Madison Reeves, the serial entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of both The Bridal Project and The Reeves Method, talks about how it was like to get her license at 18 and her accomplishments in the last 3 years she’s been practicing real estate. Madison also discusses how she categorizes talent and how she teaches goal setting. Next, Madison goes into money-mindset which helped her be successful in her business. Madison also discusses how to build and grow mindset. Last, Madison shares one universal piece of advice she’d give to agents.
Please check out Madison’s Best-Seller book and Podcast “Project Badass” here.
If you’d prefer to watch this interview, click here to view on YouTube!
This episode was brought to you by Real Geeks.
Transcript
D.J. Paris 0:00
On today’s show, we’re going to be speaking with a top producer and a real estate coach who’s only 20 years old. Stay tuned. This episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by real geeks. How many homes are you going to sell this year? Do you have the right tools? Is your website turning soft leads and interested buyers? Are you spending money on leads that aren’t converting? Well real geeks is your solution. Find out why agents across the country choose real geeks as their technology partner. Real geeks was created by an agent for agents. They pride themselves on delivering a sales and marketing solution so that you can easily generate more business. There agent websites are fast and built for lead conversion with a smooth search experience for your visitors. Real geeks also includes an easy to use agent CRM. So once a lead signs up on your website, you can track their interest and have great follow up conversations. Real geeks is loaded with a ton of marketing tools to nurture your leads and increase brand awareness visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod and find out why Realtors come to real geeks to generate more business again, visit real geeks.com forward slash keeping it real pod. And now on to our show.
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made by real estate agents and for real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris. And in just a moment, I’m your guide and host I got ahead of myself in just a moment though. And I’m so excited, which is why I got ahead of myself, because for the first time on this show, we are speaking to a very young real estate top producer. In fact, she’s 20 years old. Her name is Madison Reed. She’s amazing. And she’s also a real estate coach. So I’m so excited. But before we get to Madison, bear with me just a few moments here. Please tell a friend about our podcast. We’ve done over 350 episodes and we keep growing our audience because you tell a friend so think of any other realtor that you know that could benefit from hearing from our show. Send them a link to keeping it real pod.com Every episode we’ve done can be streamed there. And also please leave us a review whatever podcast app you might be listening. You know, Apple podcasts, iTunes, Google Play Stitcher, Spotify excetera. Let us know what you think of the show. Leave us a review. Alright, enough for me. Let’s get on to our interview with Madison Reed.
Right today on the show we have Madison Reed and Christians real estate and Keller Williams Black Hills in South Dakota. Let me tell you about Madison Madison Reeves is a serial entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of the bridle project and the Reeves method, which is an event planning company and coaching program respectively. She’s also an award winning real estate agent, a recipient of the top 100 leaders in real estate Award and a top producing Sales Team Leader with Christians team Incorporated. Madison is driven to help other entrepreneurs seek growth and take control of their results to accelerate their business and lives. Now Madison grew up in a poor neighborhood in a small town and was determined to prove that anyone could fulfill their utmost potential regardless of where they came from. Now after dropping out of college and getting fired from several jobs that’s happened to me too. She had seemingly little to no direction in life. And it wasn’t until Madison discovered entrepreneurship and creating a life she loved that she found her true calling and purpose in life. Now she wants to share the liberation of an extraordinary life with others around her. Now Madison spends her time mentoring other real estate sales agents with production coaching. She also focuses on expanding her real estate team to provide others with the same life changing opportunity that was provided for her now check out Madison’s new book which is called Project badass breaking out of your comfort zone to transform from average to extraordinary which by the way has a perfect five star review and it’s not like there’s just one review there’s lots of reviews, perfect five star review on Amazon it’s available there and of course everywhere else books are sold and she’s a podcast host please check out her show I know I’m going to which is called Project badass vailable everywhere podcasts are served, but definitely visit her website to which is called which is project badass network.com Again Project badass network.com Madison Welcome to the show.
Madison Reeves 4:44
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me here. I’m excited.
D.J. Paris 4:48
You’re our very first South Dakota guest and we’ve not had a North Dakota guest and I’m just going to say it we’re never going to have a North Dakota guest because I don’t like North Dakota I only I’m only teasing I have no problems with either Dakota but I am excited to have I’m always I always love having people from, you know, we have so many people from California and New York, Chicago, you know, Florida. And I always love talking to people in other states where I’m not as familiar I was, I was telling Madison just before Not that anyone cares. But I’ve been to almost all the states in the country, and I haven’t been to either of the Dakotas. And there is a lot to see in both. So I am, I’m excited to be talking to you, because it reminds me of something I need to do, which is figure out how I’m going to get over there and cross that off of my, my list of visiting every state, but enough about me, nobody cares, let’s talk about you. So but you do so many different things. And and I’m I’m always so interested and admiring of people who come from, you know, maybe a background where a lot of the advantages that a lot of us have have just sort of enjoyed without thinking about maybe our backgrounds as much, you know, we just sort of that’s our background. I’m always love talking to people who come from maybe a more disadvantaged background. And I don’t mean that in any sort of pejorative sense. That’s just the reality of your situation. And that and how they really break through and rise above I find that so absolutely, just inspiring and encouraging. And I’m really grateful you’re here, I would love to start at the beginning of your real estate journey, because I know you do a million other things. On top of just being a real estate agent, by the way, a top real estate agent. But tell us a little bit about why you chose real estate.
