Stop doing more and start doing less, better. The clear message from Day 1 of AREC 2025 is that the best agents don’t hustle harder—they build systems, protect their energy, and show up with unshakeable conviction.
Will Guidara – Unreasonable Hospitality
1. One size fits one. Forget cookie-cutter welcome packs and monogrammed mugs. Start noticing what really matters to your clients—their dog, their footy team, the fact that they can’t cook to save themselves—and do something with it. That’s what turns a “service” into a story they’ll tell their mates for years.
2. Be all there. Guidara didn’t magic up the hot dog stunt—it happened because he was properly listening. No half-checking emails, no “uh-huh” while thinking about your next deal. The golden stuff often slips out casually. Hear it.
3. Make magic repeatable. It’s not about pulling a rabbit out of a hat every time. It’s about knowing when and how to surprise. Think: upsizers with a dog = local park picnic, downsizers = “you don’t have to cook tonight” kit. Build it into your system so you don’t forget when you’re flat out.
Josh Phegan – Mastering Market Uncertainty
4. Lead the room, don’t echo it. When the market’s twitchy, don’t be the one reposting headlines with 🚨 emojis. Be the one who explains what it actually means—in plain English. Buyers and sellers aren’t looking for drama; they’re looking for direction.
5. Clock your energy like you clock your calls. You can’t “just push through” burnout and expect it not to leave a dent. Know when you’re flat, build in proper recovery time, and treat sleep and walks like appointments. Burnout is sneaky—it feels like you’re still working, but the work worsens.
6. Know your stuff—then do something with it. It’s not enough to say, “The market’s changed.” Show them how: different buyer plans, smarter pricing, better marketing. Use tools like ChatGPT to get local insight fast, then make it actionable. That’s how you become the voice of reason when things feel wobbly.
Robin Banks – Good ≠ Enough
7. What would the gold-medal agent do? Fourth place is fine for the school athletics carnival, not for listings. Go through your whole process and be brutal. If it’s “good enough,” it’s probably not. Raise the bar. Every step is either helping you win, or helping someone else win instead.
8. Do the brain squats. You work on your scripts, your fitness, your listing kit—when’s the last time you trained your focus? Ten minutes of mental reps each day—visualising the win, clearing the mental clutter, doing the hard thing first—can do more than any CRM tweak.
9. Edge beats effort. You can hustle yourself into a hole. The best agents don’t do more—they do less, better. One killer pre-listing kit. One data-backed insight no one else shares. One thing that makes clients say, “That’s the agent.” Find it. Then sharpen it till it cuts glass.
Steven Bartlett’s Failure Math
10. Rejection’s just the maths doing its thing. Most agents secretly hope they are the one exception who’ll cold-call their way to a 100% ‘yes’ rate. However, Bartlett’s 5% hit rate is reality, and once you accept that, “no” stops feeling personal. Start tracking your own numbers (calls, appraisals, listings, sales), then work backwards. If you know it takes 20 calls for one good lead, every hang-up is just another box ticked. It’s not rejection. It’s just momentum.
11. Reward the trying, not just the win. Social Chain tests everything—podcast titles, thumbnails, even how fast someone speaks. And they celebrate the test, not the result. That’s the bit we forget in real estate. Instead of waiting for the ‘perfect’ listing video, try ten versions. Headline tweaks, video lengths, price angles—tiny experiments that add up. Share the flops too. They’re how we get sharper, faster than the next guy.
12. Sell to what they believe, not what they’ll pay. Bartlett’s RICE (Reward, Ideology, Coercion, Ego) framework puts “Ideology” first—and honestly, it checks out. Nobody’s moving house just because your fees are competitive. They’re moving because the place is too small, too sad, or too much. Dig into that. What’s this sale for? Safety, space, freedom, fresh start? Lead with that, and you won’t have to discount to stay in the race.
David Walker – Built by Belief
13. Anchor everything to a crystal-clear North Star. Vague desires (“make more money”) won’t pull you through 6 am prospecting calls. Define exactly what life looks like when you’ve “made it”—the house, the schedule, the impact—and align each daily task to that picture. When the vision lives inside you, belief follows, and excuses fade.
14. Project identity, not just information. Clients decide in seconds whether they trust you. They’re responding less to your suburb stats than to the confidence, energy, and conviction behind them. Spend ten minutes a day absorbing market intel (rates, zoning shifts, economic data) so you can speak with quiet certainty—then let your motivation do the heavy lifting.
15. Win the internal game with disciplined resilience. Early success is outputs > feelings: calls made, doors knocked, CMAs delivered. Track those numbers obsessively and gamify targets to keep motivation high. By falling in love with the daily process—and holding yourself ruthlessly accountable—you build the unshakeable self-belief that fuels long-term performance.
