Steven shares his journey from corporate aerospace engineer to leading real estate investor and team owner in Wichita, Kansas. From selling his first property to growing a team of over 60 agents, Steven’s story is a testament to the power of grit and resilience.
In this episode, Steven discusses the challenges of leaving a high-paying corporate career and the risks he took to follow his entrepreneurial calling. Reflecting on his decision, he says, "I saw these people in their 60s still grinding away, and I thought, this isn’t the life I want for myself."
He talks about the systems he put in place, including Sisu, to track performance and build a scalable business. "If you’re not really understanding your numbers... you’re just not really doing a good service to your business," Steven emphasizes as he shares how he grew his team to over 60 agents and completed more than 500 transactions in just a few years.
With a unique perspective as a former "rocket scientist" and a real estate team leader, Steven offers listeners fascinating insights into growing a business by leveraging technology and effective leadership.
Steven also explains his strategy for building ancillary services, like mortgage and title, and why controlling the entire client experience has been key to his success. It's not just about selling houses—it's about managing every aspect of the client journey.
Top Takeaways:
(3:39) From aerospace projects to real estate success
(6:05) What happened when the corporate job said "no more real estate"?
(9:02) The shift from flipping houses to going all-in on sales.
(12:53) Why ditch spreadsheets to build a real business system?
(15:52) Building the right systems before scaling a team.
(18:49) How did this team grow from 0 to 60 agents in just 4 years?
(20:59) Why do systems only work if you have the right people?
(24:09) A $1.7 trillion opportunity that sparked a change
(29:52) How does Sisu’s data lead to a million-dollar difference?
(31:33) What do your metrics reveal about your business gaps?
(35:01) Spotting changes early to keep growth on track
(39:20) Why 2025 is about conversations and service.
(40:22) How does Sisu help deliver that "white glove" customer service?
(42:44) Why is spending on tech crucial for agent success?
Want to know how Steven overcame market shifts and learned from the challenges of running multiple businesses? Tune in to learn more about his journey and how you can apply his insights to grow your own real estate business.
About Steven Myers
Steven Myers is the CEO of Urban Cool Homes, a real estate business he founded in Wichita after realizing his passion for property went beyond his corporate career. After graduating at the top of his engineering class at Wichita State University, Steven climbed the corporate ladder to become a director of program management before transitioning into real estate. He has also worked as a realtor at eXp Realty and is the owner of Motto Mortgage Charged.
Connect with Steven Myers Today!
Episode Transcript:
Brian Charlesworth 00:35
All right. Hello everyone. Welcome back to the grit Podcast. I'm Brian Charlesworth. I'm the founder of sisu and the host of the show, and if you want to hear about grit, you're going to hear a lot of it today. So we have Stephen Myers on the show with us today. He's the owner and CEO of urban cool brokerage. Or team? Are you a team or brokerage home?
Steven Myers 00:56
We're a team. Okay,
Brian Charlesworth 00:58
so Steven is based out of Wichita, Kansas, and super exciting for me to be here with you today, Steven. I know that when you started on sisu, I think it was like four years ago. I looked it up, and I think it was four years and three days ago, and you were the only you were a solo agent, basically at that time. Right,
Steven Myers 01:19
correct, yeah. Just so, yeah. Just launched my team in June of 2020, so, yeah, it was really just me at that point. So, I mean, I launched a team, you know, in the quotation marks, yeah, yeah.
Brian Charlesworth 01:32
So you are now, I think I saw you're up to like 60 agents. You have. You're pacing it over 500 transactions year to date, and just crushing it. So, like, how do you go from that to to where you are today? But it's you were just getting into so let's back up. Before 2020 you were just getting into real estate. Like, brand new to real estate, weren't you?
Steven Myers 01:56
Yeah, I originally got into real estate as an investor back in 2014 so I was working my corporate job at that time. And was like, really, you know, was I saw the writing on the wall. I climbed the corporate ladder really, really quickly. And I saw these people that were kind of, I was a director, and I saw, like, the vice presidents of these companies, these big corporations in their 60s and still couldn't retire. And I was like, Man, this is a terrible life, like I can't imagine doing this at that point. I was in my mid 30s. I can't imagine doing this for another 30 years and not being in a position to retire. So I found a I connected with a friend who was a CPA, and he was like, Hey, you really need to start getting into real estate investing. And I caught the bug pretty quickly at that point. So it was really awesome to just kind of start seeing that path. And at that point I was like, I didn't want to do anything with real estate, because I moved in 2008 for a job and bought a house, and then I ended up having to relocate. I ended up getting another promotion to a different city, and that house on the market for like, a long time, you know, like, three years, so empty, and I was like, oh, man, I hate real estate. I never want to own a house again. It's kind of crazy to think now. It's like, where things have gone. So it was just really, it's just been quite the journey to go from hating real estate meeting a CPA that was a friend at a city that I went to, magically ran into this guy at a bar who we went to the same college and and we were in Tulsa at the time, and then we became friends. And then he was like, hey, you need to get in real estate investing. And I was like, That's a weird thing to think about right now, because I can't think about real estate at all. So Okay,
Brian Charlesworth 03:39
so back up even a little bit further you talked about this corporate job. So my understanding, you haven't shared this with me, but my understanding, and I love this, because everywhere I go, I always hear the term, you know, right? It's not rocket science. But my understanding is, you were actually a rocket scientist. Is that correct? Correct? Yeah, that was originally
Steven Myers 03:59
my degree in aerospace engineering, and worked with a lot of three letter agencies on special mission type of projects. Okay, very cool.
