do it. And I tried a lot of different things, but, you know, real estate has always been the heart of who I am. You know, like I said, when I was. As a child, I was raised by my grandparents and homeownership meant everything to them. And the community that I grew up in, Everyone was so proud. Everyone loved their home, you know, so homeownership has always been the fabric of who I am. When I met Tawana, and we're married people, when I met her, she was recovering from her army injuries, and she was working in government. And I remember telling her, like, you know, you need some time to heal. You should just take time off work, get yourself together, because nothing is worth that. Hey, you know, I have a really great job. You know, I'm stable. Like, let's get you together, and then let's think about. Then you can think about what you want to do from there. And so she did. She took time off. She, you know, got herself healthy. And, you know, she was bored. So she was bored being at home.

I have heard that story before. Like, I wasn't sure what I was going to do. So I was like, I'll get licensed.

Yes.

I was loving it because she was trying all these different recipes and, you know, come home to a house that smells amazing from food, cooking, clean, all that stuff. So it was great for me, but it was not so great for her. And Tawana is such a giving person, and she's so smart, and she just loves helping people. Like, so we were running, like, a community center out of our house. So I don't care what type of problem you had going on, If a kid needed to go to college, she was there helping somebody go to college. You needed your taxes done. She was helping people with their taxes. She was catering food. It was all kind of stuff going on.

So I said, bartending on the side, in the basement, whatever.

I said, I saw. I said to her one day, I said, you know, have you ever thought about selling real estate? I had my license in the late 90s, and, you know, I chose an IT career over real estate, which is, you know, whole different story. But I said, have you ever thought about selling real estate? I think you'd be an amazing real estate agent. And she said, no, but, you know, she wanted. So she went and got her license. And I just thought it would be something to keep her occupied and busy, you know. But she excelled at it. She got really good. And she said to me, I need you to go get your license again. And I'm like, no, I got a good job over here. You know, I'm great. You know, nobody bothers me. Got my own nice little cubicle in the corner. I get to work from home three days a week. I got a ma. You know, I'm making good money. I have A mate. So she's like, okay. So one day I was riding with her on lunch, and she went to pick up her commission checks, and I was just going through them, and I saw my yearly bonus in one of those commission checks. And I was like, wait a minute, Is this my bonus that I worked.

All year for, that I worked all year for right here in this check?

And I was like, oh, okay, let me get my license. And I went and I went and got my real estate license. And Team Peterson Jackson was born out of there.

Tawana, for you, starting in real estate, like, as a. Here's something you could do.

What.

What was your key to success out of the gate? How were you able to create momentum quickly for yourself such that LaShawn decided, I can't not do this too.

So I remember when people ask me, like, you're. You're in real estate now. Because I was doing everything. Like she said, I had a lot of hobbies. You're in real estate now. Well, how are you going to get clients? You know, I'm not a native Detroiter like LaShawn is. I'm not far from Detroit. I wasn't born far from Detroit, but it wasn' my thing. I didn't have a whole giant sphere of people. So I said, well, the same kind of way I throw parties, I'm gonna do it on Facebook. And that's what I did. I didn't know about advertising or anything. I did know about going in Facebook groups and talking to people. And Facebook grew my real estate career.

Was there anything about it in particular that let you know early on? Not just, I'm going to be successful at this, but this is something I really want to. Because what you've done, for anyone who's listening on Apple podcasts or Spotify and not watching, you know, you've got a name on the back wall. Like, that's not. That's not a small commitment. Like, what was it in. As you were starting to get momentum besides, you know, the financial success of it? What was it about that experience that, you know, I assume you're going to be doing this for decades to come, and we could do the same conversation with different topics, you know, 20 years from now.

So what. What really made real estate my. My thing, or what I was going to do was a vacation that LaShawn and I took to Portland. We went to visit some friends who had moved out there. And while we were there, we decided we were going to, you know, drive up the coast and go to Seattle and do all the things. As soon as we got to Portland, Oregon, the first thing that hit us in the face was the fact it was so much homelessness, like, right out there. Homelessness in the Midwest looks different, especially in, you know, Michigan and the Detroit area.

It's.

It's different. And I tell people that that homelessness here is hidden. We don't see it. So my friends who had moved from Detroit, when they got here, I said, oh, my God, you know, so many people living on the street. And she said, oh, my God, girl, that. That it hurt us when we got here too, because we just weren't used to it when we got to Seattle saying the same thing. And I remember Uber wasn't that big back then, and Airbnb wasn't that big. It was all new. So we were going to try the Airbnb thing, and we were calling Ubers to get around, and our Uber driver said, oh, you guys are staying on.

The black side of town?

