Episode Transcript
Welcome back to another episode of the Off Market podcast, this week we have, Amanda Howard, the $2+ Billion Dollar Agent with 8,000+ clients served. She’s a TV show host, Broker/Owner of the #1 Real Estate Team in Alabama, and a producer ranked in the top half of the top 1% of realtors nationwide. She’s been recognized in the Wall Street Journal, America's Best Real Estate, Real Trends, and many other publications as a vanguard in the luxury real estate sector. If you are looking to buy or sell in the Huntsville area, Amanda is your gal. Amanda welcome to the show!
Thanks so much, Austin. Thanks for having me. So Amanda, tell us how you got into real estate. I know you began your career in the Midwest, Chicago. You ultimately moved to Alabama, become the number one agent. You open your own brokerage, you become the number one team. Talk to us about the process of becoming where you are today.
Well, the process really started with me moving to Huntsville and just having the tenacity and grit that I knew I needed to do what it takes to succeed. I didn't know anybody in the marketplace. I was new, the new girl in town, didn't know the street, didn't know the neighborhoods and didn't have much of a plan, so I really just was.
Busting butt best I could to be able to, and I door knocked. I went back to the old school basics because that's all I could think to do in a new market where you don't know anyone. And that worked for me. I was working in the year, the first year grew a team very organically. Thankfully somebody. took me under their wing about three years and told me to hire a business coach, which was the best advice I ever received.
And then eventually opened my own brokerage in 2009. So it just, it took a lot of work, but having great mentors and great team members alongside me that we grew together with, that's what really helped get those results accomplished after that initial year or two. Yeah, I love it. So take us back to, uh, your first deal or one of the first deals you worked on that you remember, how'd you find it and what did that, uh, what that deal look like?
The, [00:02:00] one of my first deals was actually, you know, it was a client who, and I'm thinking back, I can't even, Oh, I know what it was. I had asked somebody if I could hold their house open within the brokerage. You know, I wanted to borrow a listing so that I could hold it open, met a sweet couple who came through the house.
They liked. me. They liked my personale. They liked what I had to offer to help them in finding a home. And that eventually helped me be able to list their property. Because of course, that's the wise thing to ask. You know, do you have a property to sell to be able to purchase the next one? And that happened to be just the way I I think of things in the way I market things.
It was a little bit different than what was normal in this community. And so it ended up by accident, not, you know, it was me, but it wasn't something that was intentional, but it happened to me. I drummed up multiple offers at the open house. I had a bidding war in a time that was unheard of because this was now 2003.
It was a record sale in price per square foot as a price per square foot is a big thing in Huntsville. Also, that was new to me when I first moved here. I was like, I've never heard of that. I thought we just priced off of, you know, the cost of the construction or comparable sales that not here. They really go deep on the price per square foot.
So it was the highest price on that street. per square foot and nobody had ever seen that of doing an open house in that manner where I kind of just I promoted it as best I could, I built up a lot of attention around it, but I didn't let people into it until the date that I said this will be the launch.
This will be when the unveiling is what I called it. This will be the unveiling of our open house. Everyone can see that for the first time together. I'm not gonna allow any previews and also so agents can see it at the same time as the consumers and. The funny thing is that the board of realtors, they actually made a rule after that blocking us from being able to do that, but [00:04:00] whatever it, it created such a buzz and excitement that of course my client loved me.
They stuck with me, not only for the listing and the sale, the purchase. But they're still friends for life with me and the wife I actually just shot a testimonial video with today because she's been an agent with me for 10 years. I've been doing this, that was 20 years ago and now she's been with me as an agent for 10 years and is a rock star agent.
So it was very fun early on transaction. I love it. That's exciting. It's interesting how you get this little snowball rolling where if you can drum up hype and FOMO for a listing, meaning people are excited about it, but they have no idea what they're gonna walk into, you can, you can sort of kind of game the system of people.
I don't know what this is, but it's interesting. It's different. You win one listing and then all of a sudden you start to snowball it into the next one and the next one and the next one and the next one and the next one. Yeah. So it makes [00:05:00] a ton of sense. So talk to us about the process of you sell your first home and obviously you get some more listings from there.