Brian Charlesworth 04:10
So, but yeah, even though you're doing something really cool, you knew that if you did it for another 30 years, you wouldn't be able to retire.
Steven Myers 04:17
Yeah, I already knew. I kind of Yeah. I just knew, like, the corporate life just kind of sucks, especially when you're an entrepreneur, right? Even at that point, I was listening to the early, you know, teachings of Gary V and we kind of got, kind of, you know, started the early YouTube, and I was like, Man, I really feel like, and I'm an entrepreneur at art, I did, you know, I did end up getting an MBA, kind of, along the way, because I started in on the management track, into the into the corporate world. But, you know, I was running these huge, massive multi discipline organizations, doing really crazy projects, right? And I was like, man, like, this should be really cool. This should be something as a kid that I would like, thought would be amazing. And I really. Just did not like it that much, you know, just people didn't want to do their job. People, you know, people are like, well, that's above my pay grade. That's how I kept climbing the corporate ladder, because I'll just do it. I don't care. I don't care what my pay grade is, you know, then all of a sudden they're like, Hey, do you want this promotion? I'm like, sure. I'll take that promotion and and it just kept going up the ladder from there and right and up as a director of a consulting company for you know, the CIA FBI and stuff like that. So cool. Well, thank
Brian Charlesworth 05:27
Gary Vee for your entrepreneurship. So shout out to you. Gary Vee, also, it's interesting to me. I think the hardest thing for people who come from that kind of background, where you've been in this corporate job, is saying, Hey, I'm walking away from a salary like most people can't do that. I think that's the biggest that's the biggest thing, right? Most people are afraid of making that leap. How did you feel about that?
Steven Myers 05:52
So I had, like, a plan. My plan was by time i was 40, I would have enough real estate that I could back out of that point. So that was originally my plan. What ended up happening was, it was around, it was around 2017 my my bosses came to me. They were like, hey, you know, we don't like that. You're doing real estate investing on the side. And I'm like, I like, I don't understand, like, what's the issue? And they were like, you know, we just don't like it. We think that we want more of your time here. And I'm like, Look, guys, like, my projects are on time. They're on budget. Like, I'm driving most of the profitability for the company on my projects. Like, what more do you want? And they're like, I'm like, I'm maxing out of my bonuses. Like, what else is there for me here? And they're like, well, we just want more of that. And they're like, I'm like, Well, I'm not going to back away from real estate investing. Why? That doesn't make any sense. They're like, well, if you don't want to back off real estate investing, then you know you need to find a different job. And I was like, I just shook their hands
Brian Charlesworth 06:51
and left. That's amazing, like, why that is such a fixed mindset, right? Yeah,
Steven Myers 06:59
yeah. That's insane to me. And I even told them I'm like, so if I went home and watch TV at night, you wouldn't have an issue with that. But the fact that I'm like, going out, meeting with real estate agents, buying properties, doing rehabs, turning things into rentals, you have an issue with that. Like, that's just crazy. And a bunch of my sales guys are actually real estate investors, right? They, yeah, they always, you ask them what their goals are, and they're always talking about buying new homes. And we love that, right? We want them to be independently wealthy. Yeah, exactly. And it was, it was just really wild, but they were, you know, So originally, the company that I was worked at was started by an entrepreneur, and which is why, what attracted me to that company and but that guy sold it to a big corporation. So then this big corporations bring these two, you know, executives that were in their 60s, and I think they was just, I think a lot of it was just jealousy. They were just jealous, yeah, and I think for them, it's just like they wanted to, like, figure out a way to kind of put me in a corner and just kind of like, check me a little bit. But it was hard because I was making, I mean, I was making over, you know, in Wichita, Kansas, which is a pretty affordable place to live, I was making $180,000 a year, you know. So it was not something, it was going under 80 to zero. That was quite the kick,
Brian Charlesworth 08:17
yeah. Well, again, it takes grit to do that. And these guys had jealousy, because they could never go beyond their salary, right? Yeah, and, you know, they didn't, they didn't have the grit to do that. So, so you go from real estate investor to now, is this why you had to start a real estate team, like, or go into still on real estate? I should say,
Steven Myers 08:38
Well, originally, like, I didn't have my license at that point. So I ended up getting my license because I was like, well, at least if I'm still going to be buying and selling houses, then I could at least make some extra money from that, because I was using realtors to list my properties and to buy properties with. So I'm like, Okay, well, at least I can make some revenue off that. I really had no desire to be a realtor at that point, and then, like, by the end of 2017 you know, the especially in our market here in Wichita, it became hard to find good deals. You know, wholesalers started to really infiltrate. We started to get a lot of out of state investors kind of overpaying for properties because they were their rent ratios were really good. So I was at a point where I was like, Okay, well, I'm making, sometimes I'm making more money on my real estate fees than I actually am on my flips. So, like, maybe I just need to dive a little bit more into this real estate world and become a realtor and really understand that part of it. And obviously, at this point too, the banks were starting to really question me on financing. Because, you know, I lost, they figured out I lost my $108,000 job. So it's not as attractive to give you money to lend. So my, you know, the amount of loans I was able to get went down and and so like, Okay, well, I guess I'll try this real estate thing a little bit and see