Madison Reeves 6:27
Yeah, so I guess I’ll back up a couple of years before getting my license. I actually graduated high school when I was 16. And I had this whole plan of what I was going to do. And you know, as that goes, that didn’t happen. I went to college, I did a couple semesters of that before realizing it wasn’t really for me. So I ended up dropping out. And I didn’t really know what I wanted to do. I was making like a how I don’t know, like $12,000 a year as a barista. And I was, I was very much just in the mindset of I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what the next steps are, I don’t have like a college education now is how I was raised, you have to get a college education in order to have a good job. So I discovered real estate after purchasing my first home with my ex husband. And I was like, Well, I’m not doing anything else. I kind of like this. So I’m gonna go ahead and get my license. And I got licensed in the state of South Dakota, like a month after I turned 18. And I started selling right away.
D.J. Paris 7:29
What let’s I’m gonna pause for a second because I want everyone to absorb this idea of somebody getting their license, which people can do in most states at 18. You could do it here in Illinois as well. And I imagine, you know, then you now have this arduous task of convincing people that an 18 year old knows enough to actually help them with this massive financial purchase or sale. And that in and of itself is a huge mountain to climb. So I just want to honor you for having the courage. Or maybe maybe it’s a desperation slash courage thing, but either way, the courage to follow through as an 18 year old I was, I was still like working. I mean, I was I was going to college. But I the idea of even starting a career was so far away for me, I really honor you for having the courage, but let’s talk about it. What was it like as an 18 year old to then get your license?
Madison Reeves 8:21
Yeah. So I often get asked, because, you know, I will be 21 in July. So I’m still very young. I’ve only been in this business for three years. But I get a lot of people that asked me, you know, and I focus mainly on multifamily and investments. So I worked with injectors who, you know, they’ve got a lot of money to put into real estate, and there’s just never been an issue. I’ve just never had anybody question it my age or my experience, but you just have to come with confidence and knowing what you’re doing. And I contribute a lot of that too. So backing up a little bit, I was on my first team within Keller Williams for six months. And I did about five transactions, which for six months amazing. All my sphere of influence. I liked it, but it wasn’t really the best fit for me team and culture wise. So I ended up transitioning to Christians team in April of 2020. So like, right when the world ended,
D.J. Paris 9:18
right at the perfect time.
Madison Reeves 9:19
Well, it could have gotten really bad, but luckily, you know, a pro of living in South Dakota is we never shut down. And in fact, in the real estate industry like exploded, sure, sure. Between April and the end of the year, so my first eight months on Christian’s team, I actually did 38 transactions.
D.J. Paris 9:41
So hold on, hold on, but we got to pause because to you this is like you already know all this. I want everyone to hear that. And by the way, you were what 20 At the time or a 1920 around there. I’ve just turned my team. Yeah. 19 year old doing 38 transactions in and it’s not like you didn’t grow up in a real estate firm. Amelie your sphere of influence, you have already sort of exhausted that. And by the way, who’s got a sphere of influence at 18? Nobody, so that in and of itself to do five transactions in six months, that’s amazing. And then to then go on and join a new team as a 19 year old, I’m only laughing because it’s so absurd. If you wrote that into a Hollywood movie about your life, the notes back you’d get from from the production company, you’d be like, well, that’s not believable. We’re just not we can’t do that. So really amazing.
Madison Reeves 10:27
All right. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. So yeah, I mean, it was a whole new, like, wow, okay, this is what it’s supposed to be like, I found my people, I know what I’m doing. I have the right training and the resources. But the coolest thing that happened in those eight months, while I was selling all this real estate is I discovered that I wanted to be a coach. And so in January of 2021, so last year, I transitioned into the role of sales team leader. And basically what that means is that my job is to find talent and recruit them onto the team. And I’m responsible for helping them into production. So I started in that in at the beginning of last year, and last year, I hired probably about five agents. And I did about 12 million and sales.
D.J. Paris 11:16
Of course, unbelievable. Here. And it’s amazing,
Madison Reeves 11:20
though, my goal is really to get out of production, I’ll probably do about 15 million in production this year, and then I’ll be done. So I’m going to focus just on coaching as of the end of the year, and really just finding the right people for the team expanding into other states and helping them do what I did and you know, be able to produce a lot and meet their goals they have. So
D.J. Paris 11:44
Wow, unbelievable. And you, you still can’t legally drink alcohol. That’s an amazing series of accomplishment, just just to put a just to put like a benchmark to it. I don’t mean, there’s anything about alcohol. But just the idea of that is so unbelievably mature of you. And I really, that’s I’m a bit awestruck, so congratulations on all that success. Let’s talk a little bit about and I want to back up for one moment, because you talked about working with investors, and a lot of our audience really doesn’t, doesn’t do that. They’re more traditional realtors who are you know, helping people buy and sell primary residences, most likely, however, Madison, I asked her that question earlier, and we didn’t really go back to it. I just want to follow up on it and explain why I think her answer made sense to me, but maybe not to the audience, which was, I said, it must have been tough to convince people to help them, you know, buy or sell homes when you’re so young and inexperienced. She was like, Yeah, it really wasn’t an issue, and she did a lot of multifamily investor stuff. And the reason my guess the reason why that age wasn’t a factor, really probably didn’t have as much to do with Madison’s competence or confidence, which she clearly has both. But it’s probably a lot of what investors really are looking for are the deals, they don’t really, it’s not as important to them. What the pedigree or the experience, they just want their numbers, people they want to see, they want to see the numbers and Madison went out and found amazing deals and said, Look, if you don’t, if you don’t want to invest in this, there’s lots of other people that can so am I am I on the right track with that is that why age didn’t matter as much.