So did you focus on being in the niches? Did you try to go after maybe divorces or new marriages or probates? Or did you just try to focus on a neighborhood? Or like, what was your strategy for trying to scale your real estate? Because I was so new to town and just needing to get my launch, I had no niche.
I just, I really did doorknob just to be able to get my name out there. See how I could best serve a client because I didn't know anyone and I know I needed to get my name out there without having a savings or a large budget to be able to market. I would say that about two years in is when I had an opportunity.
And again, it's just because I did not only did I doorknob and to get myself started, I also did a lot of networking. I did a lot of volunteering in the community wherever I had a natural interest. I joined my [00:06:00] chamber. I ended up very quickly being the lead Person for their ambassador program to help other companies.
And in my doing all of that in the first couple of years, I was asked to be on a radio show and to host a radio show. And I started asking him, I'm like, I'm, I have no shame. I am not embarrassed. I am not scared of rejection. You can say no to me. And I just, it's, it's a game to me on most of like, okay, well, I needed to get 10 nose today before I knew I could go home.
So I'm glad you just finally said no. So I can move to the next one. And so I asked the mayor, I asked the big developers to come onto my show. I had all the special guests. And the mayor was probably our biggest one that people are like, Oh my gosh, you're new in town. She came on my show three times that year because she loved it.
And we had a lot of fun. And we talked about the things that were up and coming, the new developments, the businesses that were coming into town and people want to talk about themselves. She wanted to brag on the city. The developers wanted to brag on their, their new [00:07:00] developments. I asked, you know, business owners, I just asked anyone and everyone to come on the show, to share about the community or whatever it was they were doing.
And in turn, of course, I had a lot that was given back to me by me wanting to give and promote other people. Now I forgot what was the core question that you just asked Austin. I am so sorry. I was asking how you started to go from one transaction to multiple transactions to scaling and whether or not you went into the niches or whether you sort of went broad in your approach.
And it sounds like to me, at least you went broad in your approach, tried to live with value, tried to build your own network and community, which in this case. It was the radio show. And then ultimately from there, snowball that into getting more listings. Cause people heard about you, that you're the new agent in town.
That's, you know, talking with all of the movers and shakers. And if somebody wants to buy or sell, you're the one to go to. I became the local expert in literally. Two years time of being in a brand new market. It was kind of funny when people would come on my show, they literally thought I had been there a decade and I'm like, this is [00:08:00] my third year.
But, you know, I'm glad you think that because I really was putting in the time and effort. I was working really long hours, really long weeks. I just, you know, I was giving it my all because I was all in, I wanted to succeed. And I really loved it. I had a passion for it. So my passion just kept growing. I was getting more and more excitement and eventually I did have to get off of the show because my business had picked up so much.
I could not sustain both. And then I just became guests on other people's radio shows or on the news. And it just, that's what did accumulate from there. So I did the show for probably two and a half, maybe three years. And then I became guests. Yeah. And then you ultimately open your own show again, and now you're a TV host.
So maybe talk to us a little bit about that. One of our customers has his own HGTV show, so a little bit of familiarity with the craziness behind the scenes, but maybe talk to us about what, uh, what you guys do and what you record and what your, like focus area is. Sure. So what I'm doing is I'm a host with American Dream tv.
And [00:09:00] what they really promote aligned. The only reason I was willing to do this was because it aligned with my core values. And that's something that I believe anyone should be doing. If it, if your mission. You should always have a mission and core value, of course, for your company. And if it's outside of that, don't do it because it's a waste of time.
I've done that before. Also, that was what some of my past mistakes. But with this, we focus on a lifestyle. And what I train all of my agents on is we're not selling things. It's not like we're selling a refrigerator or a car. We're promoting a lifestyle. We're listening to the needs of a consumer. We're helping solve the problem or fear that they are encountering right now in this life, their life, or this chapter.
And usually it's, what do they want to achieve? They, they have a lifestyle dream in their mind and they're wanting to achieve that. So just really getting deep with them, listening, having a lot of emotional intelligence, as well as active listening skills to the lifestyle they want to live. And helping them find it then that's [00:10:00] we go on the hunt and that's fun And so with adtv when they approached me about the show It's they said this is though.
It's a real estate show. It's a real show not a reality show We don't want the drama and I said well good because that's what I avoid at all costs I don't like that about most hgtv shows. It's all fake. It's all drama. I've i've had them in our office Promoting and pitching there now. I forgot what it is because we actually did do one on You know, where they show a consumer coming through and buying three houses.