And I was like, oh, really? You know, okay, hey, Uber. But when we got there, Lashawn and I were there for days, and we were the only two black people that were on this side of town that we seen. It sparked my. I have a master's degree in public administration. So I was like, let me find out what happened here in Seattle. And as I start reading, I realized that Seattle and Portland had to go through what the people at the time said was a necessary evil, which was gentrification. And Detroit had, at the time was coming out of bankruptcy. And I said, oh, my God, Lashawn, this is what's getting ready to happen in Detroit. We have to go let people know that, you know, they have to get themselves together. Right after that, I took my license and I looked. I'm a statistics person, of course, and I looked at the statistics in Detroit, and at the time I was licensed, the homeownership rate for African Americans was 36% percent. And Detroit is a very, very African American type town. And our homeownership rate was so, so low. So that drove the mission, which is of what Team Peterson Jackson is, which is to increase homeownership in our communities, build generational wealth, and also create knowledgeable and productive realtors. I just wanted to do that, and I said, this is what I'm going to do in real estate. I'm going to make a difference. Another statistic that I noticed when I got my license, and I was like, okay, well, how much do agents make? Ran it through Google and it said, from the national association of Realtors oh, yeah. The average salary at the time was like 70,000. I said, that sounds good. I said, well, how much do black realtors make? And it said 16,000. I said, Whoa, that's a big gap. That's a big gap. So I'm gonna hit that statistic too. And that just became our mission. We talk about the mission, and everyone on our team knows about the mission of increasing homeownership and building generational wealth. And I love to say that last year in the metro Detroit area, our homeownership rate is now at 46%.

That's awesome. I love the mission there. I love. By the way you sound. My understanding is that the division of labor here is that LaShawn is a bit more of the ops person, and you're a bit more of like the top line agent salesperson. And we'll get into maybe a little bit of how that goes. But the way you're speaking about, you sound like rock solid ops person who wants to get the story behind the story. Very numbers oriented. I love the mission. It sounds like it's probably very education based. My guess. My guess is that that is like the core of probably the way that you attract clients and attract agents.

Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. I started with giving home buying seminars was my first step. My father's a pastor, and he said, oh, you got a business? I was like, yeah. He was like, well, what can I do to help? I said, well, you can open up the church on Saturday and let me tell people how to buy a house. And he said, all right, I'll do that. And he did that. And then all of his pastor friends were like, well, come to my church and tell my people how to buy houses. I was like, y' all realize me and lashawn are married, you know, and they're like, we don't care. We just want you. We love that you want to help. And so they opened up the church door. We went to churches and we did home buying seminars. And every time in that home buying seminar, I would sell several homes. And so that is one of the things that our team does, and everyone on the team believes in doing home buying seminars. Now it has grown from churches to community centers. We had one last week that was at our community college. They opened up the doors to have our. A couple of people on the team do a seminar there. Schools with parents and the teachers opening up the door. So it has.

It's one of our clubs.

Oh, yeah. The Boys and Girls Club. So we work with other nonprofits to bring that message out and we just love doing that.

Right. And if you follow us on social media, especially me, you will see us several times a week with our team and the classes that we give. You know, I run the stories I, you know, post in us teaching our classes and you know, even our top agents teaching classes to the newer agent. So I education is a fabric of who we are. You know, it's everything. You know, it comes first for our our team.

My experience has been that when you teach with, you know, I don't want to inflate it or color it a particular way but you know, earnestness, sincerity and with a true spirit of service that sales are just a natural consequence. Like I found when I go, even when I'm representing a company, when I go and I have the opportunity to have a stage or a microphone or whatever and I teach something, I'm not selling the product or service and frankly, I don't have to. The natural conclusion people draw when you engage them, teach them and, you know, light them up, provoke them a little bit, solve some of their problems, answer some of their questions is that they want to talk about buying. Is that has that been your experience as well, where sales is the natural outcome of you pursuing a personal mission to educate the community?

Absolutely. Like I said, that just opening that door, you know, talking about what I do has had so many people pull me to the side and say, well, you know, the side.

Or like as soon as you get off the stage, you're like, I got questions. I got questions I didn't want to ask in the Q and A.

Yes. Yeah.

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They'Ll want. They want that I've had So many team leaders. How can I create a mission based business in my area? And I'm like, well, you know, well, what's the mission? Let's start there, let's define it. What do you, what do you guys want to do? Just leading with service has always been near and dear to my heart and it's amazing that we've been able to create a business and also continue to be leading with service and embrace servant leadership with both of. Lashawn and I both have so characterize.

For us today, you know, agents like staff and structure. Like what is Team Peterson Jackson today?

Oh my goodness.

