108. How to Build a Self-Sustaining Real Estate Business With Peter Chabris

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Millionaire Real Estate Agent | Episode 108

Title: How to Build a Self-Sustaining Real Estate Business With Peter Chabris
Host: Jason Abrams (Keller Podcast Network)
Guest: Peter Chabris
Date: November 10, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode centers on what it truly takes to build a "seventh level" real estate business—a self-sustaining enterprise that runs and grows without the founder’s daily involvement. Jason Abrams interviews Peter Chabris, who leads a high-volume, highly profitable team 2,000 miles away from his home base. They break down the mindset, systems, hiring models, standards, and cultural frameworks required to achieve this elusive business design, drawing on the foundational principles from Gary Keller’s The Millionaire Real Estate Agent (MREA) book.

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Main Discussion Points & Insights

1. Peter’s Unconventional Path to Real Estate (02:19 - 05:51)

• Background: Peter started in technology and had detours as a funk band bassist, CIA recruit, Taiwan journalist, and defense contractor before stumbling into real estate.
• Turning Point: A dot-com bubble bust, an injury, and a copy of Rich Dad, Poor Dad led Peter to focus on real estate as the path to financial independence.
• Initial Challenge: Peter’s attempt at real estate development was premature for the Cincinnati market, leading him to become an agent to “lose less money” and stabilize income quickly.

“I was five years too soon, and I got licensed really just so I would lose less money on my projects.”
— Peter Chabris (05:45)

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2. Discovering and Building Toward the “Seventh Level” (06:31 - 12:06)

• Key Influence: Reading The Millionaire Real Estate Agent inspired Peter to think of the business as a scalable machine, not just a sales job.
• Definition of Levels:
  • Level 1: “Army of one”/solo agent
  • Level 7: Business owner—no day-to-day involvement, continues to earn distributions.
• Virtue of All Levels: Each level has its merits depending on individual goals and appetite.

“The idea is that you can own a business that nets a million dollars without being active in it...it taught agents to stop thinking like salespeople and start thinking like business people.”
— Peter Chabris (07:25)

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3. Overcoming Early Setbacks (12:06 - 13:42)

• Initial Struggles: Peter’s first attempt to build a team at an independent brokerage was thwarted by restrictive policies.
• Breakthrough: Joining Keller Williams offered the right environment—playbooks, resources, and a culture of sharing.

“I just implemented the whole thing wholesale, thank God, because I didn’t really have a sphere, and I didn’t like to talk to people very much back then.”
— Peter Chabris (12:44)

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4. The Power of Coaching (13:42 - 15:06)

• Importance for Peter: Coaching (with Tony DiCello, KW MAPS) provided mindset shifts, accountability, and someone championing a better version of himself.
• Transformation: Having someone “who would not stop fighting for that better version” was pivotal.

“He believed in a better version of me than I did…When you have someone like that in your life, that is the most transformational relationship.”
— Peter Chabris (14:29)

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5. Building a Business That Runs Without You (16:20 - 18:04)

The Five Roles to Replace (16:56):

1. Director of Operations: Strong leader, not just an administrator.
2. Marketing Lead: Less critical in Chabris’s model since focus is sphere and offensive lead gen.
3. Director of Sales: Drives productivity per person.
4. Director of Growth: Recruiter—maintains/expands agent count.
5. CEO: Guides company vision, hiring, and profitability.

“What most agents don’t understand is it takes five people to replace them if they have a team of any scale.”
— Peter Chabris (16:56)

“Our staff number is twice the MREA benchmark…our marketing budget is very lean. The majority…is offensive lead generation and sphere.”
— Peter Chabris (19:34)

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6. The Culture of Productivity (24:42 - 29:01)

• Frameworks:
  1. People Model: Replace yourself in those five key roles.
  2. Culture of Productivity: “Sales hustle” (intrinsic drive) must become embedded organizationally.
• Three-Part Onboarding (30/60/90 Days):
  • First 30 Days: Core skills—lead generation, conversion, presentation.
  • Standard: 4 new client appointments/month, 2 signed, 1 closed.

“The way you let people treat you in the first 90 days is how they’re going to treat you the rest of the relationship...indoctrinate them into the culture of the company.”
— Peter Chabris (26:18)

“We only train what we train on.”
— Peter Chabris (27:39)

• Standards for Agents:
  • 4 new client appointments/month
  • 2 signed
  • 1 closed deal/month (minimum 12/year)
  • Average agent at Chabris Group: 15.5 transactions/year

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7. Maintaining Accountability and Performance (31:27 - 32:24)

• Underperformance:
  • Regular, grace-filled conversations if standard is missed.
  • After 2 off-standard months: Performance Improvement Plan (PIP)
• PIP: Specific goals and activities, built collaboratively.

“If you miss the standard…we’re having conversations…there’s no surprise…It’s easy for me to say we’re hardcore…but it doesn’t work like that because this is life and people…”
— Peter Chabris (31:36)

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8. Daily Structure and Relentless Practice (33:31 - 36:42)

• Daily Routines:
  • 30-minutes of role play, 4 days/week
  • 2 hours of lead gen every day
• Role Play: 13-week rotating curriculum—sphere scripts, internet leads, open house, buyer presentations.
• Skill-Building: Excellence comes from rehearsal, not just execution.

“If you want to be excellent, you’ve got to practice excellence. All the greats…practice relentlessly all week long.”
— Peter Chabris (33:53)

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9. Team Size Philosophy: Scale vs. “Seal Team 6” (21:19 - 23:51)

• Why Not a Small, Super-High-Performing Team?
  • Smaller teams are fragile to departures and entitlement (“hostage” scenario).
  • Larger scale fits Peter’s goals and operating model; robust to turnover.

“If you want to live in the mountains in five years, then pick problems you like to solve…and can solve remotely…”
— Peter Chabris (22:19)

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10. Handover to (and Working with) the CEO (37:14 - 40:09)

• Founder vs. CEO: Strong trust, humility, and mutual respect are essential for the founder to successfully hand over operations.
• Role of CEO (per book): Vision, right seats/wrong seats, and profitability.