But honestly, they've already bought the house with us. We're just setting the stage for these two horrible houses. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, uh. That's when I realized, oh my God, this is all a setup. And this is so fake. And it made our agent look like an idiot. The agent who actually did help them on the show.
It made her look like a fool. And like, she didn't really listen. Cause they, she showed them two dumps. And then the house, they liked it. That was obviously the one they did love. And if in reality, it makes the consumer think our agent did a terrible job because she didn't [00:11:00] listen at all and just happened upon the right house.
So I hated that. I, you know, I was like, I don't want to be part of anything like that. And this show. They said, we just wanted about real life and the lifestyle that you can live in the community. And I'm like, Hey, that's cool. I can do that. So that's been a lot of fun. It's only been a year, but, and we'll see how it goes.
You know, like I always, I don't give long range commitments when it comes to something like that. I'm like, I'll commit to six months or a year and see how it goes. And right now it's, we're at a year and I'm still happy with it. I'm still having fun. But I always know there's, there's more opportunities.
That's right. That's right. So talk to us a little bit about the importance of having a coach. It sounds like having a coach was something that was very important early on. And I know that you are a coach as well. So maybe talk to us a little bit about why having a coach is important. What are the things you look for in a coach?
How do you know that the coach is the right fit for you? And like, ultimately, what is it you're trying to get out of having a coach? The it's [00:12:00] interesting Austin how that changes. So the first thing is, you know, identifying where am I weak? What am I? What's the problem I need to solve for myself? You know, we all need accountability of some sort.
We see that. I mean, if if the top NFL players, you know, if we look at them, we know that they're practicing and with a coach on a daily basis, they're not just showing up at a game. once a week and just, you know, hitting it and, and winning, they really, they put in the effort in the. They have a coach to help them keep the blinders on, keep the focus on, know what the goal is, keep them motivated.
And they put the grind in every single day to be able to be at that high level. And I knew for myself, I was literally throwing mud on the wall to see what would stick that first year. And that's what somebody's sweet enough to say to me. That's what she's like, honey, you are just, you're just throwing things up in the wall, see what'll stick.
Cause I was spinning my wheels so much and doing what I thought was right. [00:13:00] But I, I wasn't having the results I wanted. I was, I mean, though I was happy and that I achieved the success I did, but it still wasn't, I wasn't happy. And I was working my tail off. So once I hired the coach, it's that's when they're like, they can see something when you're down in the weeds.
They can see that force from way above and go, all right, well, goodness, why in the world are you spending all that time and effort over here? Like I wasn't tracking, I wasn't tracking the number of dials. I was making it a day or the number of conversations I had. I had no idea how many listings I had. I didn't even know how many closings I had until I'd win an award at the end of the year.
And I'm like, Oh yeah, thank goodness. I didn't know how to do a P and L. I never tracked any of my expenses. So once I had that coach earlier on. That set me up for that foundation of success and I definitely needed that. Whereas a tenure agent coming in and needing a coach, that's a different level. So my first coach was excellent at that.
He really like kicked my pants. I didn't need a coddler. I [00:14:00] actually did go through two coaches before the one that I loved. And I, I kept for a long, long time, 10 years before he sold the company ultimately, and that's the only reason I didn't stay with him is because he retired, but he really helped me set that foundation in a firm way.
And for my personality, I needed that because I did have some other coaches that I hired, but they, after two or three months, I realized I didn't listen to them. I just, they were just too passive for me. I needed somebody that was a little firmer. So it's knowing that about yourself of who is going to work well for you.
And now I actually, you know, I went several, I was a coach. I still coach, uh, my own agents. Now I just coach the people that are under our roof within our brokerage. But I realized after the last couple of years, the best coaches have coaches. And I was getting to a point where I feel like I'm getting a little tired and a little stagnant, and I'm starting to take home the burdens of other people.
When I know I shouldn't be [00:15:00] so I went, you know, what, what do I need? And I took a week, I just fully disconnected for a week because I was at overwhelmed phase. And that's when that's your, my trigger point. I don't know if it's everybody's trigger point, but when I start getting overwhelmed, I know that's my tipping point or my trigger point to say, I'm not doing something right.
