It may sound cliché or cheesy, but your mindset and attitude can make all the difference between success and failure, whether in business, finances, relationships, or life in general.
Change your identity and you’ll change your future. If you want to be a person of integrity, you need to identify yourself as a person with integrity. Your decisions are then based on “would a person of integrity do this?” and not “should I do this?”.
If you want to be an agent that sells 20-30 houses a year, you need to identify yourself as being the kind of agent that’s going to sell 20-30 houses a year. Then your daily and weekly actions become much easier to choose.
What does the average day look like for an agent who sells 20-30 houses a year? Probably not sleeping in until 9am, tinkering around at the house for an hour or so, and then opening up your laptop at 10am to see if there’s anything you need to respond to.
An agent selling 20-30 houses probably has a pretty specific plan for what they’re going to do every day. And it probably starts by 6 or 7am, and most likely doesn’t include scrolling social media for half an hour, taking a 1.5 hour lunch every day, or waking up without having a plan in place for the day ahead of time.
They almost certainly have a specific list of actions they intend to accomplish that day and have organized their schedule to make sure they have time set aside to actually accomplish those things.
Focusing on your identity also reduces the number of decisions you have to make every day. If you don’t smoke and someone asks you if you want a cigarette, you aren’t going to ask what brand. You’re going to say “I’m not a smoker” or “I don’t smoke”. You aren’t even making a decision in that moment, because there isn’t a decision to make. People who aren’t smokers don’t smoke. They don’t have to decide in that moment if they want a cigarette or not.
Agents who sell 20-30 houses a year didn’t get to that level by having the same schedule and activities that agents who sell 5 houses a year. Otherwise they would still be selling 5 houses a year. At some point, they made a decision to start taking the daily and weekly and monthly actions that an agent selling 20-30 houses does, and over time, their sales volume caught up to their actions.
Whether it’s claiming the leads, doing the followup procedures we have in place, or just doing our job at being helpful and trusting the results to follow.
Claim the leads that are available, even when they don’t appear as lucrative as you’d like.
Example: A $70k land inquiry came in on April 26, 2025 and sat in the pond for 10 days with no one claiming or reaching out to them. The lead responded to one of the automatic emails, I engaged over email initially and found out what they were looking for—land to build on. I asked if they’re also interested in houses and he said up to $450k for the right house. I sent a few listings for both land and houses, they found one they like, flew out to see it the next week, went under contract a week later, and then we closed about 45 days later on a $500k house with a 3% commission.
Be helpful and kind, even when things don’t go the way we’d like or think they should. Example: I spoke with a lead consistently for over 3 years, met with them multiple times and it seemed to be an understanding that they were going to list with me. Then last-minute they listed with someone else. I responded kindly and offered to be of help anytime. It expired after 6 months, they reached back out in March to have me list it, and we closed 3 months later for $680k with a 3% commission and then they listed the lot next door with me too.
It may take a while before you see this firsthand, but if you stay consistent in the actions and activity you’re learning, you will see this prove true countless times over your career. Random connections that turn into a deal two years later, or a $50k buyer lead that turns into a $500k sale 60 days later, a random sign call that you nurture for 3 years and then turns into 5 deals in one year, or a first-time buyer who goes from a $250k budget to over $3.5m in deals 4 years later. All true stories, and all stories of deals that happened by consistently showing up and being helpful and kind.
Every homeowner is a potential seller and buyer lead. And every person you come in contact with is a potential future lead, whether they’re in a position to buy now or not.
The most successful people in real estate, or any other business, don’t get caught up in what “should” happen or who “should” do XYZ. Successful people make things happen, regardless of what other people should do or are supposed to do. Our leads “should” see our text or get our voicemail and call us back without us calling them 7 times. But many won’t. The listing agent on the other side of the deal “should” understand why our offer is a strong offer and explain it to their seller, but they don’t always. Our clients “should” read the contract we send them before they sign it, but they rarely do.
If you can get out of the mindset of doing what you “should” do and relying on other people to do what they “should” do, then you’ll be ahead of the majority of your competition. Instead of focusing on what “should” be, deal with what “is” and base your actions on how to use what “is” to get the result you want.