“Hiring somebody to run your business requires a high level of leadership…mutual trust, dare I say love…a degree of humility…Just because we got this thing where it is doesn’t mean we’re now the best leader for the company…James is a better operator…than I could be.”
— Peter Chabris (37:33)

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11. The Fear & The Future (40:12 - 40:54)

• Peter’s Only Fear: Next CEO transition—upholding commitments and maintaining culture during succession.

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12. Real “Life by Design”—Living the Dream (41:02 - 43:09)

• Peter confirms he is now living a “life by design” as envisioned—but it took years of purposeful planning, execution, learning, and evolving.
• He invites mega agents who are “stuck” trying to scale or exit the messy middle to reach out—giving his cell phone on air. (42:10)

“If I can be the guy that says you can do it on a $300,000 sales price, I’d love to be that guy.”
— Peter Chabris (41:30)

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On the Seventh Level:
  “The idea that you could be in real estate sales and own a business was a radical idea to me.”
  (11:03)

• On coaching and mindset:
  “He believed in a better version of me than I did...That is the most transformational relationship.”
  (14:29)

• On the culture of productivity:
  “If the mega agent brings with them this high intensity that pushes all this production, that intensity has to be transferred from the mega agent’s shoulders and hardwired into the organization itself.”
  (25:41)

• On practice:
  “If you want to be excellent, you’ve got to practice excellence.”
  (33:53)

• On team culture:
  “We have three values at our company. The first one is integrity, the second one is drive, and the third is teamwork. And we define teamwork as nobody succeeds alone, and we pay it forward.”
  (43:09)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Topic | Timestamp | |------------------------------------------|-------------| | Peter’s background/story | 02:19-06:29 | | Discovering MREA & seventh level | 06:31-12:06 | | Coaching and mindset shift | 13:42-15:06 | | Defining and building the five roles | 16:20-19:27 | | Team scale philosophy | 21:19-23:51 | | Culture of productivity | 24:42-29:01 | | Standards & onboarding | 27:18-30:51 | | Accountability & PIP | 31:27-32:24 | | Daily routines and roleplay | 33:31-36:42 | | Working with the CEO | 37:14-40:09 | | Life by design & Peter’s invitation | 41:02-43:09 |

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Closing Takeaways

• You can build a business that runs without you—even with average home prices below national average—if you architect the right systems, cultivate a true culture of productivity, and are willing to grow, delegate, and trust.
• The secret isn’t a hack or personality; it’s relentless clarity, accountability, and focus on the main drivers of real estate success.
• “In five years, you can be anywhere you want.” (15:32, summarizing Gary Keller’s belief)
• Notable actionable framework: Replace yourself in five roles; onboard with clear, productivity-focused standards; enforce rigor with caring accountability.

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For more detailed insights or a copy of the notes, visit: mreanotes.com.

Contact Peter:
Text him directly: 513-703-7000 (as given on air at 42:10)

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Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

Welcome back to another episode of the Millionaire Real Estate Agent podcast. I'm Jason Abrams and this is the place where we lift the curtain on the world of real estate like never before. Every week I sit down with visionaries, pirates and mavericks. We're here to document, demonstrate and most importantly, demystify their game changing models and systems. What secrets propel them to the top and how are they living their dreams. This is about passion, it's about strategy. But above all, it's about real tangible success. So buckle up and let's dive in. This is the Millionaire Real Estate Agent podcast. What if I told you that there's a group of humans that live a life by design and you could be one of them friends, I would be telling you the absolute truth. You see, in the Millionaire Real Estate Agent book, Gary Keller lays out an idea that if you want to, you can build a business going through a series of levels and you can get to the seventh level. At that level, the business continues to run and grow without you being involved on a day to day basis. Very, very, very few people ever get there. Today you are going to hear from a gentleman who has his team does over 600 units year in and year out for over $5 million in GCI. And get this friends, he lives 2000 miles away from the team as it does it. They have over 40 real estate agents and they are humming. I am talking about Peter Chabri. He is going to tell you exactly how to run your business, how, how to grow your business and how to set up your business so you can live at the seventh level. Sit back and buckle up. This is Peter Chabri. Peter, how are you my friend?

[A]

I'm great. Jason, how are you?

[B]

I am fantastic. Thanks for doing this with us.

[A]

For sure. Thanks for having me.

[B]

So I ask everyone the same question, man. How did you get into the greatest industry in the world?

[A]

So I was in technology through the dot com and thereafter. I was product manager in that world and back then I was much stronger. I lifted a lot. I played bass in a funk band and I was at a dot com startup. So I was on my keyboard 12, 14 hours a day.

[B]

Okay, stop the tape. Wait a second. Dude, you can't drop. I was in a funk band and I'm a technologist and I used to pump iron and not get some follow up questions. Let's talk about this band, man. What was the name of the band?

[A]

Groove Zone.

[B]

The Groove Zone.

[A]

The Groove Zone. Yes sir.

[B]

Playing bass in a funk band is. No.

[A]

Well, here's where it's really good. I was actually. I was recruited by the CIA out of college and they offered me the job, but I had to do a background check and that takes nine months in that world. So I went and took a fellowship in Taiwan and I worked for a local newspaper as a business reporter. But the other thing I did was I finally joined a band because I'd always wanted to. And so we played the Taiwan Woodstock. We were like the last band on the last day to play.

[B]

It's not going to get any better than this, gang. You should all tune out now. That's the high point of the MREA podcast. That's unbelievable. So how do you end up in the technology business?

[A]

Well, so I was fluent in Mandarin and having spent time in Taiwan doing rock band things, the CIA is going to find out about that. And so. And I had a local girlfriend and probably they don't want somebody that's doing rock band things with locals handling state secrets. So they rescinded their offer.

[B]

By the way, you can't blame them.