Brian Charlesworth 09:56
how that goes. So this was 2017
Steven Myers 09:59
Yeah. So 28 When I kind of fully at the beginning of 2018 is when I fully committed to being a realtor to work with actual clients. So okay,
Brian Charlesworth 10:09
awesome. So moving forward, so you started selling real estate, and when you got sisu in 2020 you were standalone agent, right? So, correct you had in your mind you wanted to build a team at that point. Or
Steven Myers 10:25
well, what happened was, kind of covid opened my eyes. So, you know, I was, I was really good at generating leads online. So I was really, you know, at that point, really flexing Facebook leads at that point, and of course, of like, two years, I created a database of around 10,000 leads. And, you know, I was still trying to figure out CRMs, I was still trying to figure out, you know, how to work with clients, still trying to figure out sales. I was trying to figure out all these things, but I had a bunch of leads. Well, you know, during covid, when everything shut down, I started following up with all leads. I said I was going to follow up with and I followed up with them, and I'm like, they're like, Oh, I bought a house, oh, I bought a house, oh I bought a house. And I'm like, I'm like, geez, I am, like, spending all this time, and I'm about, you know, I'm working a lot of hours, and I I missed out on all this opportunity, but I can't really blame myself, because I just didn't have the capacity to do that. So I really figured out. And I hired my first coach, April of 2020 or may of 2020 and he was like, well, you need an ISA, you know? And I'm like, Okay. And he's like, you also need an assistant. I was like, Okay. He's like, that will help you kind of leverage yourself. So I hired my first assistant, June 1 of 2020 and then I hired my first Isa, July, 1 of 2020 and then it was kind of off to the races for me in terms of production. I mean, that year I pretty much 2020 even though it was kind of a crazy year, I almost sold 100 houses myself so but again, like I'm tapped out on bandwidth. Then things just started to get really crazy, right? Everything was getting crazy at that point because I had all these people. And then I called somebody. I was at exp at the time, and I called, like, my sponsor, and he was like, Hey, you really need to talk to this guy, Matt Smith. And Matt Smith, I said, Hey, Matt. Like, I'm trying to do this thing. I'm trying to figure out. He's like, you need, sisu. And I'm like, perfect. I got a question. I just, I just gone the website and was like, hey, I need sisu. So I was like, He's selling 800 homes a year. I'm going to take whatever, you know, I'm, I'm one person. I'm selling, you know, at that point, my biggest year was 30 sales, you know, in 2019, and so I'm like, Okay, well, I'm going to go buy sisu, you know, so yeah, and then ever since then, it's kind of been a core function of my business. So
Brian Charlesworth 12:47
when you bought sisu, like, what were you thinking? Like, what was it going to do for your business?
Steven Myers 12:51
Well, my whole plan when I first got sisu was really understanding, because I kept getting all these buyer agencies signed, I kept getting all these listings as a sign and and I just didn't really have a good way of tracking any of that, you know. And I was like, I was using spreadsheets, and I and I hate spreadsheets. I mean, I from the corporate world. I really just hate spreadsheets. There's something that bothers me, because everyone's like, whoa, do that in a spreadsheet. Do that in spreadsheets. So I'm like, I don't want a spreadsheet, like spreadsheets not a good way for me, what I think, to manage and run a business. So that's what. So you were
Brian Charlesworth 13:23
using spreadsheets to manage the contract close process, like, when somebody would go under contract, all that was a spreadsheet
Steven Myers 13:28
I see Correct, yeah, which sucks, you know, yeah, it absolutely sucks. And so I'm like, Okay, well, this and then obviously, like, I'm not updating it correctly. And it's really, it's, you know, there's just a lot of factors going on. I'm I'm not the, you know, I'm an engineer. I'm more of, like, the I'm gonna go get shit done kind of person then, then I'm gonna sit here and I'm gonna go create chaos, and then somebody's gotta have to kind of figure out the chaos part. So, but there wasn't really a good way to show me, Okay, how many buyer agencies do I sign? How many listing agreements? What is my commission I have coming due to me, like, I didn't have any of those, those things at my disposal. And so that's where I was, like, really, like, Okay, I need something to fill those gaps, you know? So and I mean, and I had people recommend to me, what is that spreadsheet thing? I don't even know what it's called, CTE or something like that. I don't even know what it's called, yeah. And I'm like, I I got on the website. I think I downloaded them. Like, no, there's no way I'm using this. This is, this looks like my nightmare. So, so, yeah. So then I, you know, started plugging away at sisu, and I really just spent, like, a couple days on the weekend, and just really got deep into it and started building out, like, my task list and my, you know, kind of what I wanted to do from a process point, and just, really, you know, started taking off from there. And ever since then, everything that we've done has been tracked and see soon,
Brian Charlesworth 14:56
yeah, so that's awesome. So now you have gone talk to me about how you started. Recruiting agents and how like to not have a team in 2020 and to now have a team of 60 agents, that's very impressive, especially for someone who was pretty much brand new to real estate at that time. So how have you done that? And well, you know, it's interesting. I'll add this to this as well, because my sales team always comes up to me, and they're like, the biggest hurdle we have to overcome is we've got all these teams that have like, three to five agents, and they say we'll get sisu when we get more agents. Like, what advice would you have for those type of people?