So I was getting overwhelmed, starting to get really, you know, just depressed or wanting to quit. And so I completely unplugged for one week and just focused on myself and took a lot of deep dives, some hard talks, conversations, but I set it up the way I needed to, and I came out of that week with a whole new game plan.
I realized what I was doing wrong. I realized where I let myself down. Where I was letting my team down, where I was letting my independent agents down, where I was letting my leadership down, my kids, my husband, all of them, myself. And then where I wanted to course correct. And I also knew though I, it was, I had a clear path [00:16:00] for myself.
I needed a coach. I needed somebody to hold me accountable now to that new plan. And so I hired the top coach in our industry today, in my opinion, no, John Chet Black. I don't make him up by saying that, not, not to put Tom Ferry down. He's amazing. But John Chet Black was, again, it comes down to the personality.
I, at this point in my life, really. Admire people that are very, very disciplined, very disciplined and very structured because I'm a very disciplined and very structured person. And so I could tell that the personalities would work for me and John. So that's why I called him, asked him if he would take me on.
He asked me some questions to interview me as well, see if it was going to be worth his while. And ultimately we did start coaching together three weeks ago and I'm just so excited. I'm so excited of all the things I'm putting into action now. I love it. I love it. So maybe, uh, you can pull back the curtains a little bit [00:17:00] and tell us a few tips you'd have for new agents who aren't in your brokerage, but want to become one of those top percenters, right?
New people, they're just starting out. They don't have the behind the scenes look into Amanda's coaching, but maybe you give one or two secrets that they can use in their day to day. Absolutely. One thing, I think the biggest takeaway that I have for all agents, when the differences between the ones that fail and the ones that succeed, because now I've been watching so many of them, I can clearly, I can't always say who's it's, it's shocking to me.
And when I interview people, I'm like, Oh man, this one's going to She is going to kill it or he's going to kill it. And then they flop or quit in three months. I'm like, okay, I was not seeing that coming. And then vice versa. As someone who's so meek or mild, I'm like, I mean, don't be okay. And then they crush it.
It all comes down to their mindset and how they are willing to push through with their own motivation. You know, they have to have a really strong emotional [00:18:00] intelligence. They have to have tenacity and grit because yes, it's, It's hard at first people think that they're going to get it's HDTV. They think they're going to get into real estate and make a hundred thousand in a month.
Like the reality is. It takes you a good 90 days before you even know what you're doing to be confident enough to talk to another human about real estate. Honestly, they shouldn't be. It's embarrassing. It's terrible. It's embarrassing if they do. So they need to have some kind of structure or advisor or coach to help them get that training under their belt.
And some people don't want to put in that time. All right, wait, I just quit my job. I'm, I'm doing real estate full time. Why am I not making money right away? I'm like, It takes time. It takes effort and it takes your own grit. So that means if you are nervous about scripting and role playing in front of people, you better get over it because you have to if you want to be good and if you want to be good fast.
Sure, you can do it part time and maybe in a year or two you'll be good. But if you want to do it fast and start making money in four months. You better do it daily and you better be practicing every single day and have somebody hold you accountable. So that grit is first. Second is tracking that you need to do.
But right now I'm from, I was just looking at numbers on this. So that's why I do know it's fresh in my mind. I've been talking to my agents about it is the way we acted in the real estate world in 2017, 2018, 2019 is very different. Then the way that we're dealing with the real estate world now in 2023 and 2024 and the way people communicate the way that they receive and process information is very, very different.
So right now, before we were in a market of speed, now we're in a market of tenacity. So if you do not have the endurance. To deal with this market, don't get in. And that's what I'm seeing. A lot of people, for some reason, the way, I don't know if it's a generational thing or just the way that we have been coddling our children, but the endurance is just not there.
They're thinking, I don't know if they want to give up quick. Cause they're like, gosh, I see my parents succeeding, but they don't remember or see. Well, they don't remember, of course, they don't see what the, the time and effort that it took them to get there. So all they do is see the success and see all the things that we did to protect and bring our kids up in a way that maybe we didn't have.
And now they're like, oh, I thought it was gonna be easy and now I'm never gonna get to that level of success, so I'm just gonna quit in three months. So that's where I'm like, I, it hurts my heart because I know people can do it. They can, if they would just dig down and find the grit and realize it's hard.