[A]

No, that was the right decision. I totally respect it. And in retrospect, I'm glad that they did because I would not have been a great government employee. And so, short version. So I worked for the contractors that worked for the Defense Department. And the same thing happened. I got to a certain level where I needed security clearance. I couldn't secure the security clearance. And so I just had to go in a different direction. At that point in time, the Department of Defense was being. Its budget was being reduced by the Clinton administration. And so a lot of these defense contractors had assets, satellites. The Defense Department wasn't using them. And they used these satellites to transfer this wild new technology called Internet protocol around the world. And so all these defense contractors started getting into IP Internet protocol. And that was the beginning of the dot com world. So I switched into tech in the front end of the dot com bubble.

[B]

So you're crushing it. Dot com is happening. The bubble is real. It pops. In 2001, what changes?

[A]

Well, two things. One, I was on disability because I had blown out my arms. And during disability, I read this book called Rich Dad, Poor Dad. And at that point in time, I realized I could never work for anybody ever again. And that if 90% of America's millionaires made or keep their money in real estate, well, that's the industry I should get into. So I was on disability. I met a girl, she wound up being my wife. And we decided to move somewhere. I lived in D.C. at the time, and we decided to Move to Cincinnati, where I was going to be a real estate developer, where we both had some family. There is an area of town in D.C. that was just beginning to gentrify. I had just come from D.C. where this area called Adams Morgan had exploded. I thought I could be part of this new rent renaissance for this area. And since I called over the Rhine. So I bought shelves, turned them into condos to sell, and I was five years too soon, and I got licensed, really, just so I would lose less money on my projects.

[B]

So when you say you were five years too soon, you had the nicest product in an area that hadn't hit yet.

[A]

The demand for what I was building wasn't there. And between that and my arrogance and ignorance of thinking I didn't need help doing these projects, I got my ass kicked. So I got licensed. We had no money. And the thing about real estate development, even when you're good at it, is that it's feast or famine with your income. And we didn't have enough money in the bank to handle the famine parts. And I figured out when I got licensed, I can get paid in three weeks, because you can close deal easily in three weeks back then. And so I switched gears and started selling real estate.

[B]

What happens Next?

[A]

So in 2005, 2006, I was, you know, a top producer, selling a couple deals every month, you know, getting some awards, cashing some checks. And I was in Barnes and Noble looking for inspiration in the business section. And there is this red book. It was called the Millionaire Real Estate Agent. And I bought it, and I think I read it in maybe four or five days. Twice.

[B]

Twice.

[A]

Yeah, I was. It just. It all made sense. And I thought, I can be the guy. Like, I can be the guy in Cincinnati that grows a business bigger than himself that he can ultimately step out of.

[B]

By the way, gang, if you're new to the show, the Millionaire Real Estate Agent podcast, the namesake for the show is the Millionaire Real Estate Agent. It was a book. It is a book written by Gary Keller, Jay Papasan, and may he rest in peace, Dave Jenks, where it lays out this idea. Well, hell, Peter, I'll let you say what's the idea that it laid out.

[A]

The idea is that you can own a business that generates, that nets a million dollars without being active in it. But really, the idea that matters from that book, Jason, is that it taught real estate agents to stop thinking like salespeople and thinking like business people. And that shot was heard around the.

[B]

World in our industry, and it connected with you. It Sounds like on a visceral level.

[A]

Visceral. That's the best word to describe the way I responded to that. Yeah. So I was all in. Right. And I started hiring and growing and thinking immediately around how do I build a machine now? Full transparency. A lot of it was driven by the ego of having people. Right. But there was still aspiration to own a business because that's what I wanted. I wanted to own a business and I wanted to own, you know, the ancillary passive income opportunities that come with having a strong cash flowing business.

[B]

So this is 0606.

[A]

Yes sir.

[B]

I have the benefit and so do we all of knowing what happened two years later.

[A]

Yeah, that was a great run, wasn't it?

[B]

So you get this thing going, you're getting a little traction, then the world changes.

[A]

Yeah. I have done several really smart things. Several. Maybe like on one handful. One of the things that I did was I tried to build an MREA team at my local independent brokerage and they would not let me have my cell phone number on my sign. And so if they weren't allowing me to do that, I was never going to be able to build what I was trying to build in that environment. It was not designed or built for entrepreneurs.

[B]

So you read the millionaire real estate agent book, you're not at Keller Williams, you're at an independent and you read it and you're going to go run that play at that independent.

[A]

Yes, sir. That did not work very well.

[B]

Yeah, because on I forget. But I think it's in the first section. He says if it's not your brand, it can't be your business and makes the argument that you need to be.

[A]

In control of your leads 100%. 100%. And you know, you really need to be in a capping model of some kind if you're going to build a true real estate sales machine, which is what I was interested in being in. So some Keller Williams agent took the listing next to me. I was furious. And he's pulling his sold sign out of the ground and he said, you ought to look at Keller Williams. I said, okay, I'll do it. Who do I talk to? And so I signed up and that's the big recruiting process for me.

[B]

Love it. By the way, that's the big recruiting process for all of us. Right. Which is someone introduced you to something that they believe in and that can happen in any company. Usa. So I have the benefit of foresight now because I can look back.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

All these years later, you are now running a Seventh level business. So for our friends out there that haven't read the book yet, can you explain this concept of levels and then what seventh level means?

[A]

Yeah. The concept of seventh level is that you are no longer a salesperson, you are now a business owner in the most acute way. In that as the business owner, you are no longer actively involved in the operation of the business but continue to enjoy distributions from it. That would be so called level seven. Level one is I'm an army of one. I do everything. I'm a sales guy. Right. The different so called levels are just different iterations on the path to complete business ownership. It should be explicitly stated, every single level has its virtues for whatever, wherever you show up in your life and how you want to live it and how you want to organize your time and your expenses and your aspirations and your appetite. So that's your, that's the answer to the question.

[B]

Well, you looked up and said, I want to be seventh level, I want to live on that level.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Why was that so important to you and so refreshing when you read it?

