John and Andrea Richardson: A Winning Psychology

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John Richardson  0:34  

This is John Richardson with REMAX unlimited of Ponte Vedra, Florida. If you're looking to improve your real estate business, you need to be listening to the real estate excellence podcast with my good friend Tracy Hayes.

Podcast Intro  0:44  

Welcome to Real Estate excellence making lasting connections to the best of the best in today's industry, elite. We'll help you expand your circle of influence by introducing you to the leaders in the real estate industry, whether it's top agents who execute at a high level every day, or the many support services working behind the scenes, we'll share their stories, ideologies and the inner workings of how they run a truly successful business, and show you how to add their tools to your belt now. Please welcome the host with the most Tracy Hayes,

Tracy Hayes  1:16  

Hey, welcome back to The Real Estate excellence podcast. Your host. Tracy Hayes, each episode, I search out top producers in Northeast Florida real estate markets to be on the show. Recently, this guest came under my radar. He hails from Ocean City. His wife hails from Georgetown, Kentucky, from what I understand, he runs like the wind, and he is fit as one can see, as possibly as both they are. Both are great runners and triathletes successful real estate business in Naka T Florida, and we will learn as his family just returned to Chattanooga for a triathlon with his wife Andrea, and came in, just came in second, which is an amazing feat, as I'm sure there was some top people there. Let's welcome love the Florida life. John Richardson of re Max, unlimited to the show.

John Richardson  2:03  

Thanks, Tracy. I'm really excited to be here, and happy to be here with Andrea. This is an exciting time. Yes, our family. It's really fun. Well, I'm

Tracy Hayes  2:09  

glad to kick it off, because you guys are we'll talk about you guys joining forces here a little bit, and her joining your team and her retiring from education. We certainly want to do. I apologize. I botched my entire intro there, a little bit. I tried to write it the day before, which I did, I think I did write it yesterday, and more information came to my head, and that was going through my mind as I was reading that.

John Richardson  2:28  

So I think you nailed it, yeah, I think.

Tracy Hayes  2:32  

But I want to talk about a little bit your background, which I imagine. You grew up in Ocean City, but you went to University of Kentucky. What sent you there? Because I imagine is that where you guys met. Where you guys met? I imagine,

John Richardson  2:44  

yes, yes, yeah. So I grew up in Ocean City New Jersey, like you said, it's a shore town. If anybody's not familiar with it, it's in Cape May County. So like the furthest southern point in New Jersey, that's barrier island. It reminds me a lot of Ponte Vedra Beach. Actually, for those local that know Ponte vra Beach, Ocean City, New Jersey is pretty similar, except that it's very touristy. It's, you know, the main industry and time there is the summer. So most of, like, my childhood development centered around my summers. That's kind of like how we counted things, right? Like, oh, that was fifth grade summer. That was sixth grade summer. Yeah, you know, it was real coming of age type stuff. But living there, I think, shaped my personality. I have probably, like, a beach culture type personality. There's Punta feature time, right? There's like, Ocean City time, there's Island time. There's Island time. Everything moves a little bit slower. People tend to be a little bit more even keel. But also something about ocean city that I think helped shape me is that it's very entrepreneurial. A lot of my friends families owned small businesses. My grandfather was an entrepreneur. He owned a business on the boardwalk. And like, kids work early on. Like, that was just part of it. When you turned 14, you got a job. So I got a job young like, as soon as I was able in the state of New Jersey, let kids work. My parents were like, Oh, get a job.

Tracy Hayes  3:46  

John. So that is so interesting, because I grew up on Cape Cod, okay, and it's exactly the same. It was Labor Day to Memorial. I mean, Memorial Day to Labor Day. And my parents were entrepreneurs. We 14 years old. Well, besides mowing lawns before that, at 14 years old, my first job was working sport Tracy, votes, same exact you were just describing to God,

John Richardson  4:07  

yeah, I bet it's pretty similar, probably up and down the eastern seaboard, that there's like an inherent hustle, kind of in the local people, because you have such a small window of time to make, like, your whole year's salary, right? It's like you have to wake up, you can't take days off. And I think that part of me manifested a strong work ethic, and then from like, an attitude perspective, like, you know, just a lot of gratitude for the ocean. Like, when you look at the ocean every day of your life, you're gonna have like, this sense of, man, I'm, like, a small, insignificant part of this big thing, and an additional thing with, like, growing up near the ocean was just very orientating that, like, hey, that's East. I know that's East. I know that's the ocean. It's hard to explain. I think, unless somebody has lived at the ocean, what that kind of does? I agree. But to get to Lexington, Kentucky, I mean, that was a completely like, yeah,

Tracy Hayes  4:51  

that is, he's talking like, where? How'd you get the Lexington? How did you

John Richardson  4:56  

get there? A recruited track athlete? And when I turned. After my the junior year of high school, July 1 is when coaches can start calling. And my mom said, if any if a coach is going to take the time to call you, you need to at least take the time to listen to what they have to say and then be polite enough to tell them if you're not interested in their school. Yeah. So University of Kentucky called, and abiding by my mom's wishes, I took the phone call and loved the coach. I mean, he was fantastic from the get go. He was very consistent with his recruiting calls. The team was very good. And I wanted to go to a big school. I wanted to go to, like, big time athletics. The SEC was great. And, you know, academics were a part of what I wanted to do, but athletics was the primary, primary focus, and Kentucky had that. So I went there on a visit, and it was awesome. I'll be honest, I didn't think that I was going to stay there after college, right? That wasn't part of my plan to live in Kentucky. But when you fall in love, things happen. And I'm blessed to have fallen in love with Andrea, who's from there, and we lived there for quite a while, curiosity.

Tracy Hayes  5:52  

I mean, competing at that level of sport and being recruited by, you know, big division one schools a little easier today for kids to go and do some research on the coach and so forth. You'll hear say. Why? You know, a friend of mine, his daughter, goes to IMG over in Sarasota. She just committed to Florida for soccer. One of the things is they just got a new girl soccer coach that has high regards at that time. What kind of research can you do to find out, I assume you probably tried to do find out about this coach more than what he was just talking to you about.

John Richardson  6:25  

Yeah, it doesn't seem like that long ago, but then I do the math, oh my gosh, 20 years ago, it seems like just yesterday, and technology has certainly changed. And you know, this is before high speed internet and stuff, but there still was, like, the internet, like, I mean, I saw results, but the main thing I remember doing is reading media guides. So like, actual printed books would get mailed to my house, and I looked through it, and, you know, I remember going through the Kentucky media guide multiple times and being like, Okay, this is so and so he's run this race. He's only a junior, so when I'm a freshman, he'll be a senior, and really kind of doing the math of what the team's going to look like. And then also, there's just a whole lot of trust you put in the coach. And our communication at that point was probably different than it is now, because there was no now, because there was no text messaging. I don't think we were allowed to text message, nor was that even really like a popular thing. There was, yeah, very little email, even it was all communication on the phones, right? So it wasn't face to face. Obviously that wasn't a thing, but we talked quite often. And I don't know, I can't speak for how kids are recruited now, but I imagine that's probably a lost art is the actual like voice to voice communication, so you

Tracy Hayes  7:23  

felt comfortable with them, and then you went and made a visit and fell in love with Lexington.

John Richardson  7:27  

Yeah, Lexington is a great city. I definitely have fond memories of going to school there, living there. It's a great college town, great economy, great schools, great people.

Tracy Hayes  7:36  

Yeah, all right, so let's we're gonna flip over here, this lovely lady over here, Andrew, you're coming from Georgetown, Kentucky, which going to University of Kentucky is probably just a natural progression.

Andrea Richardson  7:47  

Oh yeah. It was definitely, like, my dream growing up, like I have pictures when I was growing up, like in the UK, right? Yeah, cheerleading outfit, football jersey, and just, it was definitely a dream to go there. My mom also went there, and her grand, her father went there. So I'm so happy that John came all this way. Never would have met him. I feel like it was destiny for me to go there.

Tracy Hayes  8:08  

So did you guys, like, meet right away? Or, I mean, you guys roughly the same, you guys in the same

Andrea Richardson  8:12  

so no, I was a walk on. My story is very different than John. So I was from Kentucky, dreamed of going to Kentucky, was able to walk on to the team and track team. And when I was a freshman, he was a junior, oh, he had already had some success. And, yeah,

Tracy Hayes  8:29  

so he was going after, okay, I think we all do that. So, and now your degree, you went after, was that your goal? Like, going in, is you, you were an education major. I was an education major. I mean, was that your just initial thing? Hey, I go to school and become a school teacher. That was your plan.