Steven Myers 15:33
Well, I think, like, for me, like, I just kind of, I didn't know necessarily where I wanted to go, but I knew I wanted to do big things. I mean, I don't want to live my life where I don't do big things. And that's why, you know, I was interested in climbing the corporate ladder quickly. But if I was going to do a real estate team, I just didn't want to half ass your real estate team. And I feel like that's very common in the real estate team space, you know, is like, they don't want to make the investments, they don't want to buy the leads, they don't want to set up a CRM, they'd just be like, well, you know, hey, I'm a good agent. I'm going to start a team. And I just didn't want that to be me, because I I kind of, you know, before I even had a real estate team, I had kind of a sour taste in my mouth, because I saw some of these real estate teams and how they were operating, and I just wasn't really like, that's not how I would want to operate a real estate team. So I had this idea of what I wanted and where I wanted to go. Did I envision that, you know, four years later I'd be at 60 plus agents? No, I had no clue that that was where I was going to go. But I just knew that I wanted to be able to bring agents on in a system that I could train to and that I could coach to. So, yeah, so that that's really what became big for me in getting sisu, because then I could really understand, hey, not only my own metrics, but then all their metrics as well.
Brian Charlesworth 16:48
So we started doing these quarterly events where we let people see behind the scenes of my wife's business, right, and see how they're leveraging sisu to run their business. I know you've come to two of those now. One, I think it was about a year ago. One was like, when we first started doing these a few years ago, thinking, did that change your perspective on how to run a business? Or What value did you get from that?
Steven Myers 17:09
Yeah, I mean, it really just gave me some insight on how to better leverage sisu, and it just gave me a lot of insight to that. You know, I think, I think some of the things that people don't really understand is, you know, there's a lot of chaos behind these real estate teams, you know. And they just understand that it's okay to have some chaos. Because, you know, even, you know, even with meeting spring and Justin for the first time, they're like, Yeah, we had to change some of the ways we're doing things because we were doing them wrong, you know? And it's just refreshing to hear that, because you don't always hear that when you see people give a speech or or whatever, it's like, man, it's, it's, it's challenging, right? Even here in, you know, I saw a spring speak in Nashville a few months ago. And, you know, just even now, you know, they're still with the market changing. They're adapting their business. And just, hey, we're on the same boat here. And it's not easy, it's not simple. There's a lot of work, there's a lot of chaos, there's a lot of personalities, right? So, yeah, I mean, I think that that just really opened my eyes. I mean, we, we started using some of their stuff for, you know, having VAs help recruit agents, you know, some of the scripts that Justin was using to schedule appointments with with agents and, and obviously, just leveraging the task list at a higher level, using sisu, the numbers at a higher level, just kind of all that stuff that that they kind of go over. I mean, there's a lot of really good information,
Brian Charlesworth 18:33
cool. So congratulations on your success. By the way, getting to the size you are is amazing. So how did you do it? Like, okay, great. We've talked a little bit about, okay, you've seen how they did it, but, yeah, how did you actually do it? How did you in four years go from no agents to 60 agents?
Steven Myers 18:53
I mean, I think a lot of it was, I got lucky with the people that I hired originally. I mean, I think that's a lot of it. Two of my first three hires are still with me to this day, you know? I mean, I think that that really says a lot, that they, they saw the vision, that where we wanted to go. They bought into it. And so the fact that, you know, you have people within your organization that have been here in four years, and they have plugged in the holes. So they, one started as an ISA, and worked her way up to General Manager, and then now transitioning into a different role because her husband moved out of the country. And then I had another one who was my first Isa. He was actually my original lender. And when things started go crazy, I was like, Hey, man. Like, I understand that you're a lender, but I really need some help on this is a part, and you're a great salesperson. Can you help step in and be an ISA? And so I got him to convince him to kind of give up lending and become an ISA. But now he's full circle. He's
Brian Charlesworth 19:53
running the mortgage company. So, you know, starting a mortgage company in 2022 so you. So having those people that really come in and do big things helps, helps a lot. So I think one of the biggest challenges for most real estate team owners is surrounding themselves with great people because they are afraid of making that initial investment. Like, yeah, it's a challenge to say, hey, let's just say I'm making 200 grand, 300 grand a year as a team leader, and now I'm going to pay this guy 120 grand a year. Yeah, that's a lot of fear that's going to come into most people, right? So did you have, yeah, did you have those kind of thoughts, and how did you overcome those?
Steven Myers 20:34
I mean, I wish I could say I did, but if you didn't,
Brian Charlesworth 20:37
if you didn't, that's even better. Why? Why did you not? I mean, what, like, what was your thinking and bringing in these people to take your business to the next level? I
Steven Myers 20:46
just really, just again. I just kind of knew where I wanted to go, right? Like, I just so, I just knew, obviously, just kind of being in the business world as I know, you need people to grow your business. I mean, that's just what you need, right? Like, no matter how good a systems and processes you have, you have to have people to grow your business. So I just knew if I didn't have those people, then I'm going to be stuck doing jobs that I don't want to be doing, or that I don't have the bandwidth to do. And so, you know, so it's really important for me to really make those kind of leaps going forward, yeah, so for me, I guess, like just being a classic entrepreneur, right? I mean, I think part of it is when I was, you know, real estate investing too, is like first house I, you know, remodeled. I did it myself. Well, that sucks, you know, you can only do one of those, you know. So then you just hire contractors, and then you build teams and contractors, and then, so just, I just always knew, obviously, coming from the corporate world, and being in a team environment, you know, managing massive teams, you just, you just know the real value of a team.