You have to put in a lot of hours and a lot of work. It does not come easy. That's right. But nothing in life that's good. Comes easy, right? Anything that's worth it is not going to be easy. Yeah. Yeah. The girls have all the time. Yeah. And you know, you started with real estate and then you got your brokerage and then sounds like you just took that snowball and made an even bigger snowball with some of the other things you're working on.
So maybe you can tell us about your property management company, quick, your title company, your sister offices. I mean, you got like a whole empire going. So tell us about like you nailed this, you're crushing it. And then you're like, I'm going to go get this, this, this, this, and this, like, what are those things you're working on?
What are the things you're excited about working on today? So the things that. I'm still excited about the brokerage. The brokerage is my baby. This is my core. This is my heart. So the way we grew is that my husband is, is my partner. And he also is, I think we're both serial entrepreneurs is what we figured out about ourselves and wherever there was a need for our client, because my whole focus is on serving the needs of our clients.
And when I couldn't find a good vendor or provider for my client to give the level of service I was expecting for them to receive. Then that's where we saw, well, we have a need, we have a hole, we need to fill for that client. And that's how the different avenues started growing. So, so that was, for example, property management.
I do not like property management. I know many people do, and it's great for them. I do not love it. But it was necessary. So I, we did, first we opened one and it was just managed with myself and my husband and some internal support team. And it was terrible. It was, it wasn't my passion and that was why it was terrible because it's not my passion.
So I found somebody, I closed that company down because it was just, it needed to go away. And we restarted with somebody who had a passion for it and they already were good at it and they really loved it. So then I'm an investor with them, but I'm more of a silent investor where I'm there for advice.
I'm they, they call me whenever as the owner, they'll call me whenever they need help. But I'm not dealing with the day to day. I'm not dealing with those consumers because that's a different kind of consumer. I just needed my investor clients that are our client to have somebody who could manage their properties.
And then of course, it eventually there's other things that come along with it. So that was a good benefit. And then the same thing was with actually with title. It was that our attorney that we were using. We used several and we saw the inefficiencies at some offices and the efficiencies at others. And there was one particular attorney that was doing a phenomenal job, hands down.
And he really appreciated also the coaching and advice that I was sharing. He was coming into some of the classes just so he could share and learn. He would teach, but also he was learning at the same time about our industry. So he just said, you know, maybe we could grow together. Would do you want to invest into my company?
And absolutely. It just made sense. So it was, you know, it's another it's I have found that I really love collaboration and I love partnerships. I have more fun with that. I like working with the people that come into our world. And growing with them if they have the interest to do so because they see my grit and my tenacity and maybe they have that too.
So like minds get attracted to each other. And if they have something that's a brilliant idea, I think it's brilliant. I tell them that. And then if they want me to invest into it with them and grow with them, [00:24:00] I'm more than happy to do so. Um, if I have that ability or if I have a passion and which I usually do have that much confidence in their ability, so I want to uplift them and keep them in my world as well.
So it's been, it's been fun to grow that way. It's been more so it hasn't been a plan. It's been an organic growth of what's being put in our path and into our world. And we grow, I guess. According to the way God in the universe wants us to, I guess, however you want to say that. Yeah, and that's a perfect segue to our last question, which is you have five minutes with your younger self and you can tell the younger Amanda anything that you want.
What are some of the things that you tell yourself early on in your career? In 1999, you're just starting out and you're about to go crush it. What do you tell yourself? I would have told myself to track, track my progress and what was I actually doing that was dollar productive versus what was spinning my wheels.
Because I did a lot of that, I just, and I think it's natural for salespeople or people that have that, that drive to talk to people and serve people is we will find ourselves doing a lot of things for people that are not actually dollar productive and aren't moving the needle. They're more of, you're just have a servant's heart and you're really just a volunteer.
You're just donating your time and sometimes money and energy. And I did that a lot. So I really wish I would have been a little more honed in and focused. And that's what the coach helped me see. So in my earlier life, I sure wish I would have had somebody to advise me on tracking and noticing that half your day should be DPAs, dollar productive activities.
And the other half is going to be processes and things that support those dollar productive activities. Thank you so the podcast, Amanda. Thanks for having me, Austin.