Kamala Harris’ “Eat ‘No’ for Breakfast”
16. Prepare like a trial lawyer—fresh eyes, forensic detail. Before any listing pitch or tough negotiation, grab a blank page and list every strength, weakness, risk, and leverage point while your perspective is still “first-read” sharp. Harris’s county-by-county mortgage analysis—and her yellow-pad habit from courtroom days—shows that meticulous, early prep arms you to push back on lowball offers with facts, not bravado.
17. Lead with respect and context, not charisma alone. Clients instantly sense whether you’re treating them as transactions or as whole people juggling childcare, ageing parents, and skyrocketing costs. Harris’ rule: understand their broader life pressures before proposing solutions. When you speak to the full financial ecosystem, you earn trust that outlasts any single deal.
18. “Eat ‘no’ for breakfast”—negotiate fearlessly, grounded in worth. Saying “no” to the first offer (California’s $4 billion) and staring down Jamie Dimon worked because Harris knew her numbers and her mission. In real estate, that translates to rejecting terms that don’t serve your seller, holding firm on your buyer’s conditions, and remembering that a long-term reputation outweighs a quick—but lopsided—commission.
Oliver Lavers – Relentless Commitment
19. Know – and protect – your “why.” Dig until you uncover the core reason you’re willing to endure rejection, 6 am prospecting, and weekend calls. When that purpose is crystal clear, lows become tolerable, highs stay steady, and quitting stops being an option.
20. Treat time like an $1800-an-hour asset. Calculate your true hourly rate, then sanity-check every coffee, DM, or meeting against that figure. Track calls, appraisals, and deals with the same rigour; momentum compounds only when each minute is invested, not spent.
21. Build a brand that’s unmistakably you. Stop mimicking other agents’ social posts. Decide what makes you different, ensure every video, flyer, and email reflects that point of difference, and let consistency create a ripple effect of referrals and trust over time.
Adrian Oddi – Success Without Burnout
22. Schedule life before listings. Block your calendar the way Oddi does—personal health, family time, and true downtime get inked in first, then work fits around them. When the “blue” (life) slots are protected, energy stays high, and every professional hour counts double.
23. Trade the fear-driven hustle for an abundance mindset. Oddi learnt that adrenaline, busyness, and award plaques can mask emptiness. Check in on your emotional “signal lights” (fear, anger, sadness, self-doubt, frustration). If any are flashing, reset before forging ahead—the vibration you bring to clients mirrors the one you hold inside.
24. Redefine success as health + impact, not just volume. A hundred deals and Insta kudos didn’t matter the night before cancer surgery. Measure winning by the quality of your health, relationships, and presence—then let production targets serve those goals, not replace them.
Lana Samuels’ “Business-Media” Playbook
25. Turn Instagram into a profit engine, not a diary. Frame every post as a sales asset that builds trust before the first handshake—story-driven videos, market insights, and behind-the-scenes moments that position you as the obvious choice when sellers start scrolling.
26. Show up with disciplined consistency. Samuel’s 898 posts in seven-and-a-half years weren’t random; they were a daily habit. Pick one platform, post with intent, answer every DM, and let the compound reach do the heavy lifting over time.
27. Don’t overlook the aesthetics. From colour-matching dresses to high-impact listing reels, arresting visuals stop the scroll and signal professionalism. Vendors now benchmark agents by online presence—so treat every frame, caption, and story as a living portfolio that proves you’re active, aligned, and ready to deliver.
Josh Morrissey – Own Your Time
28. Carve out distraction-free 30-minute “power blocks.” Silence the phone, shut down email alerts, and focus on a single high-impact task—prospecting, pricing research, or client updates. Morrissey’s maths shows that protecting even two of these blocks a day can claw back two-plus days of true productivity every month.
29. Turn follow-ups into strategy sessions. Replace generic check-ins with data-anchored questions that tap a homeowner’s sense of market strategy: “I’ve just sold 123 Main Street—how does that result affect your plans?” This quick hook positions you as a market educator and surfaces real intent in minutes.
30. Audit your calendar like a profit-and-loss statement. Each non-client hour should serve a purpose: sharpening expertise, creating market content, or prepping for decisive conversations. Routinely review where time leaks into low-value tasks; re-allocate those hours to mastering concise market insights you can deliver at speed.
Mark Mathews – Risk and Reward
31. Turn fear into reps, not research.
No book, podcast, or pep talk substitutes for getting wet. Whether it’s cold-calling, awkward negotiations, or 20-foot waves, confidence only clicks after voluntary exposure—again and again—until the scary thing feels routine.
32. Use “gratitude texts” as a daily reset button.
A three-line thank-you message to a mentor, client, or teammate floods your nervous system with the same calming benefits Jackson sparked for Mathews—and recipients feel it twice as strongly. One text each morning is emotional body armour against rejection later in the day.
33. Anchor every grind to a vivid ‘why’.
Mathews visualises buying his mum a house; you might picture school fees paid or a family trip booked. Define what success looks like, why it matters, and who backs you—then keep that image front-of-mind when fear whispers, “Quit.”