Brian Charlesworth 21:52
Yeah, so you started as a real estate investor. You now have a team that's doing, just doing big things. How's the real estate investment business today,
Steven Myers 22:01
I would say, now I'm kind of where I'm at with my real estate business. It's starting to pick up. You know, I've kind of taken the gas off of that to focus on this, just because I only had so many, I only had so much bandwidth to focus on things. So, yeah,
Brian Charlesworth 22:15
so you were getting more money from building a real estate team than you were getting from making real estate investments,
Steven Myers 22:21
correct? Yeah, you know, I was focusing on the growth, so I was taking my money and reinvesting it back in my company, or investing it into serving other companies, to help serve my companies. So just, just because, again, I knew where I wanted to go, and I knew that real estate, I mean, I still, obviously, I have a portfolio, but it hasn't been something I've really focused or grown here in the past
Brian Charlesworth 22:43
few years. Yeah. Okay, so you also talked about ancillary businesses, and one of the things you told me before we got on this call is that you want to focus on driving higher attach rates to your ancillary businesses. You've started a mortgage company, you've also you have a title company. Are those the ancillary businesses you have? Yeah, yeah.
Steven Myers 23:01
So I have title or so. I started mortgage first started that in 2022, and I just started title this year. I started insurance this year, and then property management about a year ago. So okay,
Brian Charlesworth 23:15
so now when we look at this, you have your investment business, you have your real estate business, you have your mortgage business, you have your title business, and you have your insurance business. Did you say property management as well? Correct? Yeah, property management, so you're up to six different businesses. So you've gone from being an employee making $180,000 a year to an entrepreneur that owns six businesses, all of which are fed from this massive real estate machine that you you've developed. So congratulations. So now, this year, you just told me, before we got on this call, you're focused on driving higher attached rates. How do you do that? Because that's, there's so much opportunity there, right? I mean, I know many people are making, you know, $100,000 a month or more for each of those businesses they have. So it's a massive opportunity, correct?
Steven Myers 24:07
Yeah. And I mean, so one of the biggest things I think that stuck out to me. I went to a white local conference in 2021 and Tom Ferry spoke, and he was saying something, and I'm probably going to misquote it, but it just, it stuck a chord with me. Is there was 300 I think, something like $300 billion in real estate commissions in 2020, but 1.7 trillion in real estate services, you know. And I was like, Man, that's a big piece of the pie. That is just, you know, that's just going away. And again, like I saw it, right? Like, as a team, as, you know, as I started growing my team, I mean, mortgage became a big bottleneck for me, because the amount of leads that we were doing, no lender can keep up to them. You know, they would always be like, Oh, I can. I can handle your leads. And they would be like, actually, no, I can't. And I'm like, Okay, well, obviously, as me, as kind of, you know, having that. A system process. Background from being an engineer, I'm like, Okay, well, I just need to control this, because no one else is going to control it the way I want to control it. Now, I will say on the flip side, starting mortgage was a lot more challenging than I thought it would be, but just because it did require a lot more attention than I thought I would have to give it. But I mean, so, so I want to stop at that for a second, because it's funny, spring had her own title business, and I kept telling her, I'm like, Babe, you need to start a mortgage company. Like, there's more money in mortgage than title, and she was doing great on title, right? Yeah, yeah.
Brian Charlesworth 25:34
She's like, she's like, I don't want to have to go get licensed. I don't want to have to learn mortgage. I don't want to do this, right? So finally, she made it very clear, and so I said, You know what? I'll do it then. So anyway, because of that, sisu has a sister company called simply mortgage. We also have simply title and simply insurance, but we're really focused on the mortgage side more today, and it's to solve exactly what you just talked about, right? You have your own mortgage company, but you had to go get licensed. You had to do all the things. And now spring has her own mortgage company now, because she's partnered with simply who we have a joint venture with her, and she didn't have to do any of that, right? We do it all for her. All she has to do is feed the business with her leads and help us promote it and stuff like that. But as far as that goes, like all the back office is 100% handled by sisu. So I just wanted to point that out now, because we wish we would have caught you inside, but certainly we've made it much easier than anybody else I've seen in the space for a team owner to actually get into mortgage. So if you guys, if you guys are thinking right now as you listen to Steven talk about his mortgage business, this is something we can turn up for you very quickly. We will do all the work. We'll recruit your Lo. We'll get all the licensing done. We'll do everything. All you have to do. Speed it. So on that note, yeah, so, you now have this mortgage business, and here, two years later, it's now going well. How long like how difficult was it for you to get it to where it is today?
