KGCI: Real Estate on Air - Rebuilding Your Real Estate Empire After a Setback

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

Morning Primer is your weekday boost from Mindset & Motivation Monday—quick, focused, and made for agents by KGCI Real Estate On Air. Give yourself a daily mindset reset for the daily direction you need to show up sharp and ready to win.Start your morning ahead of the market and ahead of your competition every day with KGCI Real Estate On Air. Summary:Spring Bengtzen, a top-producing agent, shares her powerful story of rebuilding her real estate business from the ground up after a significant personal and professional setback. She discusses the critical mindset shifts, practical strategies, and resilience required to overcome adversity and achieve even greater success. This episode is a masterclass in perseverance, providing a raw and honest look at the challenges and triumphs of a real estate career. It's a great listen for agents facing difficult times or seeking inspiration. Ready for more? Subscribe now and tap into our Always Free Real Estate On Air Mobile App for iPhone and Android, where you’ll find our complete archive and 24/7 stream of proven real estate business-building strategies and tactics. 

Every day starts with your mindset. Here's the morning brimer from the mindset and motivation Monday on KGCI, Real Estate on Air. Seven figure success starts when you start thinking like a CEO. Welcome to the John Kitchens coach podcast experience. This is your host, John Kitchens. You're ready to think bigger and transform your business into a path to lasting freedom. What is good, everybody, man. Thank you guys.

Turing into another episode of One Big Fire. And we've got a massive fire in the house today. and super excited to jump in. It's the first time for me being able to connect with Spring. So I've been looking forward to this conversation. And let's dive in. Mr. Stasick, set the stage for us, brother. Hello, Spring.

Thank you for doing us. Hi, Jay. What's up? What's happening? So before we dig in, I do want a little selfish plug here. In Spring, this is an invite for you, too. We didn't even talk about it before we went live, but we have dates. So all of you listeners who've been to rock and read,

stock rock and rock the rescue this year our dates are set for agent to CEO that's our major event of the year and we sandwich that against our concert this year it's going to be rock the spectrum all the proceeds are going to be going to charities that support autistic children and adults and I'm super excited it's a different format right next door to where we normally do it and I'm not even going to tell you the lineup the lineup is fire jay I'll say this a couple of the artists that Dustin set up in aust or in nashville when we when we did this uh was it the sprints um yeah they're oh boy yeah they're coming oh boy make sure you're mark in september 24th and 25th and uh in your calendars and then we're gonna have a presale coming up so listen close in the land in the land i'm

maybe this is the way we get spring to come to cleveland like cleveland just is like that's nowhere i've never thought i'd be like i'd go to cleveland ohio but i guarantee you spring I think you'll, I think you're going to think differently again. And I, I'm pretty close, Al, to locking in to where we can confirm one of the queens of real estate to be there with us as well. So, well, hey, we have room for two queens. Right, right. It's funny. All right.

I'll check the dates. That'd be awesome. Well, you guys heard the ex pecons in Salt Lake City. Who would ever think going to Salt Lake City would be? So that's my hometown, though. So here we go. Yeah. Yeah, it's cool.

And then the only downside that I saw to that is we're not going to be able to do any skiing because I don't think it's during, is it, or do you guys have snow on the mountains during the over. The resorts don't open until November. So it's definitely off season. Yeah. It's a random location. I mean, I think people enjoy like it's a beautiful city and, but it's not Miami. But it just made me think about Cleveland, right? I'm like, hey, there's some great areas that you just would never think of.

So no doubt. Salt Lake's beautiful. It's probably one of the cleanest places I've ever been. Yeah, it is. And it will be great. Their venues and stuff are fantastic. So I could see why they chose it in that context. I'm just comparing it to Cleveland, Ohio. Bless you for comparing Salt Lake City to Cleveland, Ohio. It's the first and probably only time you're ever going to hear. I would never put those two in the same sentence ever. Oh, buddy. Thank you for joining us. And, you know, before we hopped on live here, we were kind of talking about our journey.

And what's really cool that you're doing, this experiment is just really inspiring to so many people. And how much bravery is it take you to actually document and publicize this entire journey? Because when you're putting it out there, failure, success, somewhere in the between, it's all out there in the open. It's completely transparent. And that is beyond impressive. and my level of respect, you know, for you. I didn't really know you that while. I just looked upon everything you were doing and saying,

dang, this lady is just killing it. But now when you said you were going to start all over again, document the entire journey, it inspired me because I'm like, I don't think I would have the balls to do that. I mean, that is a move. And I love it. And so we want to hear more about it.