Andrea Richardson  8:46  

Yeah, my mom and my grandmother also were school teachers. So I definitely have, you know, a passion for serving children and love children. So that was my goal. And I went ahead and majored in education, got a master's degree in reading education, and worked in Lexington for 10 years as a teacher. So we're gonna,

Tracy Hayes  9:06  

I'm gonna fast forward your story a little bit, and obviously, if you want to add something in the middle there. So recently, obviously you're here. You decided,

Andrea Richardson  9:15  

did you a couple years here in Florida? Yes, I taught for two years here, two years here in

Tracy Hayes  9:19  

Florida, and now John's business is growing and so forth. What was it? And I asked this question, because we get going from education to real estate is actually very common, and there's a lot of former teachers in real estate and doing very well. What was it? Do you think that, from your standpoint, was a burnout, or is it just simply opportunity for you guys as a family, what helped you say, You know what? This is probably going to be a better path for us. I'm going to I can step out of teaching. Not that you can't

Andrea Richardson  9:48  

go, No, yeah, no, it definitely wasn't burnout, per se. I think I was ready for a change, but I think I would have just done a different position. You know, in my school, I love my school, nothing. I mean, I still love it. My kids still go. There, right? But it was definitely a family decision to help our family. And he was in a position where he was doing so well, and had the opportunity to hire, you know, have some help, so it made sense that way, and also just building something together, I think, is kind of what's driven to me. Yeah, exciting, yeah, like helping him, and like fueling that, like our family and our business together is, is what my kind of drive part, we

Tracy Hayes  10:24  

dabble in to the working together here, eventually, in my second half of the show, because I've had a few couples on that, you know, obviously, there's a lot of couples that could not work together, you know, and then go home at night, there's some that I've met. Man, they just, they're, one's the visionary, one's the integrator, and they just work hand in hand. We're to dabble into that. And this is all new for you, because you're studying to get your license. This is you just, you know what, three or four months you've been kind of working with them full time since school ended in May, or,

Andrea Richardson  10:54  

yeah, June, yeah. And school ended in June, or first of June, and that was kind of when I wasn't going to go back to teaching, but you have two young children. So really, this summer was more. Was more like a normal summer for me, like just being home with the kids, and so that was actually quite

Tracy Hayes  11:10  

how the fall comes around. Yeah, go back to work. I

Andrea Richardson  11:13  

haven't really gotten to jump in as much this summer as I probably would have had the you know, had it been done the school year, right? So really, this August is really when, well,

Tracy Hayes  11:24  

since you brought up the kids to tell us a little bit about the ages, how were we at there?

Andrea Richardson  11:28  

We have two daughters, Reese and Rory, and they're in second and first grade. So seven and six. They're very close, best friends. It's fun. Love going to Disney World. That's our thing. That's their perfect age. We go there all you love living here. We love being so close. We go there.

Tracy Hayes  11:44  

Often, awesome, awesome. All right, so now, John, you flip my camera here. You were a psychology major. What was your was that just a choice by default? You know, you were focused on the track, or actually, did you see something in psychology that was a possible career path. What was your initial career thoughts?

John Richardson  12:05  

Well, the NCA says that I have to choose a major, and it can't be track and field. So psychology was a good why, you know, like social sciences kind of opened up to lots of different things, and I didn't want to be a psychologist, necessarily, but I was fascinated by the brain, and I've always had a deep fascination with personal development and like concepts that have to do with self so psychology was a pretty you know, was in line with what I thought was interesting, and I knew I was going to go to graduate graduate school eventually, whether it be business school or something, I knew that, like, it wasn't going to stop there. So psychology, it was, and it afforded me the opportunity to really focus on track while I was in school. It wasn't as academically demanding as maybe some other majors, but it also was interesting to me, which was an important

Tracy Hayes  12:47  

thing as well. Yeah. I mean, you got to be engaged. Okay. Here, this is the deep thought question. I'm a David Goggins fan. Watched his or read his book, or sure if you watched his, you know, he has many YouTube videos and so forth. Both of you are runners at a very high level. You're beyond just Tommy. Obviously, both are in track and field, but you accomplish doing the mile in under four minutes. There's a psychology in that how, like you're training and so forth, or even why you're doing that, and then Andrea being you're just doing the triathlon. There's a psychology of overcoming your brain telling you, hey, you've had enough stop, or you're pushing yourself through that. Give us a little bit of what you guys go through. And John, I'll start with you. Then Andrew, you know you, you were obviously what? 10 days ago, eight days ago, yeah. And I want to, I really love for you to share with us, like, a couple points during the race. I'm sure you were like, why am I doing this right? That had to go through your mind. But John, like the psychology of the sports, and I'm used to being a psychology major and working with the brain and overcoming it in relating it having to do with business, because there's so many times I'm sure we get up in the morning and we're like, why are we doing with this? I can go just get a nine to five job. Why am I, you know, pushing myself? How do you relate the sports to what you're doing now and motivate you each day?

John Richardson  14:14  

Yes, a great question. And I think high level athletes are high achievers in other areas of life as well. Like, the things that make them high level athletes aren't necessarily, they're the fastest, the you know, have the best muscles that they have the most quickness, or, like, the athleticism, right? It's that up here in their mind, they're different and they're wired different. And I don't think I had an appreciation of, like, my own like, kind of the way I'm wired. It's a combination of, like, how I was born plus how I was raised. I have great parents who instilled an awesome work ethic in me, who pushed me right. Like, my dad didn't let me get away with not trying my best, and he would call me out on it, and, like, love him for a lot of reasons, but especially for that, because it's transcended into not just a successful, athletic life, but also my business life, and I'm a better father because of him. But where I'm going with that is that, like. I was just that way. Like, I don't think that I saw it in myself the same way that maybe I see it in Andrea. Like, I know that she is so mentally tough, and I can see that on her, but like, I'm probably that same way. It's just something that I've taken for granted. You know, I just kind of, I view it as who I am. And so those days where I don't feel like going to the pool to swim, or I don't feel like prospecting, or I don't feel like doing x right? Like, I just tell myself, Hey, that's not who you are. Like. You are a person that likes hard work. You are a person that will grind. You are a person who's going to be successful no matter what. And developing that sense of like, Who you are is way more important than a why. So I know there's like, a personal development concept about like, know your why. I think it's much more important to

Tracy Hayes  15:41  

know your who, know your why, and it sounds like and clarify this for me, a lot of positive self talk. It's not me. I'm better

John Richardson  15:48  

than that. Yeah. I think it's a combination of, like, positive self talk, but really just positive talk, right? It need to be self talk like, I like to view things optimistically.

Tracy Hayes  15:57  

I call self talk like, what's we're not verbally saying it, but we're thinking it, yeah.

John Richardson  16:01  

Just like, processing positive thoughts, right? It's easier to process negative thoughts, but it's like, a much like, crappier outcome when you do it that way. So just like, do a little bit of work on the front end, and, like, train yourself to be positive, to think, like, no matter what happens, things are happening for you. If you're stuck in traffic, like, Hey, you're it's happening for you, not against you. If you're, like, stubbed your toe, like, okay, that happened for me. I'm gonna figure out a way to make this way to make this better so I don't know

Tracy Hayes  16:24  

that, and go circle it back into real estate. And what we have to do, obviously, in my business, to prospecting all the time you're making those calls, and just because someone says, No, I'm not interested, it's not you, it's not you there or they hang you know, we hang up on telemarketing calls all the time you're making they're just not ready at that time. No one buys a house every other day, you've got to be available every day to hopefully, you know when those people are available that you are on top of their mind. So you're making those calls, and when they say no to you, it's not they're not saying no because they don't like John. They're just saying, Hey, I'm not ready to buy, I'm not ready to sell, and not looking to buy, invest right now, I'm just yeah and move on. I think a lot of people, you know, we like to think the no calls that call reluctancy, yeah. I think

John Richardson  17:10  

one of the hardest parts about entrepreneurship, and you know, this is a real estate podcast, so we'll say the hardest part about real estate is that there's a such a low barrier to entry that I think the perception is that it can be easy, but there's such a high barrier to success, yes, and that high barrier to success comes with a lot of rejection. It comes with a lot of, like, exposure, emotionally, right? Like, you're putting yourself out there, offering to help, and very few people take you up on it, because, like, you said, like, not everybody buys a house all that often, but you can still add value all the time, right? Like, I don't like want to measure success by closed deals. Like, I want to measure success by just adding value. If I can do that every day. Like, that every day, like, I'm going to be happy. And eventually, you know, add enough value

Tracy Hayes  17:46  

that you'll sell some help. It's that giving mindset you're going to give. And then, you know, obviously, when they are ready to to, they need to take, they're going to call for you, right? For your

John Richardson  17:54  

assistant, yeah, give freely. And then, you know, that's the Go Giver concept. All right,

Tracy Hayes  17:58  

Andrew, let's step over to you All right, so for those who are, and this was not, this is a true Iron Man, right? Is that my this? So we're biking, what, 80 miles.