[A]

It wasn't refreshing, it was inspiring because I didn't even think it was possible. The idea that you could be in real estate sales and own a business was a radical idea to me. And I knew real estate was where I wanted to be. I made enough money on the last deal to make up for all the losses on the previous ones and got my ass kicked, to your point, and got my MBA in the school of hard knocks. So it wasn't invaluable. It was actually priceless. But I still had nothing to show for it. And so the idea that I wasn't a failure, that there was that I could do the things that I wanted to do in this space was inspiring. And then full transparency, the market collapsed and the Great Recession happened and nobody was going to hire a guy who had been real estate sales for three or four years. Like I didn't have any options. Like the boat was burned for me. I had to go. And so that was when the full commitment happened to building a true real estate sales business.

[B]

Before we shift to the model, I have two more questions. @ the time that you read it, had you set a timeframe in your mind of when you wanted to be.

[A]

At this seventh level, like immediately? Yeah, immediately. No, I mean, I just knew that was where I was going. I didn't know how I was going to get there. I tried it locally, it didn't work. I switched to KW and I just thought it was crazy at kw all this stuff was provided all these playbooks, all this information, and everybody was willing to share, like, truly. It took me two years to realize people here weren't crazy. This was just how it worked, and we just have to pay it forward. There was a book called Internet Lead Generation that was published right before the Great Recession, and I thought this was, like, gold. I couldn't believe this thing was in print and available. So I just implemented the whole thing wholesale, thank God, because I didn't really have a sphere, and I didn't like to talk to people very much back then. And the point of all this was we got that going just in time for the Great Recession, and so we were able to grow. We were growing as the market was contracting, and Tony Dacello did a shift tour, and I was the local guy to talk about Internet leads on his shift tour when he came to the Ohio Valley region. And afterwards, I asked him to coach me, and he said no. And I kept asking to coach me, and he said no. And apparently I asked so many times over such a long period of time that he called Linda McKissick, who owns the region, and said, who the hell is this guy that keeps asking me to coach him? And apparently she said, hey, do me a favor, Tony, take him as a client. I need a hit. The OVR needs a story. And so the reason I'm on this with you right now is because of my wife and because of Tony Dacello.

[B]

So, friends, if you're at a different company, you're not sure Tony Dacello is a part of Maps Coaching. Maps Coaching is the coaching arm of Keller Williams. Forgetting Tony for a second, because he's just known as Coach, by the way. That's how synonymous with that movement he was. Why coaching for you? Why did coaching make such an impact in your life?

[A]

Yeah, you know, Jason, I was such a mess from the neck up. I had so much bad programming in my head, it just. It's a wonder I got to the point where I was even on his radar. It was just sheer obstinance that got me to the point where I had enough production that I mattered enough for him to take my call. Right. And so the power of coaching, first and foremost for me was he cleaned up all that horrible thinking in my head. He provided accountability. But the thing that I think mattered the most was he believed in a better version of me than I did. Wow, I'm choking up a little bit here.

[B]

Me too, brother.

[A]

He would not stop fighting for that better version. When I was ready to give up on it. And when you have someone like that in your life at any stage, wherever it shows up, that is the most transformational relationship you can come across. And I was lucky, blessed, whatever you want to call it, to have had him in my life in a time when I needed him desperately.

[B]

All right, so we get coaching. So I want to get into this now because fast forward to today.

[A]

Yes, sir.

[B]

The interesting things about you, One of them, you don't live in the Cincinnati market any longer yet the team, 600 plus units, $5 million in GCI plus.

[A]

Yes, sir.

[B]

You make your home across the country today?

[A]

Yes, sir.

[B]

Why?

[A]

Why? Well, during COVID we rented a house with another family for six weeks while the kids were online in Breckenridge, Colorado, and went skiing every day. And I realized I need to live in the mountains, and it needs to happen as soon as I can finish meeting all my commitments in Cincinnati. And my last commitment was getting my son to graduate from high school. So that was going to be in five years. And so, as Gary says, you can be anywhere in five years. So we just worked backwards. What needs to happen over the next five years such that. Jason, this is really important. I couldn't just leave the business. I had to leave the business because in five years, I was gonna be 52. A 52 year. Now I had to leave the business in a way such that it continued to grow in my absence because I'm too young for the business to start dying now. Does that make sense?

[B]

Perfect sense. That's actually the model we're gonna unpack. So, gang, you don't have to take the notes. I'm taking the notes. If you're on the treadmill or. Someone sent me a photo the other day, Peter, of them running outside and said, this is my treadmill. So I love that. But if you're doing it, you don't have to write it down. I'm writing it down. If you don't get the notes, they come out every Thursday as a PDF in an email that we send. Go to mreanotes.com that's M R. Eanotes.com Peter, tell me exactly how to build the business so it continues to grow even when you're not there.

[A]

Okay, the first one is this. What agents who are building sales teams don't understand is they actually play five different roles. There's five roles you have to replace when you pull yourself out of the business. The first one that typically gets replace is the director of operations. Right? The operational person. That's the Easiest. The second one is the person that handles the marketing. Then it gets a little bit more challenging. The third one is the person that is responsible for the day to day production of the company, the director of sales. The fourth one is the individual responsible for growing the business through talent. Director of growth. Director of sales is responsible for productivity per person. Director of growth is responsible for the number of people in the company. And then the final one is the CEO. So what most agents don't understand is they have, it takes five people to replace them if they have a team of any scale. Now in Cincinnati, we're psyched because at the Chabri Group, our average sales price will finally cross the $300,000 mark this year.

[B]

Our friends in California, there's, they have grins ear to ear right now.

[A]

Oh, believe me, I sit in Gary's masterminds and talk to my peers and they have three to four, our average sales price. And it makes me crazy. I love them for it, but it makes me crazy.

[B]

Okay, so let's go through this list. You said the first two are the quote unquote, easier ones, the do and your marketing folks. What's most important about those roles when you're no longer present?

[A]

Your directive. Operations cannot be a typical behavioral style. My experience, Jason, is building a company large enough to sustain my lifestyle with an average sales price that's 25% less than America's average sales price, less than more than 20% less. And so we need scale, we need volume to do what we're going to do. So we have multiple administrative personnel servicing this business. The director of operations must be a leader. It cannot be an administrator. It's an administrator that. Well, it's a leader that also gravitates towards the leadership. Excuse me, the administrative side of the business.