Big. We, we just, Tawana and I, we were very, very hands on and we, we just always felt like that this was our baby. So it was just hard for us to kind of let go a little bit. And through coaching we have found our way. So we have, we have an ops manager, very, very bright young lady. So, and she has organizational background, she has all of these certifications, you know, things that we don't have. So she complements us extremely well. We have two, we, we really don't have a title for them. We call them admins. But they are agents and they kind of do everything around here, so they help us out a lot. So we have two of those. We have a transaction coordinator and then we have the transaction coordinator. She has her own virtual assistant and we have two more administrative virtual assistants and then we have a marketing coordinator. So that's our staff right now. We're going to grow it some more.

Yeah, how about on the agent side? Where were you a couple years ago? Where are you today?

So we started our standard team and it took a while because people were like, I want to join your team. And I was like, you see the name? Team Peterson and Jackson, Peterson, Jackson. That's it. You know. So it took me a while to open that up. And she said like Lashawn said, through coaching culture, they were like, you guys got to have an admin. No I don't. Yeah you do. Like Tawana, you're doing 100 deals by yourself a year. No, I don't need anybody. I can do it, you know. And then they said, well, how many are you losing? And I was like, oh, maybe I do need a team, you know. So we started with one agent and it was my cousin and I, I said, okay, cuz I'm going to let you, I'm going to, we're going to start a team. And I remember telling her in secret, you know, we're going to start a team. And. And she was like, okay, cool, I'll be back. And then she left, went and got her license and was like, when is this team starting? I was like, I wasn't ready. She came back and she was going to be our first person on the team. And we notified exp. And my cousin did something to me. I just. I don't know, I wasn't able to forgive yet. And she ended up passing away very. Just suddenly. And I was like, maybe this team wasn't for us, but I had already started. And it amazes like when she, when she left us, we. Our first admin kind of stepped in and was like, hey, I know, I just. And she came to the interview, she had just had a baby. I was like, you bringing the baby to the interview? And she did. And she. We just kept moving from that. And it started with one or two in the end of 2022.

I think by the time we took our team photos, it was eight of us.

Eight. And now today is probably at 74.

Wow.

But the vast was about 40 of them being babies. We call them our baby agents, baby they are with and they are licensed within the last year.

One of the things I love about doing the show and one of the things I love about the industry is you can literally build your organization however you want. You can build your business however you want. You don't even need an organization, Tawana. You could have just said, no, I don't need an admin and just kept doing what you're doing. Like that's. You do however you want. So I've certainly heard a number of people who really prefer bringing brand new agents onto the team. Obviously that's the direction you've gone. What is it about that process and when did you realize that that was a sweet spot for you? All that like this is going to be our best way to go forward.

One thing I love about new agents is the fact that you get to mow them kind of the way you want them to be. So with all of the training and all of the education, all of the pieces that Tawana and I have gotten from our travels and all the workshops, seminars, conventions, everything that we've been to, we put together and like we've learned from the best. So we put together a really good system and it's kind of hard to push that system down on experienced agents. They, you know, they have pre. They come with preconceived notions and ideas and then they have a lot of hindrance on what they think that this business could be or what it or what it is. So with new agents, you don't have that. So we get to fill them up with everything that we know and they're more open and accepting to it. So we have had a lot of success with new agents and we have had some experienced agents to come and join our team and, you know, so. And we have had some success with them as well, but with new agents, you know, like I said, they're an open book and we get to help them write their story. So.

And as I think as a new agent, you come into the business at least. When I came into the business, I looked around and I was talking to other agents, they're like, oh, yeah, if you, you sell about six a year, that'll be great. But if a new agent comes in and I let them know, no, well, you can do 100 a year, they're like, okay, that's what they know. We're gonna do 100 a year, we're gonna do 50 a year. So we tell our team in the meeting, like, this is a high volume team. We're in the metro Detroit area. So in the city of Detroit, the average sales price is only $90,000. So if you want to make money, if you want to be successful, you got to sell a lot of houses to be successful. And so the, the grind that they come in, the, the drive that they come in, I love that. I love that. And even when we have an agent that does have had, you know, been in the business for a little while and they said, hey, I want to come over to you guys, I'm like, okay, you got to drop that. That you can only do 20 a year. That's the first thing out the window. We have agents that do that in a quarter. So come on, you know, so yeah.

How much of that? You know, one of the things we talk about when we talk about training is the balance of skill and will, right? So you have, you can train the skills you want all day long and you can design systems that allow agents to, you know, be in more conversations more often because they don't need to worry about all these other things that, you know, the team has designed solutions around. You know, whereas if they were a solo agent, they would literally need to figure out how to do all the things, which is probably a limiting factor for some experienced agents as well. You know, they think they can only do X because they have to do all this other stuff that you maybe design solutions for for the agents on your team. Um, so there's a Skill piece. Like, we need to be able to know how to have these. All these different types of conversations, and we need to know how to do all these different things. But then on the other side, there's the will, which is the, you know, the mindset to be open that I've been, you know, I've averaged 20 in the first six years of my career. I need to open myself up to the idea that I could do 40. And part of that is maybe skill. Some of it is the leverage that I was talking about kind of behind skill there, but some of it is the will as well. Like, how do you balance skill and will? As you're kind of either taking. Molding. I'm just using your hand signal in your language, Lashan. Like molding new agents or even welcoming experienced agents that are a sufficient culture fit that you would welcome them into the organization as well. Like, how do you balance those two things to open someone's mind up to, you know, increasing their production 50 or even 100%.