Andrea Richardson  18:09  

So you swim, first, swim first. Two and a half, 2.4 Yeah, okay. And then bike 112 this one was 116 in Chattanooga. It's one that's a little longer, right? And then a marathon, so 26.2 at the end.

Tracy Hayes  18:20  

And John was doing the camera work on this. I was getting the snippets coming through Instagram, and that last half mile, or whatever, is actually a slight incline on a bridge, right, a walking bridge, or whatever it was. And he showed you there. And I'm mentally, yeah, of course. Mentally, you're like, oh, like, 30 more seconds. I'm done with this. But tell us about the psychology that's going through your mind and different time periods of the swim. Yeah. I mean, what is your strengths? What do you love doing? Oh, definitely running.

Andrea Richardson  18:55  

I mean, that's obviously a background. So I obviously, and it's a huge advantage in triathlon, because it's always the last thing. It's always like the hardest thing. So feeling confident in the run is great, except for it's still always the hardest, you know, but this was my first Ironman, right? I saw John do this Iron Man last year, and I was inspired, and knew that I wanted to do that. And so after the swim, you feel real good. I was smiling. It's only an hour in, you know, I came out of the water happy and feeling great. And then I remember crying after the bite, just having some tears, and just so happy tears that I was getting off the bike, so so sad that I had to run a marathon to run a marathon after so there's, you know, in it's weird, you just go through it. It's, you know, it's, it was took me 10 hours. So in 10 hours, you have, like, such high highs and such low lows. It's almost like, you know, five or six different workouts, like you start over, you know, and you, you know, just keep going.

Tracy Hayes  19:47  

Just gotta keep going. What do you or so? What do you say to yourself when you feel you all of a sudden, your mind starts to focus on the pain, right? Yeah. How do you change your mind there? Yeah.

Andrea Richardson  20:00  

Pleasure. It's a lot of a lot of different tricks in your tool belt, you know, like, you guys have a lot, because it's a long a lot of times I think about, you know, training and how, you know, how confident I should be, like, I'm ready. I can do this. A lot of times I would look, I remember always thinking, like, when's the next time I'm going to see, you know, John and my kids? Like, when's the next time I'm going to be able to see them and, like, smile, and they'll be cheering. You know, that kind of fueled me. I also prayed a lot, you know, like,

Tracy Hayes  20:24  

there was a moment John took a picture of the kids standing there on the side of the road while you were running by. And I told John, that was, that's a precious moment right there, because mom's running the race. And how does that look like? Does that like give you a little adrenaline? Absolutely.

Andrea Richardson  20:38  

Oh, yeah. I mean, we tell our kids all the time, like, hard things are good things. You know, if it's the hard thing, it's probably the better choice. Like, usually the hardest thing is the best thing. And they see, you know, they've seen John do the Iron Man last year. And they see, you know, we've focused a lot on that, and having me do it, I think just because they're both girls, right? I think it's, I mean, it's valuable to me to show them that. And I think that they were so happy for me, and it made me feel so good. So I hope that they remember that.

Tracy Hayes  21:04  

So give us you came in second of the women, but you were, I think, if I read correctly, like 40 something overall,

Andrea Richardson  21:12  

yeah, so the men and women are different divisions, so I did much better than I thought, which is so amazing. And then the top runner in every age group. So I was second overall, but I was first in my age group qualifies to go to the World Championship Ironman, which is in Kona, Hawaii. So that was such a great one that's on TV, yeah, the big one, it's, like, the holy grail of triathlon, and we talked about it, you know, kind of as, like, like, that would be cool one day to do that. So, so, yeah, so I'm going,

Tracy Hayes  21:40  

isn't there like, a part of that race where you're, like, on the

Andrea Richardson  21:44  

lava field? Yeah, the bikes the lava fields? Yeah, it actually is happening this weekend, like this year's World Championships this weekend, so I qualified for next year. So joy. Tracy, yeah,

Tracy Hayes  21:56  

but you go in, so to go back to the point where, again, and I'm kind of reaching you guys dig deep at that to dig into when you're out there doing business, you don't want to make the calls. If your door knocking is your thing, whatever is your thing. And you're you wake up in the morning with the just, Hey, do I should I work out? You know, Shelly Florence was on here from Compass. She says, if she doesn't have her morning workout, she has a badge. That's her thing. So she knows she has to get up and go, yo, go do that at five, six o'clock in the morning, whatever time she gets. And that's important to her. And it's the mental thing to overcome the brain. Am I right? John? Is that you have to change what you're the mindset?

John Richardson  22:35  

Yeah, it's, you know, it's non negotiable in a lot of ways, right? Like, that's like, what's an example? Say somebody's like, you know, I don't feel like getting out of bed today, but, like, most people will get out of bed. Nobody actually just stays in bed all day, right? Right? Like, but they have that feeling, right? I have a feeling I don't want to go the pool, but, like, I know I'm going to, so I don't just put a positive spin on it and say, Oh, I get to go the pool today. I can't wait. Like, right? Because as soon as that goes away, like, if I had a foot injury and I couldn't run, I would be dying to run. Like, if I couldn't get in the pool because my shoulder was hurting, like, I would be so miserable, right? So just reframing it that like, Oh, what an opportunity that God blessed me with the health that I can go do this right for me, that's like, such an easy switch.

Andrea Richardson  23:12  

I was thinking, like, training for the Iron Man, and like, life, how it kind of correlates is, you don't finish an Iron Man. You don't get to do an Ironman on that day. It's like, all the work leading up to it is the reason why you're able to do it. And that's kind of, I've seen John working in real estate from the outside, and it's like, he's not like, you know, the one payday, like, the Commission doesn't come like, it's a huge

Tracy Hayes  23:33  

you have to enjoy the journey. Yeah, that has to be you have to enjoy the journey. To tip it off with actually having a race and finishing and, yeah, everyone being there is great, but you're not there for the payday. You're there because you enjoy the journey, right? And you hear the cake, yeah? All right, we can go on forever, but John, you enter corporate America in the health field and listen. And I obviously stole a lot of this from your podcast you did last week from that standpoint. But you if I sum, if I didn't sum it up and correct me, if I'm wrong or clarify it, you really weren't seeing a satisfaction there. Yeah, you think that's a fair way in corporate America, which I think a lot of people do. Some people just keep doing it because they just don't have the option. There's others to break out and do real estate among or open their own business while being a real estate agent is opening your own but, but, you know, go do something that's theirs from that standpoint. But what was it about corporate America that was kind of just laws to say, where are you out? You probably have a better description. What point just say, you know, hey, you know, I just gotta do something. I want to do something

John Richardson  24:37  

for me. Yeah, I don't know that it's anything about corporate America. It's more about me. So like, corporate America is great for a lot of people, and it was great for me for a long time. Like Tracy, if I'm being honest, I worked at for a great company. I had great bosses, I had great co workers. Like, I really can't say that anything about it wasn't that good. All I can say is that for me, I always felt this longing and this calling for adventure, and I. Had, I didn't know it was entrepreneurship. I didn't know what it was, except that I had always had, like, a side hustle, or something else that I was doing to kind of, like fueling entrepreneurship. And then within the corporate world, like I was having progressive management experience, I was getting pay raises, I was getting compliments, things that, like, fueled the competitor in me, which

Tracy Hayes  25:17  

any person working in corporate America would just, yeah, like, yeah, it was great.