[B]

This makes perfect sense to me. Okay. As you're describing this, I had written them as a list. 1, 2, 3. But I'm rethinking it to the way that Gary always draws things, which is one circle with your name and then five circles under it. And these are the humans that report to you. And ultimately this runs that business. These are kind of the key people. And then there's going to have staff and systems underneath them. Is that right?

[A]

Yes, sir, that's exactly right.

[B]

Okay, so the doo must be a leader.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Talk to me about marketing. What's important there?

[A]

So when it comes to marketing, that is ultimately the least important for the Chabri Group because we are staff intensive. When you think about, when you talk about expense structure, our staff number is twice the MREA benchmark. And so our marketing budget is very lean. The majority of what we do is offensive lead generation and sphere. So there's not a lot of paying for leads. It's primarily activity based.

[B]

Talk to me about your Director of.

[A]

Sales, Director of Sales responsibility. There's only two ways that a real estate sales business can grow its income. Well, grow. The first one is productivity per person, and the second one is the number of people producing. Those are the only two levers you have. So the Director of Sales responsibility is to push productivity per person. That individual is primarily responsible for the culture of productivity. And that's the second framework I want to come back to, if that's okay with you.

[B]

No problem. Then let's go to Director of Growth.

[A]

Director of Growth is recruiting. Right. So I spent a tour of duty as a launch op and learned a lot about growth and a lot about recruiting. And the Director of Growth's responsibility is to identify and recruit talent. For us to do what we do, we need a lot of scale, which means we need a lot of agents, which means that there is natural attrition, just like a market center or Franch, our brokerage, for those that are at Keller Williams. And so you have to continue to recruit because people will leave. Either they are not on standard or their life changes. And when you have a standard that you enforce, you're going to see a higher attrition rate than you will for a market center or for a typical real estate brokerage or franchise.

[B]

How many agents do you like to have on the team at all times?

[A]

As many as will produce.

[B]

Wow, that's a big question. Okay, how many do you got today?

[A]

We have 41 today.

[B]

So there's another subsection of the world listening right now that says, why don't you just have seven people, but each of them do 50 deals a year.

[A]

So I love that question. And the way I explained this was for years, Jason, we were like Navy Seal Team 6. I actually ran a 45% profit margin running Seal Team 6. Now I did wind up getting heart surgery in the process. So it may not have been the best for me, but we did it for two years straight. I think you said in one of our masterminds, you said there's no perfect business model, so you may as well pick your problems.

[B]

That's right.

[A]

And that resonated with me. And so if each business model has its problems and I want to live in the mountains in five years, then I need to pick problems that are going to be that I Like to solve that I can solve remotely that the person that ultimately replaced me as CEO can also solve intuitively. Make sense.

[B]

Makes perfect sense.

[A]

So when we were small but mighty, it was great, except that there's two problems with it. The first one is if somebody leaves one of your super awesome producers leaves, it can really hamstring the organization. And even if they leave just because they're the trailing spouse. Right. Or they burn out, or they have an ill sh. Or they got to take care of a parent that's getting sick, like, it's not that they leave you because they don't like you. They just leave because life happens. Replacing that individual can be very challenging. The second thing that can happen with Seal Team 6 is you can sometimes you can get a little entitlement, starts getting fostered in your players, and they can hold you hostage. And I've experienced both of those things. And so when I decide what kind of problems do I like to solve, I don't particularly appreciate being held hostage and I don't like surprises that set me back 10, 15, 20% of my revenue. The other thing about Small but mighty sales team, which is what you're talking about, is that it requires a really strong leader in deep relationships with the people, because these are all highly talented people. They're constantly getting solicited and they see opportunity as well, and they're great to be in relationship with. But if ultimately I'm not going to be there, I may not be able to maintain the right relationship from 1600 miles away. I.

[B]

It's spot on. Gary Keller, he told me, he said that talented people, a lot of them are going to spell love T I M E for sure. And they're going to want yours. And if you're going to be 2,000 miles away, sure, you could figure it out. But in life you get to pick your problems.

[A]

Yeah. And I just want to put an asterisk on this. I'm not saying that the people that I'm in working relationship with now are not talented, but is a different kind of relationship 100%.

[B]

I've had the pleasure in preparing for this. I had the pleasure of talking to some of the folks in your organization and you got an incredible group of humans there.

[A]

Oh, they're phenomenal people.

[B]

And what blew me away in the conversations that I was having this conversation around culture.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And Gary defined culture the other day. He said, you know, if you're not careful, culture becomes really esoteric and it's kind of scoffed and squishy. He said, think of it like this. Jason, he said culture is simply the way things get done around here.

[A]

I like that 100%.

[B]

And he said, in the absence of a culture, you get a default culture. And a default culture is usually dysfunctional.

[A]

So the first framework was the people that you need to replace yourself. Right. The second framework is what I call culture of productivity. So in the last three pages of the MREA in the organizational section, organizational model, it talks about leadership D and business D. And the idea is that leaders of sales organizations bring their intrinsic drive to the company like that sales hustle that created them, made them top producers. Business D is the systems, models, tools, technology that also drive the company forward. And Gary will say, like when the best companies have both. And I believe that to be true. The missing piece for us was that we did not have a cultural D and that was the piece that was missing. Because if you think about it, especially when you're dealing with a low average sales price like ours, there's no margin for error and there's no margin for inefficiencies. Right. We have to have a marketing thin budget for this thing to work. And so everybody needs to produce. This is not a lead receiving business. This is a lead generation business. So there needs to be a level of intensity in the organization, in the culture of the company. In fact, if you think about when you look at the KPA for mega agent, what's the number one behavior? Behavior. It's actually a modifier and the modifier is intensity. If the mega agent brings with them this high intensity that pushes all this production, that intensity has to be transferred from the mega agent's shoulders and hardwired into the organization itself. That's the culture of productivity.

[B]

Well, how the hell do you do that?