So the thing that I tell them, I can teach you all. I can give you the skills, I can give you the system. I can give all, all of that, too. But you have to come with the grit. And we talk about that in Detroit a lot. You know, our team almost made it, and they. They are our football team almost made it to the Super Bowl.

You know, a lot of good sports going on in Detroit right now. By the way, as a lifelong Detroit sports fan, like, there were some hard years across all those sports.

Yes, very hard years. But one thing you can't deny about the Detroit players is they have the grit to continue, like, losing the entire season and still being able to come back. Like, oh, yeah, that was just a. You know, that was just. We were just building. You know, we still have the grit to keep going. So you. We can't teach the hustle, but I can give you the skills to enhance the hustle that you have. So those. When you come over, you're going to be around hustlers. You're going to be around people who have that grit. It's. It's. Some of. It's going to naturally rub off. But. And, but we have had some people that. It just. They couldn't. It was too much for them. It's too much pressure to be around.

Yeah. And for. For me, I have. They have to. We run on EOs, so you have to want it, you have to get it, and you have to have the capacity to do it. That's the only three things that I asked for my agents. I can give you the rest, but you have to want it.

Where are you finding these newer agents? Are you talking to people at schools or. I mean, I'm guessing that some percent, I don't know what percent, maybe went to one of your seminars and then ended up getting licensed and wanted to join you because of this. That's pretty rapid growth to get to 70 ish agents in that time window. Where are you finding these folks?

They find us.

Okay.

I do very little advertising. I did try once, I did try to like run an ad, you know, and nothing really came of it. And. But I, I can put up videos of us, of my team, and I will get two agents from that video. So they find us people. We get referred agents. Like, people refer clients, like, oh, you should go see my realtor. If it's a new agent that get their license, the community tells them, you need to go see lashawn and Tawana. You know, so they send agents to us. We, like I said, we don't, we don't run ads. They, they come to us. Yeah, we don't. I don't talk to schools because most of the schools, the local schools have their own brokerages associated with them. So we, they don't let, you know, other people come in. So. But they come to us so off social media and through word of mouth. So I, I interview at least about five agents a week.

In general, how would you describe your value prop? Like, when you're having those five conversations, as you're trying to figure out, are they going to be a good fit here? Do we want them as a member of the team and as they're trying to figure out is Team Peterson Jackson. The place where I'm going to, you know, learn and grow and become my best self. However, I see myself growing in this industry and growing as a person, professional. What is the value prop or kind of, what's the nature of that conversation? Like, what is in it for an agent with you all?

Well, I'm glad you asked. Good.

Essentially, I'm asking like a business model question too. You know, like, like, how have you designed this thing to be fruitful for everyone involved?

So what we do is what I tell most people is that we are going to provide you what it took me three years in the industry to realize that I need, which is that we have the transaction coordination for them. We have the admins, we have the marketing coordinator. We provide the classes to train you and Lashawn and I train ourselves in those classes. We give you mentorship. Our team has a coach that comes in and you can have private coaching with the coach. We have a lot of friends at EXP who would love to teach. Oh my God, I love your team. I followed them on social media and I want to, I want to pour into this person. They'll look at our team interacting on social media and call and say, hey, I want to come meet people. I want to come over and check your team out. Austin Chevron drove up from Ohio and was like, I need to come see your team. I was like, thanks, Austin, that was really nice of you. You know, so we gave them, we created an app to put all of our onboard training in. We provide them a CRM solution. We have integrated Ylopo in and offer them that. So everything. When you think, okay, I'm going to get some business and then the next step is going to be this. The team has built those steps in, so you get them from day one. So now we can concentrate on building that hustle up, getting that sphere of influence going for you and just making you the best version of what you want to be in your business business.

We have a 12 week guided onboarding program and you have to complete that program as a new agent before you can get any team leads. We can't, we won't talk about team leads until that onboarding program is complete. I, that's one thing. Leads, we have them by the boatload, but they are not a part of our value proposition because if they join you for leads, they're going to leave you for leads. Education and training is our value proposition and our systems. So those, that, that is what we lead with. Agents stay because once they get into productivity, yes, we have leads. You know, we're a Zillow flex team. You know, we have, you know, all the pay per clicks, we have all that stuff, we have leads flying in. So yeah, you're going to get that. But initially we start off with the onboarding training and systems. So that is, that's our value prop right there. And it's all our onboarding. Like Tawana said, we have an app and it tells you step by step by step by step. And everything is there. The training, the videos, everything is there. And then we have where the agents can come in once a week and get help with anything that they need. It's like an open. What if we were in high school, they would call it study hall. Remember study hall?