John Richardson  25:21  

And again, like I said, a great company. I was in healthcare. I liked the nonprofit aspect of it. I could feel at times that what I was doing was benefiting people, right? That was important to me as well. But that overwhelming sense of, like, man, you have something else that you're called to do did not go away, nor and I still feel that today, like it's not like, you know, I'm a real estate agent now my life's complete, right? Like, I hope I never lose that sense of like, wonder, or then sense of adventure, that sense of like, Hey, you got to get out there and, like, do something big, right? Like, I don't want to lose that. But I know that my life now feels much more fulfilling and exciting and exhilarating if I'm going to be like, super dramatic, right? Is that as an entrepreneur, as a business owner, as somebody who gets to decide exactly what every single day of my life looks like. It's much better. All right,

Tracy Hayes  26:07  

this, I'm gonna tell you right now, because you're you sound you make me think of myself. Okay, when we were talking, you just talking about, yo, is there something bigger that I should be doing and that, yeah, the real estate isn't your end game. Like, oh, I'm my happy place. And because there's something instilled in us that wants to drive and that's where, obviously, a good lady in your life, holy, can crouch you sometimes and stay focused on the main thing, because we can get you'll keep looking for that other thing, but still not really, you know, realizing we have to do, you know, what brings the bread to the table, so to speak? Yeah, that'll go on for the rest of your life. I can't seem to shake it myself constantly. Is this what I'm should be doing? Is this what I should be doing? And it's funny, in every I'll pick up a book or listen to a motivational, you know, even just catch some short thing on a motivational thing on YouTube or something for a few minutes, and it's like talking to me, I gotta focus on the main thing. I gotta feed the family too. So, but, yeah, but that keeps us going, that keeps us our strength. Now, you did do some I put on here life coach, because one of the statements you made in that podcast, and I wanted you to expand on it, because I think it's so true you said, and I assume this came from training and being a life coach, but also obviously the people you were coaching, can we can overestimate what we can do in a year, but we greatly underestimate what we can do in 10 years.

John Richardson  27:31  

Yeah, yes, it's so true, and I see it time again in business. So I still work as a life coach. I work with entrepreneurs scaling the business on people who have a side hustle going from their full time job their quote, unquote real job, and taking that side hustle as their main career. And then I've been a coach of some kind for a really long time, so I just work with individuals that want to be better. And a common theme is that people expect success to come way more quickly than it does, and most people fail at whatever is important to them only because they didn't give it enough time, not because they weren't capable of it, not because, like, bad things were happening. The only reason they fail is that they didn't let time do its thing. I'm a big believer that consistency plus hard work is going to equal results. It's always true no

Tracy Hayes  28:11  

matter what field you're in. Well, I want to just expand on that real quickly. When you were training, because your goal was to do the mile in under four minutes. How you know, looking back now, you well, you may have reflected in this at some time. How long did it take you to cut that time down to get you there alone be already be a top notch runner, already? Yeah.

John Richardson  28:32  

So the I became a like, quote, unquote, good track athlete or good runner, probably around seventh or eighth grade, is when I started to have success. I would say at that point in time, I thought, hey, it would be cool to someday break four minutes. So January or February, 2008 is when I broke four minutes. The first time I thought about bringing four minutes was 10 years before that. So it took me 10 years right like I ran all the time, I've competed all the time, to take my mile from five minutes down to 359 like that didn't happen overnight, even though it happened in less than four minutes. I became a sub four minute miler in three minutes and 59 seconds by the clock. But really, like, in terms of life, it was 10 years in the main game,

Tracy Hayes  29:10  

and then Andrea running your triathlon here. I mean, you're going to be in the big one in Hawaii next year. I mean, literally, you're already mentally starting to train. You know, soon as your body is back, I'm sure you'll be back, you know, fully trained, but it's going to take you that whole year. Oh yeah, and you're already at Tri athlete level to go out there and compete. I mean, you can't let it slide.

Andrea Richardson  29:34  

Oh yeah, every day. Like, 1% little bit, right? One one degree.

Tracy Hayes  29:38  

So this journey just to do this one here in Chattanooga eight days ago. I mean, again, you were already you were already fit, you're already a runner, but now you're taking on, like, the biking part, right? That was the, you know, biking is not your thing. You the swim was okay, and you love running, but you got to work on that, that biking part of it. I mean, when does that start in your. 30. I mean, was, I'm assuming, years ago, yeah,

Andrea Richardson  30:03  

like, especially, like swimming and biking both. I'd never, ever competed in either one of those. So learning a new sport as an adult. And I think that, again, kind of goes back to kind of what John was saying of being, like a high level athlete. I just took up two new sports at the age of 30. I guess it was like 3334 it's just a hard thing, yeah, just don't have, I just did it. Did you

Tracy Hayes  30:22  

bring because I'm gonna tail this into coaching, yeah? Did you bring in a swim coach to perfect your Yeah?

Andrea Richardson  30:29  

Yeah, I we have a vote. John and I both have, like, a swim like a triathlon coach that specializes in triathlon. Yeah? He's a dear friend and accomplished athlete himself. His name is Tony white. He's out of Nashville, is he? And he's helped a lot. Yeah, he's a realtor as well. He is a realtor. He is so

John Richardson  30:45  

shout out to Tony. I'm not gonna buy or sell in Nashville.

Tracy Hayes  30:48  

Okay? I'm gonna go back to John on coaching in business, but from the coaching, just from the athletic point, and because it's very much, I think you guys are gonna agree they're related to word. But there's different coaches for different things you're doing. You had you wanted to. You are already a good runner. You probably could already swim, and I hope most people can bike. It's the coach absolutely fine tuned. You compete at the level,

Andrea Richardson  31:14  

absolutely even with running. I mean, I feel confident I could coach someone running, but when it's you that needs to do it, you can always can learn more. You can always take outside feedback, and it's also extremely difficult to go from like, I feel like I'm very accomplished runner, like I can already do it, and I'm feel like I'm an expert in running, but then I don't know anything about biking and swimming, so it's a challenge just to feel not good at something. You know, that's kind of how real estate is for me. Like I feel 12 years at teaching and a master's degree, all these things, and teaching is like, and now, you know, learning something new and kind of backtracking that's that's mentally it's really hard to overcome that

Tracy Hayes  31:47  

relate this question to the business side. Here a second coach is analyzing you on all parts of it. Yeah, you're doing it all at one time. It's not like you're biking today, running tomorrow and swimming the next day. You're doing it all at once. So you have to actually blend that together. How much effort, how much energy are you going to put forth in the swim, knowing you have 112 miles to bike and then another marathon, you definitely can mess that up. Yeah, you definitely can, and that coach is helping you. And then accountability, I think, is going to be the word John's gonna probably bring up. What we hear is from coaching segments, but the accountability to keep you on track. How did your triathlete coach do that here recently to have you ready for Chattanooga?

Andrea Richardson  32:30  

Yeah, he definitely did. Far. It's just different than I've ever experienced before. So just being able to trust Him, and so often I either didn't want to do something or questioned myself or questioned, you know, if this workout is really, you know, is this too fast or slow, whatever? And just being able to trust it and just trust the process, and then being able to even

Tracy Hayes  32:48  

feel that sometimes make, you know, you got to get out there run, yeah, whatever, extra mile. Hey, today, we've got to do this in certain time or something to

Andrea Richardson  32:55  

keep or then also, just, like not working out some days, and knowing when to let up and when to push and all of

Tracy Hayes  33:02  

that, the importance of rest, yeah, yeah, absolutely, 100% so John, going back to the coaching standpoint in business, have you had a coach yourself in real estate? Have you?

John Richardson  33:12  

Yeah, I have a real estate coach that I talk to twice a month. I think with coaching, right? If your standard is pass, you don't need a coach, right? If you just, like, yes or no, I can I do it. Like, I could do a triathlon without a coach, Andrea could do a triathlon without a coach, but we're not going to do it as well as we would with a coach, right? So like, if I just wanted to make a living, or, like, sell some houses, I wouldn't need a coach. But like, I want to be really good at it. I want to bring extreme value to my clients. And that's one of the things that I when I work with entrepreneurs and I'm coaching them like I asked them to tell me their biggest goal, right? And then my responsibility as a coach is just to help them be reminded of that so that, right the time is, you know, they don't feel like doing the extra things they didn't want to do that workout. One, it's accountability, but also it's like the self reminder that, Hey, you said this was important to you, what's going on? Why is it no longer important? Because most of the time it still is just something hard got in the way, and they lost sight of what was the most important thing.

Tracy Hayes  34:01  

Well, I think, you know, every transaction that we do in real estate is different, different issues come up. Our customers are different. The loans different. You know, how they make their money, whatever it may be. And has the coach really shortened your learning curve? For you, you haven't experienced every possible situation, but as you're going through that, and you're, you've got that coach, they're foreshadowing things that's going to come up in front of you. So hopefully, would you agree you're working out in front versus being a reactionary behind?