Madison Reeves 13:21
I think that was definitely part of that, especially with the investors. So the reason that I love doing investment, real estate is because there’s no emotions, it’s residential real estate, they’re buying their first house or the home that they’re going to raise their kids and like it’s a big deal. But I’m in investment, real estate, even though I’m selling residential investment, and not really diving into the commercial world. But the investors don’t care facts don’t care about feelings in this world. So just looking for someone who’s going to work the nights and weekends, to run numbers on 100 different deals before we find the right one. And to just honestly shoot them straight, you know, don’t push them around or tell them things that just to make them feel better if you just tell them how it is like they a lot of people appreciate that.
D.J. Paris 14:09
Let’s also and you’re you’re a recruiter and a coach. And to me those are oftentimes one in the same in this industry. And oftentimes, it’s the managing brokers are the ones that often have to do the recruiting, and I’m somebody who does recruiting for our company, and I am not the managing broker, thankfully. And I get to devote a lot of time to that. And I know what that chat the challenges in that piece are I don’t do coaching. Thankfully, that would be something that I wouldn’t be very skilled at. But I admire that you’re doing both and I’m curious on when you’re out there. And I’m curious when you’re out there looking for talent because I think this will help a lot of the listeners who maybe are solo practitioners, it’s just them. They’re not on a team. And right now of course teams are so prominent in the news and in communities like that. seems to be where real estate is headed, and are in his heading and has been heading. And it’s very common. And so we get a lot of questions from our audience that are like, how do we go about finding the right team? Well, I’m so grateful to have you because you’re somebody that’s looking for team members. And I’m curious, of course, we want to make sure we, for anyone in your local area that we talked about if they’re interested in joining your team, how they might join you, but I would love to hear what you look for in an agent, because you also talked about developing talent. So it doesn’t necessarily, I’m the way I heard it was yes, I’m sure you’d love to have top 1% producers on exclusively on the team. But I like it sounds like you also bring on newer agents and really try to build up their production is. And so I’m curious on when you’re out there trying to look for talent to join the team. What do you look for?
Madison Reeves 15:48
Yeah, absolutely. So before I answer that question, it’s important to understand that there’s really three types of talents. So are talented people. So you have proven talent, emerging talent, or potential talent. So whenever I’m meeting with someone who goes, you know, all I’m thinking about real estate, maybe they already have their license, and they’re selling a couple of deals, but they’re doing it part time, I really like to categorize them into whether they’re you no proven emerging, or a potential talent, because it’s different for everybody. But really, what I’m looking for, what I’m looking to recruit someone to the team is somebody who has a track record of success, and doesn’t have to necessarily be in real estate. But with my age, I attract a lot of younger people naturally. And they go, Wow, Madison, look at all these things that you’re doing the opportunities that you have, like, I want to do the same thing. And that’s, that’s great, and everything, but having that, you know, when was the first time you tried to make money on your own? I actually asked that in every interview, because I get questions from, you know, I was doing a lemonade stand when I was seven or eight so that I could buy popsicles, because my mom wouldn’t give me allowance or,
D.J. Paris 16:55
you know, that counts. Right. And that’s, that’s important. Yeah,
Madison Reeves 16:58
I mean, having that entrepreneurial spirit is really important. And just making sure that they’re, you know, their, their talent, and they have, they’re willing to take ownership, they’re not, they don’t have any victim mentality. And really, the biggest one for our team is that they’re a good culture fit. Because if you can fit in with our culture, and if you work hard, we will find you the right seat on the bus. And that’s, that’s just really what it comes down to. But it’s asking the right questions, having them self develop of self discovery, I should say, of whether real estate is really right for them or not. So we have a very extensive, very extensive interview process, they go through like five or six interviews before we give them the Yes,
D.J. Paris 17:41
wow, that’s, uh, but I guess, I guess that’s really smart. Because you want to make sure they’re the right fit, you want to make sure they can handle five or six interviews, because we all know that oftentimes, especially you know, when it’s somebody who’s not in your existing sphere of influence, who may hire you to help them buy or sell a property, they might be, they might be interviewing a number of different Realtors as well, you’re probably you might be third on the call sheet for, you know, going in for a listing presentation. So this idea that they can continue to come back. And it’s almost like an indicator of can you handle five or six interviews, which is a lot. And that’s hard. For a lot of people, it’s stressful. But it’s also a great weed out system, I’m sure to say, hey, we need to make sure that you’re the right fit is we’re going to invest a lot of time and energy in you, Mr. or Mrs. Agent. And we want to make sure that that you can handle our process. And it’s not to torture them. Of course, you guys really want to make sure it’s the right fit. But that’s really interesting. I love that process. Because I’m sure there are some people that just self select out, just go, you know, this isn’t for me.