[A]

There's three frameworks. The first one is you're onboarding that 30, 60, 90 is critical in. I'll pivot for a second. The way you let people treat you in the first 90 days is how they're going to treat you the rest of the relationship, right? Sure. So you have to cast a certain kind of relationship in the first 90 days and indoctrinate them into the culture of the company. And I don't use the word indoctrinate in a negative fashion. I mean it actually in a positive way. Because when people buy into understanding and value and win with the values of the company, the values of the culture of productivity, like they get it and their life goes faster, their income gets bigger and they start controlling more of their lives than they thought was Possible.

[B]

Okay, so walk me through. And friends, if you're new to the program, 30, 60, 90 is the first 30 days, then the next 30 days, then the next 30 Days. So don't take me through all of it, but give me some of the high points. What matters in the first 30 days the most?

[A]

What matters in the first 30 days that they have demonstrated they have the skills that deliver core competency in their 20%.

[B]

And what is the 20%?

[A]

20% is generating a lead, converting it, signing it, serving it. That's it. Can you generate a lead? Can you convert it? Can you sign it? That's the only thing we're training on. We only train what we train on.

[B]

Okay, that was my question. Which is when you say you're not expecting them to have that on day one, you're just going to train on only those things fanatically for the first 30 days.

[A]

We train on for the first 90 days, but it's most intensive in the first 30 days. Yes, sir.

[B]

Take me through the list one more time. I need skills, sales skills, acquisition, which.

[A]

Primarily is communication skills, and it is pipeline, development and lead generation. That's really all we do. Okay, we have a standard. Okay, so a proper 30, 60, 90 in the last 30 days, the agent is on standard for whatever the production standard is. The production standard, the Shabri Group is. Book four appointments with new prospective clients.

[B]

Hang on. Go slow.

[A]

Book four appointments with new prospective clients.

[B]

What does that mean?

[A]

That means you're meeting with somebody for the first time to talk about representation, and it's a signable opportunity. You've qualified them, and it's a signable opportunity.

[B]

And is that on a weekly basis?

[A]

4 per month. Excuse me?

[B]

4 per month. So once a week I'm going to have a meeting with someone who ultimately could sign on the line that is dotted.

[A]

That's correct.

[B]

Okay, what's the next standard of those.

[A]

Four, you got to sign two of them.

[B]

Ooh, you got to play 50% ball with Y'.

[A]

All.

[B]

That seems.

[A]

Which is easy.

[B]

Okay, convince me.

[A]

Well, I'll pull up SISU if you want to see it. Our conversion rate on the buy side is 85%. And on the list side it's 80%.

[B]

Okay, and are these leads, are they coming out of something warm? Are they coming out of a database that you've curated? Or are they just walking up to people in Starbucks and saying, hey, you want to have a meeting? Because if you're going to go 50%, there has to have been some framing of this along the way.

[A]

50% conversion rate from kept to signed. Gosh, Jason, I don't mean to disagree with you in front of other people.

[B]

But I feel, by the way, disagree with me in front of the largest audience in all of real estate. Go ahead.

[A]

I truly believe that if your agent understands how to communicate their value and they're following a presentation structure format system that pre handles objections, they should sign a high percentage of the time, in fact.

[B]

You like that, man, you just got me there. Because I got news for you. If you don't have those things, you're not batting 50%. The mega agent's going to go out and bat 80%. Everyone else on the team is going to be 20% at best.

[A]

Well, the funny thing is, our company. And remember, There are over 40 producing agents in our company. Our company's average is over 80%.

[B]

I love that. Okay, so number one, I'm going to book at least an appointment a week with someone that can sign. Number two, Two of them are going to sign. What's the third standard? Sell a house, put one deal closed.

[A]

Yeah. Our minimum Production standard is 12, but the average productivity per person at the company is 15 and a half. So we're not managing to the minimum here. We just know that if you can't sell 12 houses a year with us, we're not the right model for how you're going to succeed in real estate. And so that's just a way for us.

[B]

It stands out to me that these three things are all lag measures. Are you tracking any lead measures around this?

[A]

I think appointments set, kept and signed are all those. To me, I consider lead indicators. Got it. Pending sales and closed sales are lag indicators.

[B]

That's what I'm getting at. Because if you say to me, jay, we start tracking at how many appointments they set, to me, that's the lag of the lead, which is how many minutes did you spend doing it? How many contacts did you make?

[A]

We put pressure on 4 per month. If someone isn't at 4 per month, then we apply pressure to conversations. Yes, we track conversations, but because it's so subjective and because it happens at different times of the day, we put the pressure on appointments booked.

[B]

Okay, let me ask you this. I miss this standard. How many months do I get to miss it for? And what does the protocol look like the first time I do miss it?

[A]

It's a great question. I could talk about this all day long. It's my favorite conversation. If you miss the standard over the course of a month, we're having conversations. Well, actually, we're having conversations during the month. If you're lagging the standard, there's no surprise at the end of the month if we're like, hey, this isn't working out. You got to do something differently this month. It's easy for me to say, Jason, like, well, we're hardcore. You don't hit that month, you're on a PIP immediately. But it doesn't work like that because this is life and people and we all have things that happen in our lives and so there's some degree of grace. Right.

[B]

I know your heart. I know that never would have been the case.

[A]

No. Well, I think there probably was a time when I was a little more draconian, but I've grown up. If somebody is not present and they're not doing the things and they're not taking it seriously. Yeah. We might bring out a pipeline immediately after the end of the first month that someone's an on standard.

[B]

What's a pip?

[A]

Performance improvement plan. It's a short term, high focus reset for the agent to decide through their own actions if they want to get back in the game or get off the team.

[B]

What would be in a pip? What does it look like? Is it a sheet of paper? Is it a commitment? Do we build it together? Are you handing me a new set of rules? What's a pip?

[A]

It is a sheet of paper where we identify the goal, the standards that were not kept, and then we identify the number of activities or benchmarks over the next 30 days and if necessary, over the following 30 days, if they're really behind. But the reality is most people, we all have mistakes. We all have a bad month. We all have things that happen in our lives. If we're going two months without hitting standard, that's when we're pulling out a pit, generally speaking.

[B]

And are you mandating, which is an interesting word in a 1099 contractor industry, but are you holding to a standard of lead gen as a time frame per day?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Do you have dual career agents as well on the team? Okay, so everyone's working in full time real estate. What do the days look like?

