Symone Gatt says competing real estate agents began telling prospective clients she was effectively finished in the industry.
Word was making the rounds across the local market: Symone was pregnant, she was stepping back, and she was about to become a stay-at-home mother.
The rumour mill was so pervasive that even long-standing past clients, ready to list properties, were led to believe she had walked away from real estate entirely. It took a chance conversation with a local conveyancer to set the record straight – Symone wasn’t quitting; she was just getting started.
“I was actually losing business because clients were told, ‘Symone’s going to have a baby, she’s no longer in the industry,'” she says, reflecting on the campaign used against her.
“It was dirty… discounting me based on having a child. But that’s probably been a bigger bit of fire in my belly – to just prove that you can absolutely still do both.”
Fuel for a record-breaking year
And prove it she did; in a year where most agents would have been content simply keeping their heads above water, the OBrien Real Estate agent turned what competitors viewed as a liability into her ultimate sales asset.
Throughout her pregnancy and the arrival of her baby boy, Coast, Symone grew her total sales volume by 27 per cent to 56 transactions, while boosting her written commission by 28 per cent over the financial year.
Her performance secured her a spot as the ninth top-performing agent across the entire OBrien Real Estate network – an achievement forged entirely while carrying a pregnancy or caring for a newborn.
The secret behind her record-breaking stretch wasn’t a miracle work-life balance, but a ruthless willingness to adapt. Recognising early on that she couldn’t maintain her usual workload solo, Symone hired a full-time assistant just two months before her March due date.
The strategic leverage allowed her to offload logistical, non-dollar-productive tasks like photography appointments and admin, freeing her to focus strictly on high-impact moments.
“I would still go out and appraise and list all my properties, and I was still present at all my opens on Saturdays and do all the selling,” Symone says.
When Coast arrived, Symone took just two weeks off, strategically timed around the Easter holiday period, before returning directly to the Saturday open-home circuit and she hasn’t missed a weekend since.
Rather than hiding the reality of motherhood, Symone leaned into it completely and her pregnancy and newborn became an unexpected bridge to local families who saw a relatable human being rather than a slick corporate pitch.
“I’ve always said, even when I was pregnant, I feel as though having Coast has been, in a big bizarre way, a little bit of a superpower,” she says.
“It’s been something that I’ve been able to bond with other families over. I’m not just an agent … I’m a mum, I’m here, I’ve got a newborn at home.”
Making the juggling act work requires an operational choreography that relies heavily on her family and workplace. Her husband, Dillon, who runs his own business, joins her for a weekly Sunday debrief to map out schedules and childcare, supplemented by help from both of their mothers.
Meanwhile, her office environment has adapted to the presence of a newborn – it is not unusual for Coast to be passed around the boardroom during morning sales meetings or looked after by colleagues between appointments.
“I work with some of my closest girlfriends, and if I’m in here for a few hours, I feel like I rarely see him because he just goes from one office to another,” Symone says.
“I’m quite blessed to have the opportunity to bring him in and have that support.”
Looking ahead to the next twelve months, Symone isn’t pretending to have every detail mapped out and as a first-time mother juggling a full-throttle career, she’s comfortable taking the journey step-by-step – and doing it on her own terms.
“I’m not going to sit here and say I’ve got this grand plan, because I’m a first-time mum and I’m learning as I go,” she says.
“The one thing I’ve learned in all of this is that I don’t necessarily need to be in the office nine-to-five to still be successful. My phone and my computer are my business.”
Ultimately, her record sales numbers are secondary to the bigger motivation now driving her every morning.
“Having Coast gives you a purpose I didn’t previously have,” she says. “It gives you that push to strive and keep going … you’ve got someone else to account for now, and at the end of the day, I just want him to be proud of the parents we are.”