Madison Reeves 18:45
I mean, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had the first interview, and they’re like, they just don’t show the second one. All right, well, but I mean, in our interview process is set up that way. We also have a very extensive training process their first 90 days or are very full on. But the way I see it is this is a this is a hard industry, you know that I know that there are there days where we don’t want to continue to do our job, it’s difficult. And if they can’t handle five or six interviews and the training process, we put them in the first 90 days, they’re probably not going to cut it in there. And the industry and it’s it’s kind of it’s maybe comes across as a little mean or whatever, but it’s just the truth. I mean,
D.J. Paris 19:27
it is it is the truth. And I want to talk about this idea that I know is really important to you. And I want to set it up a little bit with this idea of learning how to get comfortable being uncomfortable. And I mean when I say uncomfortable, I mean uncomfortable, healthy things that we all go you know, I should be doing more of or less of x. But you may find yourself not not finding doing that because it’s uncomfortable. I met a woman, many many years ago, was a writer and she had this really interesting project For the for a year, every week, she wrote down a lot of fears and like challenges and insecurities and things that were just like, oh, I don’t do that, or I couldn’t do that, or that’s just not who I am. And she said, every week, I’m going to tackle one of these things. And I said, by the end of this year, you are going to be completely like unstoppable. Because nothing all these things, you know, if you can find the courage to step into the fire, and you know, be do a trapeze class, which was one of the things she did. And it’s not like, you’re gonna conquer your fear of heights, per se. But now you’re like, I can still do that, even though I’m terrified. I’m curious on how important it is immune again, you have done so many things at such a young age, all of which are really things that young people your age don’t do, let’s be honest, they don’t start podcasts, they don’t become top real estate agents. And they certainly don’t coach people, right? That is a very awesome thing that that I’m really proud of you only knowing you for a short time. But I’m like, wow, that is incredible. But that’s you stepping outside of your comfort zone. So I’m curious. Let’s talk about that. How important is it to learn how to step into discomfort?
Madison Reeves 21:10
Yeah, it’s I mean, it’s what I wrote my book about, my entire book about error is about getting out of your comfort zone. So with that being said, I love the way that your friend that you’re talking about did it because I kind of do the same thing. I believe getting out of your comfort zone is a muscle and the more you work a muscle, the stronger that that gets. So I try to push myself to do things that I don’t want to do. But usually, it’s things like, for example, I was in Vegas last year, and I did not want to jump off this building, but I jumped off the building because I was didn’t want to do it. You know, basically, if I ever am like, Oh, that would be kind of fun to do. And then I start thinking and get in my head and go, Oh, I don’t want to do it. Like I have to do it then. So you know, whether that’s jumping out of planes or shark diet, when you’re traveling to a different country by yourself. Like I really pushed myself out of my comfort zone in my personal life. And that builds that muscle, it makes that muscle stronger so that I translate over into business as well.
D.J. Paris 22:19
But it it’s a muscle, so it needs to be exercised often. Right? Because like, I mean, it’s okay to feel fear, right? It’s okay. It’s it’s a normal human reaction, we all feel it. Every time I go into the gym, and it’s lower body day, like leg day. I’m like, I hate this. It’s scary, it hurts. It’s the worst. And but I but I just have to do it. I don’t have to. I don’t have to, like fall in love with working out my my quads, because I don’t understand people who like that. But there are people, of course, the two, but all I have to do is do the exercise. And if I can just shut off my brain enough to go, hey, you know what, it’s healthy for you. It’s a good idea, just do it, then I get to feel proud of myself especially. And I think that’s that’s really something that doesn’t get talked about enough is the feeling of pride that you have in doing something that’s really difficult. And you are somebody that is constantly doing incredibly difficult things. Can we talk a little bit about that, even if maybe the goal doesn’t get achieved in the like, whatever the outcome you really want are, I have always been way more impressed with my own effort than the actual results because the results kind of like they either happen or they don’t. But if I can, if I can get myself just to take action, which is the hardest part. I think if you can do that, if I can do that, then I ended up going well, it might not have worked out the way I wanted to. But boy, that was hard. And I did that. And I get a little pat on the back a self pat on the back.
Madison Reeves 23:49
Right. Yeah. So I mean, I think that it just comes down to fear is a natural human emotion. And we all we all experience it quite frequently. It just It matters how you do it, how you handle it, you know, don’t let it shut you down, but let it wake you up and and the more that you do these difficult things, the more that your subconscious mind is going to go, oh, okay, I have the capability to complete all of these things. So and speaking towards like the where you’re regarding the actions, that’s actually something that I coach all of my agents on when goal setting. So we go set to things that you have in your direct control. Yeah, of course, we have an outcome that we want to get. So put this in terms that you know, real estate agents that are listening to this can understand if my outcome is to get an under contract to get a property under contract. That’s not my goal. My actual goal is to you know, have 25 Two way conversations with leads in my CRM, because you can control that. Yep. So that’s what I teach all of my agents because we’re kind of setting ourselves up for failure. If we’re goal setting things that week. can’t control, you know. So for another example would be I set a goal to write and publish my book. But I’m not the outcome, of course is I want to sell as many copies as possible, I want to be a best seller, I want to have a ton of reviews, whatever, I want it to be amazing. But my goal is writing it because I can control that. So that’s something that I teach every every agent that I work with. And I personally think that it’s very effective.