Oh, absolutely, I do.

I was like, so we have agent study hall once a week where you can just Come in and get help with anything. Tawana and myself were in there. Our two agent admins are there, our ops manager is there. Everybody's there to help you. There's no dumb questions. I don't care how many times we've taught it, we'll teach you again at study hall. So you know, that is one of our major values of being on this team. But you know, we also have our mass, our weekly mastermind which we bring in training and we bring in guests and things like that. But besides that, you know, if you don't learn here, it's because you don't want it or you can't get it or you don't have the capacity to do it.

Yeah, really, really good. I appreciate especially the idea that yes, we have as many leads as you're going to need to start building your book of business. But that's not why you're coming here. No, no, in part because that, that is one of the more transactional dynamics. I mean it's required. I mean if you, if you had no leads it would be really difficult to get someone to say like listen, come on in. Like well I can sign up for me for a trade. It's having all those different pieces together as well as this process for bringing in. So something I'm hearing and as I'm, I try to do my mind is doing all kinds of things. When I'm in the middle of this conversation, I'm actively listening so I don't miss an opportunity to ask a good follow up question reflecting your thoughts back. So I understand them clearly and that you feel heard. But at the same time I'm also thinking a little bit on behalf of a viewer or a listener of the conversation. And so where I am in that zone right now in my head is okay, so we've got this team that's got 70 plus agents, they're a Zillow Flex partner, they've got an app to help support their 12 week onboarding program. They've got this staff. But I also heard that you know, not that long ago it was one of these two people became licensed and was doing, you know, 100 transactions. It was attractive enough that the other joined her in that talk a little bit about close this gap a little bit on we were doing all of our business from Facebook and you know, community education to you know, we're rocking all these online lead platforms so that we can keep bringing new people into the business. Like when do you develop the app? When did the 12 week onboarding program come not ask for like, obviously all the details, but I'm seeing like a today and a then and there's a lot of question marks and X factors in the middle where a lot of people get tripped up. So I personally feel like the way that I've heard your story, and of course I do some homework in advance too, that this is a pretty tight window to go from where you were to where you are now. So like, what were a couple of key things along that journey that allowed you to sustain momentum or maybe like jumped you up from like, you know, because most people like that the path is, you know, it's kind of like this and it's generally up and to the right, but it's got all these ups and downs. I'm feeling like there's like one or two, like maybe plateau jumps in here for you where you're like going along. It's like jump like. Anyway, that wasn't a super well formulated question. But you know what, I'm kind of like probing around.

Yeah, go ahead.

You want to start? Yeah, I can tell you. So when we first started the team and we, we had the momentum and we went to the ap.

Let's talk about a little bit before the team.

What happened?

Go ahead. So, before the team.

So, hey, thank you so much for listening to these episodes of Real Estate Team os. If you're like me, you're listening to a podcast conversation and sometimes you have questions or you want to go deeper or it reminds you of something that someone said on the same podcast two or three weeks earlier or two or three months earlier. Good news for you. If you go to realestateteamos.com bot, that's/bot. You can tap into the collective wisdom of every single one of our guests. Use text mode to type back and forth and get your questions answered. Get 5 tips to improve your recruiting, for example, or go to voice mode and you can talk to it back and forth, interrupt it, redirect it, ask follow up questions. It's totally free. It's available to you@realestateteamos.com bot. That's realestateteamos.com/bot. I know you'll find it just as useful as the rest of this conversation.