[A]

So half hour of role play, four days a week.

[B]

Is that in the morning?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay, so what time do you all start?

[A]

When we were sales team 6, we started at 8 and the listing agent started at 7:30. Now at scale we start at 9. Role play is for half an hour.

[B]

Why do you start your day with role play? Matter of fact, these people are talking to people all day. Why do they even have to do role play.

[A]

Because if you want to be excellent, you've got to practice excellence. Right. If you think about Tiger Woods, Tom Brady, all of the greats, they don't just go to the field on the football field on Sunday and play the best football there is. Like they practice relentlessly all week long. They're either in the watching film or they're practicing plays with their teammates or they're training. Right. Like if you want to be the best, play like you want to be the best, behave like you want to be the best. And that means skilling up.

[B]

I love that. All right, so the, the four days.

[A]

A week, four days a week of role play for 30 minutes followed by two hours of lead gen each day.

[B]

And are you picking the topic for role play or is everyone just getting in? And it's always the same, which is connect with people and drive to appointment.

[A]

Yeah. So we have a 13 week role play cycle like every quarter. And so we go through that roleplay cycle in that cycle or two weeks where if there's some market of the moment event, we can specifically train around that language.

[B]

So every 13 days the cycle is going to reset.

[A]

Every 13 weeks the cycle resets. So once a quarter we'll start the role play over again.

[B]

Would you please walk me through some of the most important pieces of the cycle or the cycle itself?

[A]

Of course. The very first thing our agents learn is how to call your sphere for the first time without making it icky, man.

[B]

How do you do that?

[A]

Well, that's the first dialogue that we teach is how to call your sphere without having them want to avoid your phone call the next time you call them. Right. So a lot of agents don't call their sphere the ones that do it wrong and then don't do it again. And so it's important that you have permission to work real estate into the relationship in a way that still primarily honors the relationship you have with somebody from your sphere and takes the pressure off of them to use you directly. And when you do those two things right, you crank on referrals as long as you're consistently marketing to and communicating with them, which is what we do.

[B]

Love it. All right, what else you have? What's the next week?

[A]

Internet lead dialogue. Right. How to have a conversation with a stranger that registered on your website about real estate. We do open house. We have an open house playbook that we run. Sign call conversion, Google local service conversion skills. And then we move into the buyer presentation because most agents usually start on that side of things. It's easier. So we teach them the TCG buyer consultation, which is lethal. We teach them how to present and sign the buyer broker agreement. We teach them how to handle objections around commission and or transaction processing charges. And then what else do we do? We work on things like closes. Right. Like the 10 closes that you'll see. And I believe it was shift. We'll go at that point in time into situational stuff. What's going on in the market at the moment.

[B]

Everything you're saying, you've removed all of the bull.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

I mean, you are hyper specific on creating a productivity driven environment and you've stripped everything else out.

[A]

That's the perfect language. Because there's no margin for inefficiency or bulk in a seventh level business functioning on a $300,000 sales price.

[B]

Man, that is one big sentence. All right, I got this. This makes perfect sense to me. The only rule that we didn't talk about and I wanted to save it for last, is the CEO.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And because you lay out this business. But yeah, dude, you're kind of a mad scientist because the only reason you're getting passionate about telling me about it is because you believe in it, which means you had a hand in creating it.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

How does a founder work side by side with a CEO and how. You've had to grow, man.

[A]

Yes, I had to grow. One of the things that I believe is one of the. One of my strengths is that I am constantly looking to be better and I'm constantly looking to evolve. And that has served me well because I've never gotten complacent in where I was in my journey. That being said, hiring somebody to run your business requires a high level of leadership skills. It requires a really strong interpersonal relationship. It requires mutual trust, dare I say love, between you and the other individual. And I think it also requires a degree of humility because we have to understand, yes, I'm the founder of the business. Yes, I am the guy that got us most of the way that we are, or to a point. Now, James, who is the CEO, he was right there with me when we made this transfer from Seal Team 6 to. Well, we swung all the way over the People's Liberation army of China. We figured out our new mojo somewhere in the middle. But he was with me through that journey and he was on the leadership team when we made this switch. And so at this point, he understands the machine better than I do. And so we're going to get back to humility. You have to understand that just because we Got this thing where it is doesn't mean we're now the best leader for the company. And that requires a degree of humility, and it requires a degree of trust in the individual. That is. And James is a better operator of the company the way it is today than I could be.

[B]

That's a huge sentence, man.

[A]

It's true.

[B]

We read this book. A CEO does three things, and ultimately the book said, number one, they help set the vision for the company and make sure everyone understands it. Number two, they make sure the right butts are in all the right seats and the wrong ones are removed from the organization.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And number three, they keep an eye and make sure this thing makes money and hits its goals.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Would you say those are the three things?

[A]

Yeah, I mean, look, Jason James has been in this role for three years, right? I've been in this role for 23 years. Well, not quite that long. Let's say 19 years I've been doing this. So I just have a deeper level of experience. So I'm still riding shotgun to his executive role, right? Of course. So, yes, he's responsible for those two things. I'm kind of like sitting here on his shoulder, talking him through the week to week decisions he has to make along the way. But, yeah, that's his responsibility. I mean, he has. He's learning also. He's learning where to delegate and let go. So he's just holding onto those three things. So. But yeah, absolutely.

[B]

I love it, man. All right, I got two more questions for you.

[A]

Yes, sir.

[B]

When you think about the future, is there anything that scares you if this thing is gonna implode, if this isn't gonna work out, what's gonna be the reason or what's the thing that you wake up at two in the morning thinking about?

[A]

The only thing that makes me concerned about the longevity is, you know, what does the transition of power from James to the next person look like? And I don't believe that transfer happens anytime soon. But I do know that James will, at some point in time, want to do something else and will have earned the right to do it. And when that happens, I want to make sure that all the people that we've made all these commitments to. Right. Staff, agents, affiliated business, all these people we've made commitments to, I want to make sure that we don't stop delivering on the commitments that we've made.