D.J. Paris 25:24
I agree. And I was thinking about a joke that I’ve right, humor, I’ve been doing that for a long time. And and some, oftentimes people will ask who know that I Right. They’ll say, oh, what’s the funniest joke? I’m not really a joke person. But say, what’s the funniest joke you ever heard? And I say, Well, I don’t know if it’s the funniest. But I like this joke, probably the most of any joke I’ve ever heard, because it’s the truest thing I’ve ever heard. And, and this isn’t a religious statement at all, it just happens to have a little bit of a religion in it. So I apologize for anyone listening who, who doesn’t like the word God, which by the way, I’m not trying to say anything other than it’s just this joke has it? So the joke is, and it’s a really simple, it’s not even really a joke. It’s, we make plans, God laughs. And I always thought that is so perfect, because it’s exactly what you’re talking about. There’s a lot of things that we just don’t control. You know, things happen, whether something goes under contract, whether it doesn’t, whether your book becomes you know, international bestseller, or it sells a modest number of copies, again, a bit outside of your control. But there are things you can do like jumping on podcasts, of course, promoting it, making sure that you’re getting your name out as best you can, which that you can you out you can control. So I always like that joke that if you can, you want to use that as the number name of your next book that that’s there’s, there’s, there’s maybe there’s a better way to say it, but I always love that joke. I want to talk about money mindset, because you are somebody who who talks about not coming from a super, you know, economically advantaged background, right? So it’s not like you grew up with all this extreme wealth, and you just know what it’s like to sell, you know, expensive homes or help people in that way, because it wasn’t your your background. How did you change your mindset to then begin to allow for like working with investors, or even just people, you know, wanting to buy or sell, you know, homes that might be different from the kind of home homes that you grew up in?
Oh, you’re muted. Sorry,
Madison Reeves 27:25
crap. Sorry. I
D.J. Paris 27:26
have like, Oh, no problem. I was like, Oh, my gosh, something just went wrong. Which by the way, that happens, too. But it didn’t. Madison accidentally muted yourself. So you heard my question, though, go right ahead.
Madison Reeves 27:37
What I said was, that’s a great question. And to put it into perspective, I actually grew up in a town of about 5500 people. I’m very small, like, everybody knows everybody, there’s no secrets. And my family grew up very poor. monetarily, we always, you know, had food on the table roof over our head and clothes on our backs. But it was definitely more of like a poor mindset when it came to money as well. what was expected of me when I was growing up and becoming an adult, was to get a job that pays, you know, 10 to $15 an hour work 40 hours a week, you know, I probably get a husband he worked to we have a couple of kids live in a, you know, a small but decent house. And like that was that was good for me. Sure. So what really changed my mindset was when I joined the real estate team I’m on now. And it was mostly because I was in in the environment with all of these people who are making so much more so much more money than I was, and we’re doing things with that money and was they were, you know, improving their lifestyle. And I’m like, okay, so I need to jump on the boat or not. And so, you know, we are the sum of the five people we spend the most time with. And I just found that being in a room of, you know, 10 people and those other 10 people are making over six figures, and I made 12 grand last year, I need to get my shit together.
D.J. Paris 29:02
And and you see that it’s possible. You’re like, Oh, now I know people who do this. And they’re doing the same thing I’m doing and maybe they’re more skilled, because I’m newer. But I can learn how to do that. Like, why couldn’t I do that? Yeah,
Madison Reeves 29:14
I mean, success is simple. It’s not easy. All you have to do is just follow the clues that people leave. You know, what they did that you want to accomplish as well. And it is quite simple. The hard part is staying consistent. And you know, doing it when you don’t see results come right away. So
D.J. Paris 29:30
I’ve always thought that was something that agents, you know, this this whole podcast that I do is really very simple. I talked to the top 1% of agents across the country and I say how’d you do that? Right? It’s a very simple concept. And I when I first started doing the show, before I actually started producing I went well the biggest challenge is going to be guests because you know people are going to be who these top producers gonna be too busy to talk. They’re not going to have time they don’t care about my stupid pie. gasps, they’re just not interested. And also they’re there. These are people I don’t hang out with, you know, we have a lot of people agents at our firm, but I don’t really go out and meet agents at other firms. And it was just the opposite. I found that some of these top almost we almost never get turned down. And it’s not because I’m so special. I’m not. But it’s just because I reached out and said, Hey, would you share your story. And I think that’s a huge lesson. For anyone listening who may be struggling. And Madison just said, it is really important thing, you know, we are maybe the average, or the sum of the five people we hang out with the most. And we’re not here to say, you need to ditch all of your friends, what we’re here to say is there are people you can emulate and hang out with. And by the way, when you ask somebody, can I take you for a cup of coffee and find out how you did that? That is a an incredibly flattering thing. And more often than not, they’re going to be so honored that you did that. And they’re going to just tell you everything they did to become successful. So I really appreciate you saying that, because getting around people who have who, especially people who started without like a sphere of influence, and people who didn’t necessarily have what a lot of people think are what you need to be successful right away. Those are people you want to hang out with and learn. But I want to also talk about how do you identify? What, because I know this is important to you? How do you identify? And as a coach, you do this a lot? Sorry, I interrupted myself twice? How do you identify what’s holding you back from success?