Steven Myers 27:19
It was pretty difficult. You know, one of the things I always say is, every lesson I learned, I feel like I had to learn it the hard way. So just because, I mean, you know, you think to yourself, like, okay, mortgage is going to be pretty simple, especially for me being, you know, having the background idea that, and I think at the end, it's not really all that complicated. But again, it's like, there is, you know, we had to hire Los, and then we had to hire Loa, and then I had a train processors and all this stuff. And I'm like, Man, this is a lot more than just bringing on an LO you know, when you start a whole mortgage company. So yeah, and then you're having, you know, we're going to wear a broker shop. So then you're having to learn, okay, well, each lender that you send business to, they operate a little differently. So then we had to take into account for all their differences and, and so there was just a lot of different factors kind of going into it. And then also on top of it, I'm sure a lot of people that run teams run into that is like, I start to become the, you know, the evil empire over here and, and, you know, they don't want to accept our pre qualifications, because they don't want the fact that I, you know, know that I'm getting paid multiple ways on deals. So we have some agents that kind of fight back on us on that. But over time, that has kind of gone away because, you know, we, we've been successful in closing on time and, and having, you know, our people are pre qualified and, and just kind of going through all those different dynamics. So it's really a whole different business. And it's a whole different I mean, there's similar in some ways, and they're a lot different, and in some ways too. And so you really have to kind of manage that in through it. So
Brian Charlesworth 28:59
I think when we think about starting a mortgage or a title company or an insurance company, the first thought we have is, oh, how much money can I make from it? But the reality is, if the thought we had was, how can I provide a better experience for my customer? Because you actually can, right? You can ensure that they can close in three weeks, versus if they go to some credit union and they they can close it in five weeks, and you have to push out your deadlines. And now there's fees that are involved in all this stuff, and it's chaos. It can be so much easier by controlling that end to end experience for the consumer, right? Oh, yeah. And it's great, especially for us now. I
Steven Myers 29:40
mean, we have buyer consultations now, especially with the new rule changes, right? Like we're really focusing on bringing people the office we were before the rule changes, you know, because that's one of the things that, you know. Push flash forward. Let's go back to sisu. I really understood from, you know, 2020 that my success rate of people. That signed a buyer agency with me, or with one of our agents, their close rate was so much higher than someone who didn't right. So I was so from, from the beginning of the team, or really been 2021, oh, my God, we have to sign by agencies with everyone. Like it works, like it works to get these people committed to you. We think to ourselves, like, Oh, it's just a piece of paper that they had to sign. But, man, the numbers show me a totally different conversion rate from a from a buyer shopping to to closing. So, so
Brian Charlesworth 30:28
stop, stop right there for a second. So, like, I know, sometimes people think, Oh, if I have to pay sisu, you know, 300 bucks or 500 bucks a month, or, you know, if you're a big team, maybe $1,000 a month, but, right? But like, How much money did you actually make by actually knowing that information? That they make more money because those buy, like, there's little things that you discover like that. I mean, for me, it's on a weekly basis, right? There's little things you discover where you can make that little shift that actually turns into hundreds of 1000s of dollars or millions of dollars. And some people hesitate to say, oh, I need to spend 300 or 500 bucks a month for that. Yeah, no. How do you feel about that? You never had the hesitation. But there's so many people that do. What advice do you have for those people,
Steven Myers 31:20
if we're talking about, like, investing in technology, I think it's really important to really understand the core fundamentals of your business. I mean, there's no Corporation on this earth that does not know their numbers. So if you're not really understanding your numbers and where your money is coming from, or where your revenue is coming from and where your profit margins are, you know, you're just not really doing a good service to your business and to the people that you're better on your team, because they wanted those numbers too. I mean, when it comes to our coaching sessions, be like, well, you know, the reason you're struggling is because we're not getting buyer agencies like, or we're not meeting people at the appointment, like, what do we you know, we can start dissecting the process on where they are failing. Because I know, you know, we know our global metrics from sisu, and we know where agents are falling below those metrics. And okay, well, I you know we need to coach you up on your appointments, on setting an appointment. We need to coach you up on how to meet an appointment, or we need to coach you up on how to get a buyer agency signed or a listing agreement signed. I mean, just, it just allows us to dissect and really train those people that are level so they they understand where they're falling short or where they can improve. And then also, it allows us to find people that are exceeding those targets that we have, and then help guide the team into what's working for them, so they can contribute back to, you know, to the organization by like, Hey, this is how I'm getting my buyer agency signed. Or, Hey, this is how I'm getting my listing agreement signed, because I have a 90% success rate of it, you know. And then there's agents that are, you know, we all have agents that are below the metric, and they're telling us that, you know, their people just don't want to work with them or something, or people just don't want to sign that buyer agency. It's like, well, that's not true, because we have people exceeding the metrics here. And so they're running the same number, the same people you are. It's just all a numbers game. So, yeah, it also helps too, because I think sometimes agents, especially newer agents, they have a hard time really understanding that you're not going to close. 100% of people you meet with, you know, and I think that that's really like they get, they kind of will beat themselves up on on somebody that fires them, or someone that doesn't want to sign an agreement with them. And I'm like, Guys, the numbers are the numbers. It's fine. Like, you know, like, we're not here to shoot 100% we get 70% of our people that we meet sign. That's success, in my mind, right? Like, the numbers tell us that this is what you're going to make, but this number of people you know, so and as
Brian Charlesworth 33:41
soon as you know it's a numbers game, it's so much easier to say, Okay, I need to have five more appointments. Or, yeah, right, yeah, yeah. Or I need to have this many more conversations, because I know if I do have this many more conversations, I'm going to have this many appointments, which is now going to get me this many closings, right? So, yep,
Steven Myers 33:57
100% Yeah. And so it just, it just makes us so much easier to really show agents the way of how to be successful. And really when you can pull up someone else's sisu dashboard and be like, Hey, this is an agent that's making the type of money that you want to make.