We. So when I came along, Tawana was at a boutique brokerage and I was like, well, that ain't really my thing. You know, I'm a corporate person. I need a little more structure. So we went to a name brand brokerage and we were, and we, we did very well there, but it was it wasn't really a good fit for us. But I'll tell you about our clientele. When we first started, we worked for a lot of investors because Detroit was investor heavy. So we were, you know, closing deals with investors. We were renting properties, we were doing all of these things. And that kind of, for me being a homeowner and it never like really getting out into the rental market. It was concerning because I was like, I can't believe the investors are renting these type of properties. And then seeing how much rent people was paying was concerning. And it was, it was messing with my, you know, it was messing with me. It was convicting me. Like I, you know, I'm making too much money for these investors. I don't like it, you know, these people should be buying homes. So it was kind of convicting for twine and myself. And that's how we switched from an investment based business, working with investors and you know, doing all that until home ownership, because it was very convicting. And along with the mission of what we saw and we knew about the gentrification and we could see it because we had, we had investors from all over the world buying these homes in Detroit. But that was the only people who were buying. And even though we were preaching home ownership, I don't, you know, I felt like we could do more. So we needed a bigger platform. So we switched brokerages, right? And we got with like minded realtors like ourselves who wanted the, who had the same mission. And we built a collaboration. It was called the real estate collaboration. And we all trained together, we would train together weekly. We got an office together, a brick and mortar, and we kind of all, you know, worked, helped each other out from there. Because one thing that I noticed when I came to, when we went and I came to real estate in Detroit is that there was no community for realtors like us. Like, I, I, I was used to being in a corporate environment where, you know, I had a lot of support as a woman and as a black woman. You know, we all stood, we all stuck together. So when I got my license, I got on social media and I was like, hey guys, where are all the black realtors? You guys want to have a meet up? You know, anybody want to meet up where, you know, let's all meet for drinks? And we did, we got together and I was like, hey, let me ask you a question. Let me pick your brain. And it was like your competition. We don't talk like that, but we can have drinks. And I was like, this, this can't be all that there is, like. So we built it, we built it and we built it through the real estate collaboration. But what we found ourselves, with all this training and all of the attracting and all that, what we were, we were doing, we were running a team because we were. We had, like, man, I had 100 deals a year and we were getting more than we can handle. So we were giving out referrals to other agents. So we were running a team, but it wasn't a form team, which made us decide with our cousin to actually formalize a team. And so when she passed away, it gave us some pause and becoming, Let me tell you, going from a domestic team to a standard team was hard for us because we wasn't ready for some of the conversations that needed to be had with people regarding their performance when we were just a collaboration. If you didn't win or if you didn't sell, that was on you. But for us, if you didn't sell or if you didn't want it or if you didn't have that grit, you didn't show up to meetings that affected the entire team. So we did stumble a lot because we didn't know how to have those conversations. You know, we didn't know how to manage a team. We didn't know how to put the systems in. So we had to go to team leader school. We had to go to team leader school because I had a few devastating losses. Like, I lost, like three team members at once. They. They all buddy.

The good ones, right?

They all buddied up and left together.

Yeah, yeah.

I said, oh, God, you know, so I was like. And then they, you know, was going to start their own team, you know, because they thought it was easy because we were not ready as far as our systems. And, you know, we had the training thing down, but we didn't have the systems and we didn't have, like, steady source of leads and things like that coming in. So we had to go to team leader school to figure that out.

And what, what was school for you like? Like, what was team leader school?

We went to Jeff Glover's lead up. That was the first training that we had. Are you familiar with that one?

I'm not.

Oh, my goodness, it's amazing. And I shout out to Jeff Glover. He gives, he does. He's having one soon, but he does this thing called lead up and he brings in, you have to apply to go. And even though Tawana and I numbers wasn't there, he's in our marketing and I kind of Sent him an email like, hey, Jeff, I really need this. You know? And he's like, okay, you ladies can come. And we got to sit in a room with some of the very top teen leaders in the country, and we were like a sponge. We soaked it all up. They took you from recruiting, training, culture, systems, everything that you needed to run a team into, and also having the hard conversations, discipline, you know, like, okay, you know, letting people go when they don't fit, and just, you know, being able to recognize those. You know what they say, slow to hire, quick to fire, all those things. So, you know, that did a 360 for us.

Yes.

So that was one of the things that we did. And then after that, we started looking for any type of leadership training, and anytime we could be in the room with other top team leaders, we took it. So we paid to go to a lot of conventions, and we were always in the team leader section. So we sat on a lot of rooms and a lot of corners and just. We just became sponges on how to be the best. So what would be your take?

You did it.

Okay.

So that was the school, the team lead. And I remember Lashawn coming in like, oh, my God, we're failing. I was like, what do you mean? We. We just started. She was like, nope, we're failing. We're going to. Well, after team leader school. She was like, this isn't working. We got invited to California, and we met with Team Fast was out there.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Kenny Trung. He's been on the show, too.

Yeah. So they opened up the door, and we were sitting there, and I was sitting in the room, and all these team leaders like, well, you know, what really took my business further was hiring the right people. I was like, hiring the right people. Check. You know, so I was writing these things, and I'm like, what else do we need to do? He's like, you really should have some kind of onboarding. Onboarding check. You know, and just taking these notes and not just taking the notes and putting them on your desk, like, oh, I have to do that. Actually implementing it immediately is what. What I noticed that made our business continue to grow.

Now the team knows when we go to training or we go to a convention or mastermind or whatever, they know what's coming.

Something's coming.