Madison Reeves 31:28
So? That’s a great question. I have always been very self aware, it’s probably one of my best soft skills. And it was just something I naturally developed. It definitely, it’s a muscle you can strengthen over time, the more that you use it. But I mean, I have a coach who will call me out if I need to be called out, because that’s good for everybody. So that’s a big part of it. But it’s just being really in tune with yourself and having clarity on where we’re going. If I didn’t know what my outcome was long term, short term, and the next year or five years, whatever that looks like, it’s really hard to be self aware with yourself, because you don’t know the direction you’re supposed to be following. So when I’m thinking about things that you know, if I know my direction, and if I know my, you know where I’m trying to get to, and I have real clarity on that. But I feel like I’m being held back from something, well, then all I have to do is just do some investigation to figure out what that is, and then fix it because I know where I’m going. So clarity is a huge, huge priority for me in my businesses. And it’s what I coach all of my agents because you don’t know what you don’t know. So it’s really important to really outline all that and get everything down on in black and white and on paper.
D.J. Paris 32:44
Yeah, I agree. Really well said. And I want to back up for a moment because Madison, who is a coach, also has a coach, like what do coaches need coaches? Of course they do? Of course they do, right? And it’s not because you’re young, and you’re like, Well, I’ve only been in the business a few three years, I don’t really, it’s you’ll probably have a coach when you’re 75 years old, I’m guessing because because coaches like you said they can identify our blind spots. And it’s not because you’re like not motivated. Or obviously you’re disciplined and you’re not stupid. And you’re not like I’m just gonna let someone else fix all my problems. No, you’re a take charge go get get her independent woman, by the way. And this is a I’m so glad we’re having you on during women’s history month. Just funny timing, because I think you are a great example of what what you know, not just what a woman can accomplish, but what anyone can, but I’m glad I’m talking to you this month. But I want to talk about choosing a coach and I know that you do coaching and by the way, are you interested in our audience, if your audience reaches out to you to do coaching, are you only coaching people on your team and in your immediate area?
Madison Reeves 33:56
So I do, I do have some openings for independent coaching, I only take on a few people at once, just based on my schedule. So I actually only have three openings right now. But yeah, anybody in any industry real estate or not? If they’re interested, they can absolutely reach out to me.
D.J. Paris 34:12
I love that. And let’s talk about so we talked about maybe how to identify some of the challenges and we all have challenges, it’s normal, if you didn’t have challenges, you’re lying to yourself, or you’re just unaware everyone has challenges, you’re gonna have challenges your whole life. That’s why coaches are so great. You know, it’s why therapists are so great. There’s so many professions designed to help people with their human challenges. But once we sort of figure that part of it out and sort of know ourselves a bit better, then I want to talk about choosing sort of making choices that really help you to to go in the direction that you want, despite the fact that you have challenges because we all have them. And really, I think we’re talking about mindset. I know that’s a big, big thing for you. So how do you go about staying in a mindset that is supportive to you, especially in those moments where things aren’t going well.
Madison Reeves 35:06
Yeah, that’s a great question. So really, it’s funny that you brought this up, because this topic is exactly what I talked about in my first episode that I’ve published for my podcast. So I’ll you know, you want to listen to it and dive deeper into it. But basically, where it comes into is your big why? Why do you do what you do every single day, if you don’t know what motivates you, then it’s really easy to you know, get held up when there’s big challenges or objections, it’s easy to you know, I don’t want to lead generate today, because it’s boring. And I don’t want to be told no or hung up on, you know, or I don’t want to do this showing all of that crap that we all deal with, we all hear that it’s our drunk monkey on our shoulder. But if we know where we’re going, and why we’re doing it, we have that clarity there, there’s a lot of power in it. So I talk a lot about this in the first episode of my podcast, actually, which worked out perfectly for timing wise. But there’s this Japanese theory basically, where your calling and your big why’s basically the intersection of what you love, what you’re great at what the world needs and what you can get paid for. So that’s really your big why. And if you can discover that, and lead with that and make decisions in your business and your lifestyle with that. I found at least that I don’t have the mindset of oh, I don’t want to do that today. Because I’m I’m working for something bigger than myself.
D.J. Paris 36:30
Yeah, it’s more than the current challenge that’s right in front of you at that moment, right. So like, I can think about it in relationship, it’s easy for me, I’m in a relationship, to get mad at my girlfriend, if she does something or says something that I don’t like. And we all struggle with these parts of relationships, right? It’s easy for me to be like, Oh, you said this, or you did this or and we can do that back and forth? Of course. And yeah, fine, whatever. Is it productive? Probably not. But it’s easy to do it when there’s this immediate problem that were challenged. This actually just came up this morning, we had a slight disagreement. So I’m just like, I’m getting all upset. And then I and then I had to take a breath. And I had to say, what’s my long term goal here, oh, I want to marry this person. And I want to spend the rest of my life with them. And they’re like the most amazing person I’ve ever met. So even though in the immediate moment, I’m struggling with this, you know, interaction, which is like no big deal, but in the moment, it feels like everything. And then or, you know, the client hangs up on you, or whatever the deal falls through, or whatever your struggles are, and then you go back to Okay, yeah, bumps in the road happen. But this is the most amazing person I’ve ever met. And that helps reset. So I’m curious on how you reset when you’re in that you know, your why. And do you have any techniques about going back to your why in those moments of like extreme hardship, where you’re like, oh, that’s just not working? Yeah, absolutely.