John Richardson  34:30  

Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know, definitely, especially as the markets change, I have a perspective my coach, who works with top real estate agents all over the country, so she's very helpful with that. But then, you know, in addition, I think my skill in real estate has been shaped a lot by my corporate world experience, right? Like, I know what it's like to be a professional in a corporate organization. My coaching background, I think a lot of real estate being a good real estate agent is being a coach for the person that's buying or selling the house, because that's a hard thing, too. I think coaching is beneficial for everybody, and I would encourage every. Buddy, at least hire a life coach at like, at one point in their time, just so they can measure against it, right? Like you might not like it. It might be uncomfortable, and that's fine. It's not for you, but I guarantee you, you'll see like, an extreme amount of growth in a short amount of time.

Tracy Hayes  35:13  

I don't define a life coach explain because I agree with you, or, you know, whatever, there's something you want to do in your life. You can really shorten the term, because I've been an entrepreneur, failed forward, you know, done things. And I can look back at different businesses over 30 years post college, and different things that I was involved in and learning what I know now, which is inspirational, because I've seen some 30 year olds come in here for the podcast, and I'm like, blown away. I'm like, I wish I was at your level when I was 30 years old. You know, it's so inspiring. They inspire me. But how the importance of the life coach? What? Sell? Sell the life coach to us. Why behind your statement there?

John Richardson  35:55  

Yeah, so a good coach is going to be a cultivator of human performance. So if you want to perform better at something, whatever that is, hire a coach, and a good coach will help you do that. So I don't know anything about ballet, right? But if somebody wanted to get better at ballet, I think I could help them, because I understand motivation. I understand what it means to want something, and then the accountability that goes forward with that. But it doesn't matter who you are, like I guarantee somebody that's either listening to the show or somebody knows somebody wants to be better at a specific thing, you can hire somebody, they'll help you get better at that achieve a specific thing that, like, you've thought is impossible for your whole life, right? You'd develop this thought that, like, I will never be able to quit smoking, or I will never be able to run a marathon, but I guarantee you, both of those things are false. And then if you hired the right person, they could

Tracy Hayes  36:35  

help you do it. This is, I mean, I think most people need to realize even the greatest athletes that are out there, or even in your case, here's a mom at 3233 decides she wants to run a trade athlete, if I heard you correctly, and you bring in the coach in. You did it. I have a good friend of mine. He taught a lot of women on the PGA Tour. These are greatest golfers in the world. They still have a coach because they're because they obviously are. It's a stroke or two on every match is a difference. Of them winning. Most of us would be just happy qualifying, right? Or, you know, even if we didn't make the weekend, just being there, right, being on the same surface as as the others, these guys are competing to actually win, because this is their life, and now you're jumping in, you know, your life, and now into real estate, and having that coach to shorten that learning curve be there. And I mean, how important is from a coach's standpoint, or necessarily, say, from the coaches, how important is for the coach in the accountability piece that we were talking with Andrea there, very important.

John Richardson  37:41  

You know, it's important, when you're selecting a coach, that person's gonna care about your results, right? And that's one of the things that comes along with investing in a coach, right? They take a professional responsibility with and people pay attention to what they pay for. And that's what's a big difference between just like joining like a fun run or something like that. You want to get better at running and you joined a free run club. Like, those people aren't that invested, right? They didn't take any money, and nor did you pay it. But if you paid for a running coach, one that person then is going to be more invested in your results because they took compensation for it, and you're going to be a whole lot more invested because you paid for it as well. Like, that's where I think the professionalism of coaching comes in, is in the exchange of dollars, and that's the same thing with a real estate agent. Like, you know, real estate agents get paid to do a really good job. So, like, if your real estate agents not doing a really good job, like, remember, they're getting paid for this. They should be trying really hard for you.

Tracy Hayes  38:29  

Is there a time in a real estate career that a coach is good? Should you have or should you think hiring one? Did you hire one pretty much right away?

John Richardson  38:39  

I didn't hire one right away, but I probably would have made progress more quickly had I kind of, I don't even know why I didn't. I don't have a good answer for why I didn't, but I hired one eventually, and now my

Tracy Hayes  38:50  

business is doing better. Okay, all right. Now, you know the Richardson group here, Andrew is joining the team. One of the biggest things I've heard on the podcast of 90 some real estate agents that I've interviewed, most of them, if we talked about it, one of their biggest mistakes or regrets in the business, knowing what they know now, looking back, is getting that first assistance, someone to handle a lot of the tasks that are required when doing a transaction. Because I heard you talking in the podcast that you did last week that you are your front person. You like to be out there doing the sale. You're prospecting. You're you want to be out there showing the house, building the relationship. And at some point, did you're is this something that just naturally, with your business acumen, that you just realize or something that you and your coach said, okay, hey, you know what you're at the point you need to either hire an assistant, which then I'm sure the discussion with Andrea began months ago. Where did that conversation come up that you hey, you need some help?

John Richardson  39:54  

Yeah, well, I think foundationally, when I coach entrepreneurs and I coach business people like, I've known this that. You don't have a business unless you have revenue, and you don't have a business unless you have customers. So it was not that important for me to, like, learn the ins and the outs of a transaction. Like, because that's stuff you can just learn when you have to, and you'll learn it money back. You got to get the deal. Yeah. Like, it's all hypothetical. I'm like, and whatever. But if it's like, actual people's like, lives depend on it, then I'm gonna, like, for sure, learn it, and I'm gonna, for sure do a good job. So when I started in real estate, I was like, hey, I need to meet people. I need to tell them that I would love to help them buy and sell a house. I would need to tell them all about the market. I need to inform them. I need to let them know that I'm a real estate agent who wants to serve them. And that's where my focus was. So I was not, honestly, as concerned about, like, making sure I had the right, like, customer relationship management tools, the right, like, back end type of work, like, I figured that I could figure that out when I needed to, and that was true. Like, I didn't need to know the contract, like, super well on the front end, most of the time when we and people, right, like, are starting a business, the problems that they want to solve don't even exist yet, right? Like, you don't have a problem about, like, a customer relationship management tool, like, if you don't have people that you know, right? So meet the people and then figure that part out.

Tracy Hayes  41:06  

Yeah. Well, if you talk to agents who have worked, you know, single, solo for so long, they have neglected and they continue to, you know, chip away, keep swinging the AX, digging another ditch to find the next golden nugget. But they, there's all these golden nuggets behind them because they're, they don't have someone actually picking them up for them, right? And using the CRM, calling their past clients, nurturing what they already have.

John Richardson  41:31  

Yeah, absolutely. And I think this, you know, I've gotten to the point with my business now, and our business, right? This is Andrea's business, too. Where we have, we do? We have people that we've served, we have clients that we love, and hopefully they love us too, and we need to cultivate that relationship. And I think one of the things that she's going to bring enormous amounts of value to is systematizing the things that kind of occur, right? She the way that she operates is much different than the way that I think, and we complement each other very well that way. And I think that's been one of the successes with us as a married couple and as parents. It's like we truly do complement one another.

Tracy Hayes  42:04  

So all right, since we're on that subject of working together, who is the I think I know who is the visionary in this relationship, and who is the integrator? Who actually gets it?

Andrea Richardson  42:15  

John's definitely the visionary. And then I follow behind him and do detail.

Tracy Hayes  42:21  

I mean, my wife is my wife. I think not to be sexist in any way, but I think women have a little more patience. It just naturally comes with them. I think in my mind, of the

Andrea Richardson  42:33  

details like five to do lists on my desk and five more on my phone and five more in the bedroom, that's right, but I think

John Richardson  42:39  

there's a component of, like, risk calculation too, where, you know, I tend probably to be a little more risk averse than maybe some entrepreneurs, but I think Andrea is more risk averse than I am, and that complements it as well, right?

Tracy Hayes  42:51  

She understands well, explain that to us so you see the risk she's calculating and to see if it's what the actual risk is. Yeah.

John Richardson  42:58  

I mean, like, part of our story of moving from Kentucky to Florida was like an extreme amount of risk. We did it like in the midst of covid, and didn't have jobs with knowing no house, knowing nobody, and that's like, God is blessed.

Tracy Hayes  43:13  

You calculate the risk and well, in Florida, they're growing so much they're going to need teachers. So getting a teaching job should not be that.

Andrea Richardson  43:19  

Yeah, yeah. That definitely, yeah, that definitely was.