Part of what I'm hearing here is, you realize, okay, this. These are some of the core building blocks. These are how. These are some of the things the other teams are doing. And what I want to roll this into is you know, as you're looking at, oh, you know, we've been doing it this particular way, but we need to put this piece in place. We need to figure this out. We need to solve this thing. I'm assuming that it was through that process that each of you started reflecting on and probably in conversation with one another, figuring out what you, your best role is in the next iteration or the next plateau or the next level of the team is. And so how did the two of you have that conversation and kind of how do you divide and conquer on all the different pieces in the business as it is today?

It's very much talent based. Tawana is an amazing trainer. I will write the classes for her to train and sometimes she don't know, she'll come in and I'll be like, here's what you're teaching today.

Here's all your stuff.

You know, because she is an amazing trainer and to. And I always tell people, and I'm not just saying this because I'm married to her, she is the best agent I know. Like, she has a solution for every situation. Like, she is a master negotiator. And, you know, any type of. She can, she can, how you say it, Sell ice to an Eskimo. Like, she is amazing when it comes to real estate, she's amazing. So I, you know, with me and my background as a project manager and then being in it, I'm better with systems and tools and like I said, I can write a class, I can do all of that, but the delivery is on hard. And I think I'm better on the HR and hiring side.

Absolutely. So Lashawn, she gets the talent. How we're able to grow is usually most leads go through her Facebook page, believe it or not, or her Instagram page or something like that. Whether it's a, a lead from an agent coming over or even a client lead is because LaShawn has such a big heart. So people are like, oh, I can go talk to Lashawn, but I'm gonna go talk to Tawana so she can get kicked in the butt to do some things. But I'm gonna talk to her because she's the heart of the team.

I feel a little bit of good cop, bad cop here.

A little bit, A little bit. And it's just a natural thing. I think it has to do with just how we are and how we operate. It's a beautiful dance. I like to say we compliment each other well. And so if it's something that I totally, totally don't want to do. She doesn't have a problem stepping into that role and making sure it gets done and then telling me I don't have a choice. I have to do it. But it's. It's nice.

But, yeah, we. We. We definitely complement each other very well, and it has it. But it definitely had to evolve into who. Who. Who does what the best. Now, I will say the. Our. Our team and staff, they know who to go to for what.

So, yes, it's super important for people to understand that.

Yes.

So as we record this kind of on the cusp of Q1, Q2, 20, 25, where do you all want to be by the end of the year? And. Or where do you want to be over the next, you know, two or three years? Like, what's your vision for Team Peterson Jackson? And. And then maybe we'll fill in a little bit with, like, what's that gonna take?

Where are we going, Lashawn?

We are expanding to Houston. We have plans to expand into Atlanta this year, so we are actively in expanding into Houston right now. So we have quarter two.

Our team should be officially announced for the Houston area, our expansion team. So that's where we're going with it as far as Team Peterson Jackson on that aspect. We are also doing a lot more with our nonprofit sectors and, you know, trying to put, of course, to get into the community. We have a nonprofit organization that started out of Team Peterson Jackson, I sort of say, and we are going to be trying to teach 254 kids in the metro Detroit area how to swim. And so that's what we're raising funds for right now. One of our admins did lose her son to a drowning accident.

Accident.

And that became her mission of what she wanted to do was to make sure another mother wouldn't get a call like, she got. And she put up a post one day and was like, okay, you know, I got everything together. Tawana. I'm put up and say, hey, I want to, you know, help kids learn how to swim. And she said, I'm put a sign up. And I said, well, hey, Poppy, I think you, you know, do we got to put a limit on it or something? She was like, nah, it's not going to be that many. And by the next morning, it was 200 kids that had signed up for it. And so now we're like, you know, expanding that out and. And trying to raise funds to get those kids up so we don't have to tell them no. So working on that.

It's going to happen.

It's gone. Yeah.

Well, I mean, I don't doubt with what you all have accomplished together and again, kind of like the energy behind it that you'll get it done really quick follow up question on Houston and potentially Atlanta and wherever else you might take it. So are you essentially going to that market, maybe finding the right partner and offering this training and approach and systems? You're essentially offering the operating system of your business in another market so that other people can, you know, continue building on this foundation that you've developed. Is that essentially what you're doing when you go to another market?

So how we.

Here's our stuff.

Here's how to run it over here, sort of. Except we again, like other team leaders say you have to hire the right person. So we have a. We have, we hired a team leader for the Houston area for. And we're interviewing a team lead for Atlanta. And well, I birthed the team lead that'll be for Indiana. So she's working on that right now. And I have three children together and they're. Two of them are real estate agents. One is a mortgage loan officer and a transaction coordinator. So we kind of got it. And then we have two grandkids. So you're going to see Team PETERSON Jackson about 20 years from now. So that's how our plan is to continue it on that way.

I love it.

Is it Indianapolis, South Bend, Indiana?