Madison Reeves 37:53
So that’s, that’s another great question. So this is actually a technique that my my coach shared with me. So basically, when we face problems, we need to get ahead of myself. So we’re looking at two scales, I want you to imagine that we have a scale over here from one to 10, and a scale over here from one to 10. Now, this scale over here is my level of mindset. And my commitment to my big why. So let’s say just for example, sake, on a scale of 110, or one to 10. On this side, I’m a six. If my problem is an eight, when I have a six, it’s going to feel like the world is ending. But if a problem is a two, when I’m a six, it’s not even a bump in the road. So basically, what my what my business coach taught me is that you need to continue to move yourself up on this scale, that these problems become smaller.
D.J. Paris 38:44
So in my example of getting upset with like, I hate to say this, because if she listened, she’s gonna be so upset that I’m airing our grievances, but really, it’s no big deal. We’re doing I hope we’re doing good. But now we know I’m teasing. I’m teasing. But no, I would never I would never, if we were really having problems it would not be talked about on the show, but but I’m using it as example because it came up but here’s, here’s what you really just just said to me, I get your mindset in order first. And that’s the part we can control. I can’t control if someone says something crappy to me, or if my girlfriend’s having a bad day and just kind of you know, has a bad moment. Of course, that’s those moments are going to happen. But in this case, I hadn’t got my mind set in the right spot before that happened, because I didn’t think to do that. And had I had woken up in the morning and for 20 seconds gone. Remember this amazing person lying next to you like this is the person who wants to spend the rest of her life with me, like how lucky am I and that might have helped shoulder some of this. This this particular interaction we had hours later. So what we’re really talking about is that’s what you can control you can control waking up and putting yourself in the right mindset, but you have to go first right
Madison Reeves 40:00
Yes, absolutely, you know, if you’re a two on this one, and you get a five, I mean, it literally feels like the world is ending. So and it could be something so simple, but you don’t have the skills and the knowledge and the mindset to be able to deal with that. So it feels like, you know, you’re trying to climb up Mount Everest here.
D.J. Paris 40:16
I just last night, I have to I have to share this. I’m so sorry. I feel like I’m hijacking our interview. But I think this will be really helpful because it blew my mind i I’m in a DBT class. And if people don’t know what that is, it’s it’s, it’s called dialectical behavior therapy. And I’m very fortunate to be in this course, it’s very hard to get into them right now. They’re, it’s very popular. It’s basically considered the gold standard in emotional regulation and mindfulness. And it’s a skill set. It’s not therapy, in the traditional sense of lying on a couch and talking about your life. It’s just learning skills. And we learned a skill last night that absolutely blew my mind. It’s so simple, and I won’t go into it. But it’s called cope ahead. And what I loved about it, the idea is that you can sort of fantasize or imagine what situations which will be difficult. And we all know in real estate, every transaction, there’s there’s a wrinkle, there’s at some point, something goes wrong. And it seems like the end of the world. And so we’re talking about mindset, right? So this idea that you can even fan I just fantasize isn’t the right word. But you can imagine he could vividly imagine, there’s something that is going to go wrong in every part of your life at some point. And you can’t predict when that is or what that is, but you can be honest about it and say, Hey, I’ve got this really big sale right now. And it’s everything’s going smooth. But at some point, there’s going to be a problem. And that’s just how things go. And I’m going and so we learned this skill last night called cope ahead, where you can vividly imagine yourself going through something that’s going to suck, it’s going to suck to get that call that says, You know what, I don’t want to work with you anymore, or whatever. And you can do your best to go, okay, how am I going to react? And you can actually imagine yourself as the person and it isn’t. What’s so great about it is it’s not a sort of a losers mentality. It’s being honest and saying things are gonna go wrong? And how do I give myself the best possible mindset so that when it happens, like you were saying, it’s a two, as opposed to a nine, because I’ve already prepared in advance of what what what resources I need, in order to to be able to handle that when it happens. And then like you’re saying, it’s not as big of a deal. So I apologize for going on a bit of a rant there. No, and
Madison Reeves 42:22
that actually plays perfectly into what I wanted to mention next is the more that you build and grow your mindset, you’re continuing to work that logical problem solving muscle, and as you know, kind of a repeating theme of today’s conversation. But to be honest with you, I actually like enjoy those problems. It’s kind of weird, but you know, when I get a phone call on a transaction, and it’s like, okay, well, this is probably going to be an issue. I’m like, alright, well, I like to solve the problems. So I don’t even see it as like a really big issue anymore. Because I know that I have the skill set and the mindset in order to handle whatever comes my way.