John Richardson  43:22  

But all of that to say, like, I think Andrea has a tremendous amount of faith in God and Jesus and in me as well. And I will tell you, like, Tracy her believing in me that I would be able to be successful at real estate, or that, hey, you know what? Don't worry about that corporate job you've done really well at. Like, you don't need, that you could figure it out on your own, that like emboldened me to be like You're right. And you know, without that, I don't think I would have been successful.

Tracy Hayes  43:49  

There is a lot to that. And I'm actually listening to a book right now of Heather Monahan, and she getting rid of your villains, is the thing where she was fired from corporate America in her young 40s, and how she totally, you know, redid, her whole thing. But one of the important things was that she talks about, and I have only the first three or four chapters, but she's not the only one that has said this. You've got to get rid of those people in your life who are negative. In your case, you are already a match because she's supporting you. Now, if you said something crazy, she'd probably correct you, because she's your wife, and she has feel the benefit, but she's calculating the thing, but knows you that if you're doing what you like doing, you're going to 10x that you're going to be really good at it. And I think the disconnect I was, we were I was fortunate enough, if you listened to the last podcast with with Brittany Nolan of DJ and Lindsay at 30 years old, she understands that in their processes and their machine at that brokerage people are good at certain things. Put those people in the right seat on the bus and you'll be you're good at so the circle all what you're talking about. Get rid of the villains in your life, which a lot of. Fortunately, sometimes they're family members, they'll be naysayers. You know, we all have them at some level, whether it's jealousy or they really, because they wouldn't do it themselves, they're going to say for you not to do it, and then surround yourself with, in this case, your wife, with people who are going to support you. And then it frees does not free your mind? Does that free? And, you know, saying, I say free your soul, really, I mean to go out and go after because what you want to do is going to make money. It's not like you're going to go out and you want to become an artist today. Okay, we're going to come in, you're gonna go out sell real estate. There's other people selling real estate. John is smart. There's good people selling real estate. I think John's smarter than most people selling real estate, so he should be able to

John Richardson  45:41  

do it. Yeah, I think, you know, you're the sum of the company you keep. Is what my mom told me when I was young, and that saying stuck with me and like, you know, if you want to hang out with complainers, you know what? Most of the time, you're gonna end up starting to complain. But if you want to hang out with high achievers who think optimistically, who are positive, who are like, filled with the Spirit, then you know what? You're going to be all of those things.

Tracy Hayes  45:58  

I'm going to ask somewhat just for my personal information. Are you, because we have a lot of similarities, the things that you talk about that you're making me think of myself. Are you the type that, when you go somewhere, go out to dinner, or just say, this could be done better conversation?

John Richardson  46:15  

Yeah. I mean, I see things from like an efficiency lens. I think, you know, like an economical one like, you know is the return on this worth the reward. And oftentimes I see businesses not run that way, or, like relationships not run that way, right? Things not run that way.

Andrea Richardson  46:29  

Also, I think that John and hopefully me as well. But John's very optimistic, like, sees good in things, and like, when you go out somewhere, it's like you just kind of make the best of what you got, and be very grateful for Jeff. And that goes a long ways, Python and real estate and everything.

Tracy Hayes  46:44  

Well, you mentioned faith earlier and so forth. And I really, when I really dug into John Maxwell's reading books, he really enlightened me to that where you see the problem. And sometimes you have to let people, you know, I tell my wife this all the time, because she wants to correct all the time, and I do want to correct some situations that I see my like, you know sometimes, hey, you have to let other people. Our government right. Our government makes mistakes all the time. Whether it's your HOA in your neighborhood, or the federal government, they make mistakes all the time. Now, hopefully their heart is where it should be. If it's not, then there's the problem. But if their heart's in the right place they are going to make mistakes, but they're making, to me, he's guiding them to not guiding them to make the mistake, but he's allowing them to make the mistake so they actually learn from it, so they're better in the next decision. Right? That, and John Maxwell kind of gave me that mindset of, you know, you know, the Lord has a path for us. And you know, whether you got fired from a job or, you know, you guys literally just like, said Hey, he baited you to come to Florida. And you came here with no job, knowing that it would you guys would dig deep. And, yeah, yeah, it was interesting.

John Richardson  47:54  

You brought up John Maxwell because, and you brought up life coach training too. I'm a life coach trained for the John Maxwell Coaching Academy. John Maxwell has been influential in in how I coach people, and then also, I think, just in the way that I think and mentioned, like, there's no perfect people, right? There's only one perfect person ever, and he was crucified. So Grace, I think, isn't a tremendous tool to have and positive

Tracy Hayes  48:14  

thinking, yeah, yeah. All right, so let's dig into some real estate, because we're way into the scale with this. We're not here for I love, could sit here and talk all afternoon. Let's talk about being a real estate agent. Well, you're here for it. You decide to become a ruler, which listen to your podcast. You have your you have generations of your family that have been real estate agents, as you've had teachers. You go into real estate. What made you choose your brokerage that you're at today? What was it that that you saw value in there, in speaking to a new agent, someone who might be thinking about getting into real estate, or maybe started with a brokerage and realized homeless, what they promised me is not here or I need more, because I really believe every brokerage in town is run a little differently and offers different values for different agents at different stages of their career, right? So what was it that led you to where you're at today? A couple different things.

John Richardson  49:03  

So this is a really good question. I think it is a really important thing when you're selecting your brokerage, right? If you're a real estate agent that's starting off, your success could be dependent on the brokerage that you choose. I don't want to say it will be, because that abates your own personal ownership of your career, and that's a very bad thing for me. It started off because the agent that we were working with when I found when we found our house, it was a rental, but she was a REMAX unlimited agent, and our landlord is REMAX unlimited agent. And both of those women are phenomenal real estate agents who have been phenomenal mentors for me, and I love them both dearly. So that got me started with REMAX. But honestly speaking, they told me, well, at least one of them said I wouldn't go to REMAX, not as a first agent, a new agent, and mainly because REMAX is designed right? Their business model, I think, is for high productive, high producing agents. But when I heard that they were for high producing agents, I said, Well, I want to be a high producing what do you mean? It's not for me. That's exactly what I want to do. So. Thinking back to like you're the sum of the company you keep. I knew that right away, if I want to be a good agent, I need to surround myself with good agents, not just from high producing numbers, but people of integrity, people who do it the right way.

Tracy Hayes  50:09  

Okay, so let me, let me dig into that a little bit. So I all on. I think anyone had just heard what you just said. That is awesome. So how do you go from zero to hero here in walking into that room, what, how were you welcomed? Did you go after some of the top agents and start picking your mind? What did you do to take advantage of the some of the people that were now

John Richardson  50:32  

around you? I took floor time whenever it was open, right?

Tracy Hayes  50:35  

So, like, that's how you and Andrew Michael know each other. And Andrew Michael

John Richardson  50:39  

is a great guy. He's one of those guys that was very and he still is. He still is. He's a friend of mine. He still is very giving with information, and the whole like real estate agent team at REMAX Unlimited, like Michael Paul is Matt and Naomi are phenomenal people. Like, I could go on and on, naming real estate agents who poured into me because I asked a question. They were super generous with their time and their information, and there was no competitiveness about it, which made basic a new agent feel very welcome and feel very able to ask questions. I have phenomenal brokers, James plenty and his wife, Erica, and then America's parents, Ron and Brenda, are phenomenal people who will do anything. But at the same time, what I liked about REMAX was that they also gave me the autonomy to fail. And I mean that by like, if I didn't come into the office for four weeks, like I might get a text message, right? Like, maybe alive? Yeah, exactly. Not because they don't care about me, because they want agents to want to be successful. And that's what I wanted, like, I wanted to learn at my own pace. And part of that, I think, is my background in running, like, I'm used to things taking a little bit of while my professional career in the corporate world, like I wasn't walking into this from a perspective of, like, somebody that just graduated high school, because if I had just graduated high school or just graduated college, I would not have been successful. Like I was able to do things because of the sum of my experiences from the last 15 years. And I also knew, like I was in a position with my coaching business doing well, that I didn't have to have an immediate source of income. Like, I didn't need to sell houses right away, because if I needed to sell houses right away, I probably would have joined the team, like I would have wanted that immediate level of leads. And, yeah, and like, you know, my first six months of real estate, I only sold one house, and that came from floor time. So, but then, you know, the next 12 months, I sold almost $15 million worth of real estate, so like that. And I didn't just sell that real estate then, because of that time, right? It was because of the six months of consistency, the six months of like, showing up and meeting people like that. Was why that? All right,

Tracy Hayes  52:32  

so the key terms you're using here, and everyone knows, if you've listened to my podcast on regular basis, I've got them listed, showing up, you're you showed up to the office. Course, they chose a retail location in the middle of one of the hottest areas

John Richardson  52:45  

of Florida, the best right there.