South Bend. Okay, cool.

Yeah.

Yes.

Really good. That's all my. I spent a lot of time in Grand Rapids, Chicago. Been to Detroit a lot. I never live there. And I know Indianapolis really well, too. Like, this is like my area.

Yes.

She graduated from Notre Dame and never left. She still works for the university.

Oh, cool. Awesome. Well, I have three pairs of closing questions that I always like to wrap on. Besides, where people can follow up and connect with you, which we'll do, too, but I guess I'll go back and forth on these. And we'll start with you, lashawn. What is your very favorite team to root for besides Team Peterson Jackson? Or what is the best team you've ever been a member of besides Team Peterson Jackson?

It's the Detroit Lions, of course. Of course. The Detroit Lions. You know, we're going to the Super Bowl 20, 26 all the way.

Yeah.

Yeah, for sure. Like, it's gotta happen. It's gotta happen.

It's gotta happen, it's gotta happen. I'm, you know, I have gear I haven't worn yet, so it's.

Yeah, yeah. I need to get that out yeah, well, and I'll tell you what. I mean it the. I mean, you never want to blame it on anything, but for them to have made it in 2025 with the number of injuries, especially on the defensive side of the ball, what is just. It just proved to be a little bit too much to overcome, I think.

Yeah.

Okay, Tawana, what is one of your most frivolous purchases? Or what's a cheapskate habit you hold on to even though you probably don't need to?

My most frivolous purchase. My God, I do it every week. I have a little gym shoe habit going on thanks to my son. Just a small shoe habit. I have that.

So does that collection have its own closet yet?

Because if not, like, I have a room in my house.

Yes, it does. Yeah.

Yes.

This is officially over the top, and I'll leave it to lashawn to decide whether or not it's problematic, but it's definitely a thing. That's funny. LaShawn. Or actually either of you, or both of you, what does it look like, what are you doing when you're investing time in learning, growing, and developing? Or what are you doing, what does it look like when you're investing time in resting, relaxing, and recharging?

I can do the resting, relaxing, and recharge. My off day is Saturdays. It's the best off day to have when you're in this business, when you're a team leader because no one bothers you.

They're close showing houses.

No, they're out showing houses. They're out busy. They're out being busy. So I totally take Saturdays off. And sometimes I spend it all day in the bed resting and chilling. And then we have a little lake house, like 20 minutes from our house. It's a little house, a little 800 square foot. Was it 800, maybe 600 square foot lake house. And I. Some days I just lay there on my. In my easy chair with my blanket and stare out the window and just relax and listen to my audiobooks. And that is an amazing day of relaxation for me and. And pet my dogs all day.

Nice, Tawana, anything come to mind for you on either of those?

I don't really like relaxing too much. I'm a walker. People always say, like, tawana, where are you going? I don't sit. I'm constantly in motion, always moving, thinking, and things like that. So when I'm investing time and learning to growing and developing, I'm not here in Michigan. I like to do that out of the state. So we spend a lot of time catching planes to different masterminds and traveling to other locations because that to me is the time when I'm able to take more in and actually focus on what I'm there for versus you know, okay, let me try to learn this really quick and then go out here and implement it at the same time. It's always wrapped into out of town. If I'm leaving town that means I'm going to do learn something and I'm coming back on fire. So that's how I handle it really good.

Well, if someone's gotten to this point of our conversation, they may want to follow up, learn more about you. Reach out what links should I put down below in the description?

So I would like for if you're looking for Tawana Jackson, it's any just put the little at symbol type in my name. T O W A N N A P E T E R S O N J A C K S O N at Tawana at Tawana Peterson Jackson. It'll pull up all my social media pages. I'm most active on Facebook. I am getting into the Tiki Talky. I like Tiki Talky and so I'm on there as Tawana the Realtor. I'm not famous yet, I'm not tick tock famous but I'm in there and.

I am at LaShawn Peterson Jackson on Facebook. I am at Team Peterson Jackson on Instagram I did Lashawn Peterson Jackson also has Instagram and I'm trying to get into the TikTok as well. So I'm LaShawn Peterson the realtor on TikTok.

Awesome. All that stuff is linked up right down below. Whether you're watching or listening on Spotify or watching or listening@realestateteamos.com if you're watching on YouTube or you're listening to Apple Podcasts or any of the other podcast players, there's a description down below. All those things are linked up. Lashawn and Tawana, I appreciate you both so much. I appreciate you spending this time with me. I wish you continued success. I love the essentially the mission that underpins this beautiful business that you've built on top of it and all the people that you've been able to to bring around you in it and hope you have a great rest of the day.

Thank you for having us. Ethan. We appreciate it so much.

Thank you. I appreciate it. Ethan, thank you for your time.

Yes, thanks for checking out.