Brian Charlesworth 34:11
Here's what they're doing. Yeah, I don't know how anybody in real estate coaches their agents up without having sisu. So what does 2024 look like to end the year for you and into 2025 I know the last two years have been challenging for everybody, but yet you've still been in this massive growth mode. Like to talk about that, but I'd also like to like dive into what do you see the end of 2024 looking like? And what are you predicting for 2025 and what are you doing to really take advantage of now the market being slowing, and now, you know, we see more people putting their homes on the market. Today, we see interest rates dropping. It's going to help buyers like I'd love to get your thoughts on just the whole industry today and where you guys are going to go and you. How you're going to take advantage
Steven Myers 35:01
of that? So, yeah, so the first part is like, 2024 so 2024 started off really, really well for us. So we were really exceeding our stuff over 2023 by, like, quite a bit. And I was like, Man, this is going to be an awesome year. And then we hit June, and I don't know exactly what happened, but this is the nice thing about sisu, because I can see immediately in June that my business was not going that direction it needed to be going. I could tell that all my lead indicators were starting to fall. So I was like, Wait, what happened? So, you know, I think at that point, I don't mean, I don't necessarily know exactly what happened, but at some point, consumer behavior started to happen. I think the agent started to get a little bit, maybe complacent, a little bit with with kind of the fact that the human consumer behavior was changing a little bit, and we really started to focus on, like, all right, well, we need to have massive amount more conversations. Conversations was something we talked about, and stress was important, but we didn't really focus on it all that much. I focused on more like setting appointments and meeting appointments than anything. But then we started turning our business back into, let's focus on these conversations, conversations, conversations, conversations. And for us, we use follow up boss, so getting all that activity and follow up boss, like, stop using your personal number. Stop doing that. Everything needs to be in follow up boss. And then, you know, so then we were able to kind of hit that plateau, and then now we're all back on the upward trend. So really focusing on really good conversation. So that's really been our big focus in the second half of 2024, and that has turned our business around where I wanted to go. Because I was like, man, we're not going to grow this year. We're not going to exceed our count this year. I thought, you know, I thought back in March we were going to exceed it by a few 100. You know, now, now I think we're going to probably end up somewhere tracking accordingly, maybe somewhere around 650, 700 which is still going to be 100 more units last year, which is great, right? Like it's, sales are down. So
Brian Charlesworth 36:57
there are many people who have done that in this market. So congratulations on that. But what I love is that you actually saw those, you saw those lead majors dropping, and you knew instantly, if I don't get these up, my business is going to be down, right, yeah. And so you made the shift, and you went for conversations instead of just appointments, because you realize it takes more conversations to get an appointment right.
Steven Myers 37:20
Is that why I did that? Yeah, yeah. And then, and then also, I figured out, too, that a lot of these, you know, a lot of buyers were getting, you know, sellers were hesitant, right? They're a lot more hesitant. So we need to have better conversations to get them to feel like they were doing the right thing, as opposed to, you know, them just waiting on the sideline and who knows what? What's going to change for them to get off the sideline, but really talk through them, you know, because, again, interest rates, you know, they did fall right? And they're, they're the lowest they've been since beginning of 2023, but a lot of them are in their heads. Are still interest rates are still really high, right? And then, now we got more inventory now than we have since covid. And some of the buyers are like, well, there's too much inventory. But no, we still like, if we were back before covid, we would consider this an inventory shortage. It's just this, it says double what it was during 2021, and 2022 so so just kind of having those conversations, and being able to really get through those objections that they have, and providing better information to them and and so really focusing on the agents, on having those kind of conversations with their clients, as opposed to be like, Oh, you want to wait till next year to buy. That's fine, you know, I'll wait till next year, right? So, yeah, really starting to understand that quality conversations really became a lot more important in the second half of this year. And I know everyone can say, the election, the economy, all that plays into it, but I still don't want my business to go down. I don't think, I mean, I really think, you know, honestly, that this is the best time to buy since covid. So, you know, we have more inventory. You have more options on the market. Interest rates are in the fives now. So you know what's really preventing us from moving forward, you're able to get your closing costs paid for if you need down payment assistance. That's available now. So all these things that people need in order to really move forward, you know, it's available right now. So we really just got to coach them into knowing that, you know, because, like, yeah, obviously, who knows what's going to happen? Like, I think 2025, I think it's going to be a tough year again. I don't think anything is showing that 2025 is going to be at me, hoping it's better, but I don't think it's going to be dramatically better. It's not going to be 2021 or 2022 but I still think it's going to be a challenging year and just really focusing on on having these really good conversations and providing value. I mean, we're really big on how to, you know, really great customer service, really great programs like, look like we have a lover listed program. You know, we have all these other things to really try to help buyers or sellers move
Brian Charlesworth 39:53
the needle. As I listen to you, 100% of what you say, it's already but 100% of what you say is. Is essentially control what you can control, right? No. Know your numbers. Know where you can focus. Don't listen to the media. Don't listen to the market. Don't listen to the consumer. If you do listen to the consumer, it's really getting feedback on what adjustments you should make in your business. One of the things you can
Steven Myers 40:15
control, yeah, 100% Yeah, yeah.