Tracy Hayes  52:48  

Let's go get in the trap, because there people are going to walk in and you have that, at least that opportunity, but showing up the office every day. And did you find the top people that were in the office, that were you were able to peel from they're showing up regularly too. Now, I mean, not as often as you because you're new, and a lot of times they're around busy, but there was probably always someone in the office who was one of those people who you wanted to surround yourself

John Richardson  53:13  

with, yeah, yeah. And to this day, like Michael Paul is a phenomenal agent. Sells a ton. He is there before anybody else. Every single day. I see his car every time I go there, yep. And that's like, I remind myself of that, that if you want to be successful, you need to keep prospecting like you need to keep moving forward. You need to grow your business continually. You cannot rest in your laurels in this

Tracy Hayes  53:31  

business that goes to add one of the terms that are on here, and I'm writing a book in these chat. These are chapters of the book here. You've already talked about showing up. Already talked about some of the people are surrounding yourself by the people around you consistency. And would if I could some of what you just said, your consistency in your business is to keep moving forward, keep prospecting, don't don't stop that, and keep showing up. Because that whole thing that you've learned through your athletic career is you don't go out and run a four minute mile after doing some jogs for a couple weeks. Yeah, it takes time. It takes time. And then perfecting with a coach of how you're running, you know, and so forth, when you should accelerate, when you should not accelerate, and that sort of thing, or get behind somebody, right? And you're running long distance.

John Richardson  54:13  

Well, one of the beautiful things about consistency, too, is that it compounds Right. Like, say, You did, you prospected for a week, and you met one person. Well, then you like prospect for another week, and then you meet two people, and then those people tell people, like success just compounds the same way that interest does, like hard work has a compounding interest effect that I think a lot of people don't take into account.

Tracy Hayes  54:32  

Very good statement, because, well, you don't know, in that third week, someone that you tried to get a hold of in the first week finally calls you back, right, or emails you back because you left something in their mind, like, Hey, this is John with REMAX. Oh, you know what? Friend of mine? Yeah, John call a couple weeks ago. Let's call him. And that's that compounding effect. But if you gave up real quickly after just two weeks, you wouldn't have been there in the third week to get that call right, you know, or in the right, right frame of mind. Handle that call on the credit, education is one of the key components. What have you done in the short couple of years now, you've been an agent to really, you're dealing, you're out in OC that most of the clients are fairly affluent. And I think you sold. I think Did you have, did I see on there you had a couple million dollar home that you sold? Right? You've had a couple, yeah. So it's a different clientele there. How important is education and every the foundation? I think it's the foundation of everything that we've been talking about. But what are some of the ways that you gathered your education at the whether it's podcast or it's at the Board of Realtors, taking classes or sitting down and picking brains of the top people? What are some different ways that you thought were most beneficial for you.

John Richardson  55:41  

Good question. I think an easy way is, like, emails, right? And this day and age of information is just so abundant that you have to almost try not to, like, accumulate education. Almost have to, like, put blinders on too much, yeah? And actually, that's way. One way that you can is to filter out that noise, yeah. And I think too many people go, like, an inch deep on a lot of things, and they try to go to a mile wide, but if you went a mile deep on just a few things, you would get a lot more out of it. You know, for me specifically, though, when it comes to education, you know, I want to be the market expert. Like, if there's something in nakati going on, I want to know about it, because people want those local experts, right? That's how you position yourself as a good agent. But then I don't think it's important that if I don't know something, I'm going to tell that, like, I'm not going to pretend to know something, because all of the problems in real estate are solvable for the most part, right? Unless we get in our own way, then it becomes not solvable. None of it is like life or death surgery, where if I like, cut the wrong artery, it's like over and I need to know what artery to cut in five seconds, right? Like, we can figure things out. So I think it's way more important to be very resourceful and humble, that fact that you might not know everything than it is to, like, try to know everything and act like you do

Tracy Hayes  56:48  

well, if you're out there and you're searching out knowledge, and you're at the board, or you're going to this, or you're sitting down with some of those top agents, and they may bring up a story, and you're like, whatever, because you don't know where To stick it. You haven't had that situation yet, but when you do have that situation, you're like, you know what I remember talking to that realtor about, that you know situation? Oh, this house has a well or whatever. You know whatever situation. And you know where you that resourcefulness that you're talking about. You know where to go get the answer you because you've been out searching for all that information. You remember someone talking about it. You just didn't know where to categorize it in your exactly and that. But you do know where to go back and find it, and now you can file it away, because now you're actually having that situation. Need that knowledge. Huge, huge. What would you say is, been it may I say biggest mistake? Because if someone you were, you know, you talked about in the previous podcast about, you know, hopefully in the future, growing the Richardson Group and having agents that you can pour into what is something that you would like? Tell them like, yeah, don't do that.

John Richardson  57:52  

Interesting question. You know, I look at it from the lens of, I hope I listen to this podcast a year from now, and I'm like, oh, man, I really need it to grow. I like that. You know that continually processing perspective quickly, but as if you've had a lot of time to reflect on it right? Like, so how you handle something within five minutes? Like, how could you How would you handle it within five years? You know what I mean? And being able to just, like, tighten that window, if that makes sense. So, and I have, like, a pretty short attention span to mistakes that I've made. It's categorized. It's just not like, an emotional thing where it like, like, weighs on me a whole lot. You know, I've been fortunate enough not to have, like, any mistakes where I'm like, Oh, I lost that guy's binder. That was, like, really crappy. I wish I hadn't done that right. But I would say, you know, generally speaking, like, mistakes I've made, I probably missed opportunities because I've had a moment of weakness where something was just a little extra hard, like, maybe I just didn't send a text message, or I, like, didn't provide enough value in the moment to get the person to make a purchasing decision, right? I think I probably

Tracy Hayes  58:48  

kind of the unknown. So they're like, Hey, does the tree make noise here?

John Richardson  58:52  

Right? Yeah. I wish has there been a smart take

Tracy Hayes  58:55  

or, you know, advice you took from someone that you're like, Whoa, and then that didn't work for you.

John Richardson  59:00  

You know, I think with marketing stuff, I've definitely done a lot of things that, like, I haven't seen a like, immediate response from that would be easy to say it didn't, it didn't hit. I think part of being a realtor, and really, if you're selling professional services, so it'd be the same for like, an insurance agent or financial advisor. Like, your presence is generally speaking, like, going to be valuable. So if you sponsor, like, a high school team, I don't think anybody is gonna, like, list with their house with me, because I was the nice high school band sponsor or something

Tracy Hayes  59:28  

like that. But, like, that's a donation, but that's just part of being

John Richardson  59:31  

in the in the community, right? Yeah, yeah. You know, as this market has changed, I've definitely had things happen that did not happen when I first started real estate, right? Like, once you got something under contract two years ago or a year and a half ago, like it was done, like you weren't doing anything to jeopardize that. The seller wasn't going or the buyer wasn't gonna mess up. They were gonna do everything they said now, like, I'm encountering more like appraisal gaps and repair requests, and it's getting more and more important to have really great communication, both with the client that you're serving and then the agent on the other side right you're supporting vendors that are supporting. Yeah, and like, having a great loan officer, like, you, like, that's very important to build that network. So I think coming in, and this is where I'll go with this. And my biggest mistake probably has not been investing kind of mental effort more than anything, into the fact that real estate transactions might fall apart. And how can I, like, bulletproof the real estate transaction? Because right now, like, if they're not bulletproof, there are going to be holes in it, because the market is changing. I don't think buyers and sellers have ever been further apart, kind of on what their house is worth.

Tracy Hayes  1:00:24  

That statement of the podcast, yeah, that was very good statement, yeah.

John Richardson  1:00:27  

And that, like, can really impact the transaction. So it's much harder to sell homes now than it was a year and a half ago, and I'm learning that firsthand. But I also feel like it's exciting, right? It was exciting when I got into it, because the real estate market was never in this position before. Now it's like coming back to a position that hasn't been in a while, and that's new to me, and I love it.