[B]

I love that. All right, last question. You are living a life by design. You're living where you wanted to live. You're running the business you wanted to run.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I'm not suggesting you haven't always done that, but has this experience.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Do you think you could have done it earlier? Meaning have you been as purposeful about a life by design the entire time and you've now crossed a bridge that a handful of people will ever cross, which is I hit the seventh level, and. And I'm living the life that I want to live.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

A lot of people are stuck because they truly believe that's not attainable.

[A]

If I can be the guy that says, you can do it on a $300,000 sales price, I would love to be that guy to say, yes, it can be done, and it couldn't be done faster. You haven't asked me what I do with my time. What? And I'm. This is not a plug. And it may sound like it, but it's not intended to. But the thing I do now to keep current because it's still fun is I help stuck mega agents. Just coach them through getting out of the messy middle and starting to get this thing to run like a business gang.

[B]

If you're listening to this, and this sounds like a life that you want, and you do want to get over that bridge, then how can they reach you, brother? You're a coach who lives to coach.

[A]

Really? It's like consulting, because I've done it right.

[B]

So how do they reach you?

[A]

Just text me. 513-703-7000.

[B]

You just gave your cell phone out on the podcast that gets over 100,000 downloads a month.

[A]

Can we edit that out and no chance. It did. It's so good.

[B]

I'm not editing it out. I'm leaving it in. Okay, well, here's the thing.

[A]

We're going to test how many people actually download it and listen to it by the number of texts I get. We're going to give you a little feedback.

[B]

I'm just telling you, gang, you just got the golden ticket. Dropped in. I love it, man. I love everything you're doing for the industry. I was blown away when I talked to the people on your team who told me how supported they feel. I had a limiting belief, man. I thought I was going to start calling them. And they weren't going to kind of know who you were. They were going to know who your CEO was. They weren't really going to know what you stand for. They weren't going to know your story. I found the complete opposite. I also found a culture of people who all talked about helping each other. Yes. And if You've been purposeful about that, then bless you. If you haven't, then you're the recipient of one of the greatest things you could have had.

[A]

We have three values at our company. The first one is integrity, the second one in drive, and the third is teamwork. And we define teamwork as nobody succeeds alone, and we pay it forward, and we believe in that. And if you're not a team player, there's no place for you at our company.

[B]

I love it, man. I love it. I'm so glad the CIA had no use for you. Thank you for everything you're doing for the industry, brother. Honored to have you on the program.

[A]

Yeah. Jason, this has been such a treat. Thank you for having me and thank you for letting me share. Gives me goosebumps. Thank you.

[B]

Thank you, bro. That is awesome. The fact that he gave his cell phone number out over the air, I absolutely love that journey for him. Everybody text that dude and call that guy. And if you want a coach who's gonna change your life, he's the one. Why? Because he understands a productivity specific environment. Gary Keller just wrote a course on this called Leadership Academy, and what he says is a productivity specific environment sets the conditions that need to be there to support each person in achieving their highest productivity potential. It's not generic. It's specific. The bottom line is it has to do two things. Number one, determine the productivity value you must provide. Then number two, run the business to provide it. You see, once you have that, you have the makings of a culture. And in this same course, Gary says that culture is the shared set of values, beliefs, and behaviors and that shape how a group of people interact and get things done. Culture is the invisible architecture of every organization. It's, quote, how we do things around here. The success of culture rises or falls at the hands of the leader in charge. In the absence of culture, an organization doesn't become neutral. It becomes chaotic, untrustworthy, and ineffective. Culture will form by design or default, and a default culture is usually dysfunctional. Confusion replaces clarity. What's right becomes what can I get away with. Politics and ego fill the void. Culture is replaced by internal competition and self preservation. Morale and belonging collapse. Performance becomes transactional relationships and brands suffer. Turnover rises, results decline, and the company and its brand are at risk. You want to know the truth, friends? The truth is the success of any business rises and falls at the hands of its leader based on whether they get culture or don't understand the power of a positive culture. Created, lived, and protected. Quote, unquote. Gary Keller. That's what Peter Chabri understands. That's why he can sit 2,000 miles away in his mountain of solitude, and the business continue to run and the people within it continue to grow. The truth is, friends, any one of us can be at the seventh level. You only have to do three things in a very specific order. Number one, decide that's where you want to be. And I'm telling you, in five years, you can be anywhere you want. Number two, decide on the culture and the value that you need to provide in order to get the thing that drives the business happening. Everything Peter is doing is designed to create productivity, specific results for the agents on the team. Everything else has been cut out. Number three, you gotta run the business every day to the letter of those two things, because here's what happens. A lot of people do the work for one and two, and I watch them, and then they start to have mission creep every day, and before you know it, they've refilled the business with all the other things that. That don't really matter. You know what his genius might really be? Eliminating all of the other distractions and focusing on the one thing that has the biggest result to his business. Here's my question for you. What's the one thing that if you get it done, makes everything else easier, less important? Someone I know wrote a book on that, and the book is called the One Thing. See, if you're not careful, friends, you wake up and you do everything, Think about it, what matters most, and then double down on that. Go forth and do likewise. There it is. That wraps another episode. Friends, I don't know what you're taking out of this. I really don't. I'll tell you what I want you to be taking out of it, which is these are the people that are having tremendously big lives. And the reason it's happening is because they're setting up the models and systems to do just that. Gary Keller told me that leadership is teaching people how to think so that they do the things they need to do when they need to do them, so that ultimately they get the things they want when they want to have them. And that's what I want for you. You're all leaders, but it begins with leading ourselves. Hey, gang, if you're enjoying this as much as we are, I want you to subscribe. Hit the button right now. Do it on YouTube, Amazon Music, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. We also send out a newsletter at the conclusion of every show to make sure that you get the highest points in the models and systems that were discussed. So if you want to sign up, I need your name and your email address. Head over to themillionaire agent podcast.com millionaire agent podcast.com enter your name and your email address and every week that newsletter will be in your box. Friends, you just went on a journey. I hope that what happens between now and the next time we meet is absolutely wonderful for you. Thanks for listening. I'll see you next week.

[A]

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