Brian Charlesworth 40:18
So you started saying something about
Steven Myers 40:20
oh yeah, but it's just gonna say sisu really allows us, you know, was one of the things that has allowed us to make sure we provide customer service, because we have our touch points from our transaction team or operations team to reach out to the buyers or the sellers to make sure they're they're having a good service. You know, that we try to have that white glove approach with our clients. You know, we don't always succeed in that. We still have room to grow, but it's still something that we constantly have, that we're focusing and tweaking and but, you know, having those, hey, you know, transaction department, please reach out to them to make sure they're good with everything, because you can't always count on the agents to do what they need to do.
Brian Charlesworth 40:57
Do you have the SISU client portal set up through your clients.
Steven Myers 41:00
I have not I need to. That's one of the things that's on my list to need to do. So, so
Brian Charlesworth 41:05
I would just suggest it, because it doesn't take long. In an hour, you could have it set up. It'll just pull in all your things that you're checking off your TCS for the during the transaction closing process, and you can choose which of those are client facing and change the verbiage of them, yeah, so that they can see exactly, okay, we just got a sign in our yard, okay? We just had the appraisal, and what's next, you know? So they see the whole step of the way. My personal opinion is that that is the future of real estate. Yeah, 100% because it's the future of everything. When I order DoorDash, I know when it's sitting on my doorstep. I know the whole step, every step of the way, right? Same thing. And a lot of people think of dominoes for starting that, but, like everybody does that now. So anyway, I think, I think it's just a key, and it does truly provide better customer service and communication. Yeah, 100% No, it's definitely something that is on my project list to implement this winter. So Well, if we can help with that, just reach out to your account manager and they'll dive in and make it easy on you, so you don't have to take them full weekend take an hour instead. All right. Last advice, Steven, what would you say is the most important thing for somebody that wants to build a real estate business? I mean, there, there's so many people, I think, right now that we're sitting at that three to five agents, there's so many people that are sitting at 15 agents that are like, geez, you know, should I just go back into selling real estate myself? You know, like, people don't know what to do today. There's a lot of confusion I'm seeing. Yeah,
Steven Myers 42:36
one of the things that I think is really important, and this is something that I just knew from the beginning is really just get your tech stack dialed in, you know? I mean, I think it's really important to spend the time, spend the money, on getting your tech stack dialed in, because it's just so important to really understand for both you and your agents on what they need to be doing and how to coach them, right? And then that just allows us on our recruiting appointments, you know, we can literally show our sisu dashboard and be like, Hey, this is how many appointments our isa said last month. This is how many leads we got last month. This is, you know, so it makes it so easy to switch, easier to recruit people, because, hey, you have a way to bring them in and coach them up and and that. But then it's also like, Hey, I'm not bullshitting you. I'm not lying to you. I'm not telling you that you're going to make all this money. Here's somebody that is on our team that is taking this appointment, these appointments from the ISA, and is having this kind of success, or this is somebody that is an soI driven agent, and this is what their success looks like. And so then you can have agents start to model those agents, and you have real numbers to show them that it's not just like a hope and pray kind of situation.
Brian Charlesworth 43:45
So you're actually leveraging sisu dashboards to let these people see what some of your other agents are doing and how they're growing your business in order to recruit more agents. Yeah, I mean, I literally, I
Steven Myers 43:58
mean, not even show my competitors my sisu dashboard. I don't care, right? Like, I'm like, Hey, this is what you know, like, on my market, like, Hey, you want to see what we're doing. Here's our numbers.
Brian Charlesworth 44:05
Yeah, I don't love it. So you're saying, you're saying the most important thing to do is to get a good tech stack. You obviously did that first thing your tech stack. I just heard a CSU and follow up boss. Anything else
Steven Myers 44:21
we're using rooster and welopo,
Brian Charlesworth 44:24
okay, okay, again, guys, Cecil and follow up boss, you have follow up Boss, you're gonna need something, some sort of lead gen, lead gen,
Steven Myers 44:32
yeah, and and follow boss. I mean, ever since they, you guys had that two way integration with them. It makes it so much easier. I mean, when I was originally started. We had lofty trying at the time, but that was a lot more difficult to do it. But now, with the way follow up boss and sisu talk to each other, it's so easy.
Brian Charlesworth 44:51
Our follow up boss integration is amazing, and everybody tells us that. So yeah, listen to Steven here, guys. That makes. Easy if you have that, Steven. Thank you so much. I love hearing your story. I love even more than anything. I love seeing your success, and I love being a part of it. I love that we have had you out to events, and that you've just like taken it and run. So if there's ever anything I can do for you, let me know, my friend. It's great to see you, and thanks for joining us on the show today, for all of you listeners, again, like the show, follow us, and obviously we have a lot of team leaders on this show. Have a lot of tech entrepreneurs. But I think if you will take their advice and follow their footsteps, you don't have to go through the hard and difficult challenges and trying to figure everything out, just do what they're doing, and it works that I can promise you. So have a great week, everyone. We'll catch on next week episode of the grit podcast. And again, thank you Stephen Myers for joining us on the show today.
Steven Myers 45:51
Yep. Thank you.