D.J. Paris 43:00
Because you practice having the mindset that allows you to handle those situations. And it like any other muscle that you were saying it gets stronger, and things become less important, because you realize they’re all just blips in the road, there’s there’s peaks, there’s valleys, I win some I lose some it all just happens. And instead of looking at the garden, saying there’s no weeds, there’s no weeds, there’s no weeds, it’s like no, the weeds will take over, if you don’t acknowledge them. And what you’re saying is I it’s not that my life is perfect, or I want it to be perfect, because that’s silly. But this idea that my life is manageable, I can handle the imperfections of life. And that is the real in my mind, that’s the most important skill set anybody can have. It’s the best thing you can do for mindset. And your book teaches people how to do that. I want to remind everyone, if you’re not that you’re just tuning in now, but remind everyone Madison has a book that tells you all about this. And, you know, you might think well, gosh, she’s 20 years old, what is she? What kind of Wisdom does she have, she has enough wisdom to have written an amazing book that has amazing reviews, she has a publicist, she’s a real estate coach, she’s on one of the most successful teams in the state. And she goes out recruiting talent, and probably you don’t probably even meet a lot of people who are as young as you in this industry. So check out her book, which is called Project badass, can find out on Amazon everywhere else and her brand new podcast, which is called also project badass, which you can visit project badass network.com And I want to ask you one last question. So this question is, what’s one piece of advice that you would have for our audience? Again, some of them are top producers. Some of them are brand new and or people who are struggling in between? What’s one piece of advice that you would say if you were coaching our entire audience, which are all different people? What’s one universal piece of advice that you find really works for everybody?
Madison Reeves 44:56
Yeah, absolutely. That’s a great question. So um, The biggest shift in my business as a real estate agent, was when I started to think like a business owner and not just a real estate agent. So real estate agents get in this habit where they are just focusing on the next deal. What’s the next deal? What’s the next deal versus thinking of it as the CEO who is working on developing a successful full scale business? So you know, what does that look like I have systems in place, I know my numbers, I know what I need to do and what I need to produce in sales, I know where I’m going, I have that clarity piece of where I want to end up. And I’m really treating my real estate business like a business and not just, you know where the next deal is. And the reason that is so important is because when you shift over to that business owner mindset versus just a real estate agent, we’re really more in an abundance mindset. So we’re not worried about the deal that falls apart, or the one you know, the for sale by owner who hangs up on you, or the expired listing who wants to take a different agent, we’re not worried about that, because we see the bigger picture, and we know where we’re going, that would be my biggest piece of advice.
D.J. Paris 46:05
I love that. And it really, again, distances you from the immediacy of any challenge, when you have that sort of long term vision. And again, I always think direction is so important, it’s like I just want to head in this direction. And that might be your vision, whereas I don’t know where I’m gonna end up. But I’m heading in this direction, it’s a very specific direction, I love direction. And if, if you’re heading in a direction, yes, that’s gonna fly at you all the time. That’s just part of the deal. And this, so I, I love every, every part of your messaging today. And the fact that you are this clear about how to help people at such an early age of your life is maybe the most incredible part of it all is that most people I know, I didn’t have it figured out before I turned, oh, God, I don’t know, mid 30s, maybe. So this idea that you you have a huge jump is really amazing. And I am really excited to follow your trajectory and your growth, you know, over the years, because you’re not done evolving, as well. And so I’m very excited if you’ve done all of this, by by your current, you know, your early age. And I don’t mean to say that with any sort of neg negative, it’s just very unique. And I honor you for that. So I want everybody to really check out what Madison is up to project badass network.com is where you can go to learn about the book, the podcast, this, you know, I’m sorry,
Madison Reeves 47:32
that coaching if they are interested in coaching with me, it’s on my website as well.
D.J. Paris 47:36
Yeah. And could you mind sharing your email address for anyone out there who wants to just reach out directly to you? Do you have an email that that they can meet? That sort of I communicate with you that way?
Madison Reeves 47:47
Yeah, absolutely. So the best place to reach out email would probably be Hello at to the Madison reeves.com.
D.J. Paris 47:55
Awesome. So check out project badass, the podcast go by the book. And this is somebody who is I mean, she’s already a superstar, and she’s going to be going on to do bigger things. And she’s going to be helping a lot of people along the way. So you want to hitch your wagon, to somebody that is all about helping because that is just you know, the most important thing I found in life is having supportive people in my orbit, who say I know how to help you with that if assuming you want to be helped. And Madison is devoting a good chunk of her life to doing just that. So if you’re looking for a coach, she’s an amazing person. If you’re in the South Dakota area, state and you’re looking for a team to join, she wants to talk to you as to like it’s Christians, Team real estate with Keller Williams. I mean, what’s better than Keller Williams right, Gary Keller, he’s the he’s the king, and you get all of their training, and, of course, all of Madison’s help along the way. So definitely check them out as well, Madison, I am so, so grateful to have you on the show today. You’re amazing inspiration. And I’m excited to be able to introduce you to our audience. So thank you. On behalf of our audience. Thank you for spending time today. I know you don’t have time to do this. So thanks. And also on behalf of Madison and myself, we want to thank our audience for continuing to listen watch support our show. So after you’re done subscribing to our podcast and buying her book, one, two things we ask you to do one, tell a friend about this episode. Best way to do that, just send them a link to our website, keeping it real pod.com. And every one of our episodes can be streamed right there. Or if they’re a podcast person, just pull up a podcast app search for keeping it real, hit that subscribe button. And then last, please leave us a review. Whatever podcast app you might be listening to us on. Let us know what you think of the show. You don’t have to give us a five star review if you don’t want to but we hope you do. But let us know good and bad. We want to continue to improve the show is for our audience and any information you can provide us will help us continue to get better. So thank you so much Madison, we’re honored to speak to you and we wish you continued success.
Madison Reeves 49:55
Awesome. Thank you
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