Tracy Hayes  1:00:46  

Well, this kind of you kind of summarized everything there as you were coming together. Why someone I'm going to let John do his sales pitch here, someone who may be maybe listening, but from what I heard, and then obviously listening to you on the other podcast, you have a clear understanding that, yeah, I think you should go into the attitude, yeah, a year ago, you could probably make mistakes and get through but that's not how you should be doing your business. That you actually are trying to bulletproof the transaction, knowing that it isn't bulletproof, that someone might be able to get a headshot in there and but it happens. But you're trying. You're with your professionalism, your thoroughness, your communication, you're minimizing those opportunities of failure.

John Richardson  1:01:29  

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think above all else, like Andrea and I both deeply care about what we do. Like our time is the most valuable resource that we we're not spending it together with our family. We're focusing on what we do professionally, like that is very important to us. The outcome of the transaction is very important to us, and the people that we serve are very important to us. Like the whole thing, the way that we view our life is like, this is an important thing, and we care a lot about the outcome and the effort we put into it. Like, I don't think either of us get into something without really committing to it. That's why she's successful at triathlon, having never like ever swam in her entire life, is that she was very committed to going to

Tracy Hayes  1:02:04  

the pool. Never went to the lakes. I could go on but,

John Richardson  1:02:09  

but like she she wanted to be good at it, so she woke up at 445, and jumped in a freezing cold pool while the pool was born. But it's freezing cold by Florida standards, right? And that was a hard thing to do, but that's just who she is, that no matter what, she's going to be successful at it, because, come hell or high water, like she's going to give her best effort.

Tracy Hayes  1:02:26  

Take, give us three seconds. So today, now, with Andrea coming on, what is the because I'm sure you guys have talked through the processes, what can a customer expect now with the Richardson Group, there's two of you, what are you doing? And at what point are you handing it off to her. You know, not saying you're forgetting it, but obviously you're running a business, you got to do the front end. You got to open the door. She's fulfilling the order, what, who's doing what, and how, just kind of given oversight to maybe a possible buyer, or any customer, even a listing situation, of who is doing what and why. You know you're that's what you're good at, and that's what she's good at. That's why they're going to get

John Richardson  1:03:04  

the best. So currently, Andrea does not have her license yet, so she's serving more in a transaction coordinator role. She's not doing any real of her duties. One of the beautiful things about owning a business, though, is that we can do whatever way we think is best for the client, and that may look different each time. So we haven't necessarily, like delineated roles or responsibilities are like certainly not job descriptions. Our promise to a client is that they're going to get the best service they can get right that we're going to work very hard for them and beyond. That's kind of a moving target that I think is going to evolve with time. I don't think that either of us are going to put a whole lot of pressure on making it look a certain way. We're going to let the process play out in a way that best serves the client, and that may be different each time, but I know what I'm good at, and she knows what she's good at, and I think we'll gravitate towards those things naturally.

Tracy Hayes  1:03:45  

I think that's a great answer, because knowing the many transactions, having worked in a call center for 12 years, been in this business 17 years, there's a some customers that you'll click with that want just feel like they got to call you. There's others, as soon as she talks to them, they're never going to call you again.

John Richardson  1:04:02  

That's probably everybody,

Andrea Richardson  1:04:04  

I would add, just we kind of live in the parameters of how you do anything, is how you do everything. And so you see like us having success like in other areas, it's because we work really hard and we give everything we have, and we live like that in every aspect of our life. And we've kind of said that throughout this podcast.

Tracy Hayes  1:04:19  

Well, I think it's talking about John Maxwell and so forth. And I mentioned, you know, it's where your heart is, and if you're, if your heart's in the right place, the rest of it will come together. Yeah, all right, we're gonna go to our Two Minute Warning questions here. What is your guys favorite things to do? Or with the kids, you're the girls. What's your favorite things to do here in

Andrea Richardson  1:04:39  

Northeast Florida, the sea world,

Tracy Hayes  1:04:43  

but locally. Obviously, I hope you're not going

John Richardson  1:04:45  

over there seemingly every weekend, but sometimes we have to do other things. We love going to the beach. So I've mentioned I grew up in Ocean City, New Jersey beach kid, through and through 10 years in Ocean City, beach patrol like I feel at home on the beach. And even though Andrea didn't grow up there, I think that. She has a stronger affinity for the beach than I do. That's one thing that we love to do. We love the knock at the amenities. I mean, spray and splash park are phenomenal. We love swimming,

Tracy Hayes  1:05:09  

and that is sub Disney, right?

John Richardson  1:05:12  

Yeah, sometimes I feel like we get to Disney World and the pools are disappointing. Yeah, yeah. You have to

Tracy Hayes  1:05:17  

share them with too many other people who don't know. Yeah,

Andrea Richardson  1:05:19  

I agree. We all have the golf cart life too. We just like being outside with each other.

Tracy Hayes  1:05:24  

And isn't that you obviously knock that's the lifestyle it wants to sell. So those people who are listening, or, you know, if they take a clip out of this, and I love your How do you put on your your website is the Florida life. Love the Florida life. And that's really what it's you're selling lifestyle. You know, whether you want to live out nocati Now the splash parks, or you want to go 15 miles inland, and, you know, maybe get some acreage and buy a manufactured home that's all the power to you whenever there's so many things and in between there that you the lifestyle that you want to live at the beach or on the river, or, you know, with Florida.

John Richardson  1:05:57  

When I was growing up, Florida is where I went on vacation, and I always felt freedom when I was in Florida. It sounds kind of like cliche or weird to say, maybe, but like, when I got into the state, I just felt like I was able to do like, anything. And I think the Florida life embodies sort of that feeling that you get here and it's like things are possible. It's like the California Gold Rush probably, like people went out west and like, Man, I can do anything. This is amazing. Like, that's kind of how I feel every day. And Andrew and Andrew and I talk about all the time, like we are so grateful to wake up in the morning with like, endless limit, endless possibilities.

Andrea Richardson  1:06:27  

That is, yeah, it's like on vacation when you wake up in the sun shining and right the windows are open, and you, like, go on a jog or go get donuts, and you're in your you're on a bike, and it's like, every

Tracy Hayes  1:06:35  

single you like to dress casually, like I wear, I try to wear shorts every day of the year. Oh yeah, occasionally I'll put on a pair of jeans if it's a little cooler. But yeah, see me in slacks. That's a rare situation, because I'm in Florida. Yeah. All right, last and final question, is it more important who you know or what you know and why? We'll start with John.

John Richardson  1:06:58  

Sure, it's like the chicken or the egg. I don't think you can have one or the other. Ultimately, I think who you know is going to be more important, because from them, you're going to learn things, right? Like, if I know the smartest person in the world, eventually I'm going to get to be like, kind of smart, so I'll know stuff. You could know any everything in the world. Like, if I okay this, I'll answer. If I had to choose one, I'd rather know the best people, then know everything.

Andrea Richardson  1:07:17  

Okay? Should I take the other one? Just because

Tracy Hayes  1:07:21  

the education side. So that's interesting, because I don't, although I think some people, if they got on the administrative side and say it so who you know is, how you got there, yeah, but from a from the teaching side, you know that mindset of education is because I don't think we teach our kids enough.

Andrea Richardson  1:07:38  

So I think, yeah, I think it's, I think it's really like, who you are, and so education and finding out, like, like, feeling confident what you know, feeling confident who you are, that's really, I think, where the power comes. Oh, that would probably be more the education side of me. Like, knowing who you've known, that you're confident in what you know, what you can do, what you can accomplish, who you are, and then you can respond to anything.

Tracy Hayes  1:07:58  

Because, yeah, you can be in front of the most, smartest

Andrea Richardson  1:08:00  

person right world, or don't matter in the world.

Tracy Hayes  1:08:03  

Someone you should know, but you don't know enough to know that you're in front of that right person, right? You know, really? And then obviously, I think the common theme here is relationships, to build those relationships with those people. But guys, I appreciate you coming on today. We can talk for hours, but hopefully our hour and 16 minutes, we got another one. Got that. No, you guys a little bit here and coming in, but thank you very much for coming on. I appreciate it.

Podcast Intro  1:08:30  

Thank you. This may be it for today's episode of Real Estate excellence, but we both know your pursuit of excellence doesn't stop here, to connect with the best of the best and really take your skills to the next level. Join our community by visiting Tracy Hayes podcast.com where you'll meet more like minded individuals looking to expand their inner circle and their personal experience that's available at Tracy Hayes podcast.com

Speaker 1  1:08:58  

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