And shoot, how many months now is it? We met five today, like five this week. Yeah. Man, that moved by. Yeah, it's gone by really fast. It's interesting, you know, when I said yes to it, part of the play, I thought it was like, how am I going to do this? Because EXP has 80, 90,000 agents.

And coming in at this place, like, it is a different animal because people have already talked to an EXP or they've got their friend or whatever, right? But, and there's a whole long term. I'm not even going to get into it. But when I finally said yes to it, I was like, you know, here's a deal. I started at Real Agent 2000. And there, yes, there is that early. I didn't have the competition of everybody having somebody they've talked to.

But I also built something that at that same time that not very many people did and continue to build. And so I was like, well, if I've done it there, I can just, obviously need to tweak it. But it wasn't that it was necessarily the company. It was that I put in the work. And so I'm like, well, if I put in the work here. I can have some of those results. And so it's been a journey. I am documenting it.

Sometimes, like, to give you an example, I actually just pulled my numbers yesterday to do an update. And I was like, oh, shit, it's only gone up by four people. And I was like from my weekly update, you know, and I was like, okay, well, it is what it is. Do you know what I mean? Like, I can't control that it's only been four people. So we'll just document it and report it. And so, yeah, there is that part of me that I'm like, uh, and then there's also the part of me that it's fun and it's just transparent.

And I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. So we'll all play out how it's supposed to. Right. And, you know, it does always feel like you're, you know, the flywheel doesn't start spinning immediately. Right. So like, you know, the tallest trees have the deepest roots and, you know, change takes time for people that, you know, that I'm sure the pipeline is is full of people, great people that are coming over. I got a question for you. You know, this whole, you know, when you join co-sponsorship wasn't a thing here.

So, you know, that was, and to be honest, even though we kind of asked for it, we didn't know what we were asking for. And thank you to Glenn for being brilliant and making it 10 times better than any of us would have probably thought. But how has that changed your approach or how has that kind of opened up the game differently? I know you has had that at real to a certain extent. It was obviously completely different. Yeah. So Real launched it probably a year and a half, two years after I had joined. But so when I said yes, I didn't know that co-sponsorship was going to be a thing. And then I went to Dallas and met with the executive team to plan out how this was going to work.

And Leo told me that day, hey, co-sponsorship's going to be launched. And so I was actually the first co-sponsor agent at EXP. So I knew that it was going to be a thing. I'm incredibly grateful to be very candid with you because instead of it being like, oh, I'm competing with 80,000 agents. Now it's like, no, I have 80,000 agents that are an army of people recruiting and a lot of them are bringing me into the mix. And so it's been actually a huge value proposition.

Like, for example, I started my growth. So I'm just right under about 300 agents right now. And I have a massive pipeline. I have a team of 40 onboarding right now, and I have another team of 40 onboarding on July 8. Like, I've got some stuff cooking. And I would say co-sponsorship's been really great because some of these guys have been talking to people. And they have their friend or they have this. And it's like, hey, let's make it a win-win.

Like, I don't want this to be a thing. And so it's been really good that way. But what I was going to say is part of my momentum started with, a co-sponsorship with Andrew Franklin. And he'd been working with the NIL team for quite some time. I've known the NIL team for a long time. And it just happened to be that there was synergy there that were like, let's go, let's go do something.

And so I'm super grateful for it. I think I've set a goal. I've put it out there. I set it on stage. I was like, oh, shit. Did I really just say that? But I set a goal to have 10,000 agents in the next like three years. And I know it's lofty.

I know it's crazy, but I believe with the co-sponsorship and I believe with the right partnerships, I can get close. And if I don't, at least I shot super high. I'm going to get somewhere, right? And so right now I'm pacing. If I look at my numbers, I'm pacing to be on the same path that I did at Real. Real, my first year, I did about 700, I had about 700 agent partners. And then then it started like compounding. As you know, it does that.

And so I feel confident that I'm going to start getting that compounding coming up, but it's a grind for a minute too. Yeah. I think most people don't understand that math, by the way. But like, that's, that is the beauty in this model. And it's not going to be really so much what you do that gets you to the, and by the way, I believe the record. And this is up for debate because I think they arbitrarily gave John Micahish the record. And I'm not sure if you beat us or not. but I think we hit 1,011 months.

And that was pretty crazy. But you're on track for those kind of numbers, right? So like that's what people don't understand. It's not what you do necessarily. It's going to be what you get 10 other people to go do, too, right? Yeah. Yeah, my strategy is to have 25 running mates. So 25 people who want to grow with me.

I've got about seven that are like, I want to grow a rev share org, you know. And so my strategy is, let's go get the 20 to 25. I have the capital. I have the infrastructure to put some fuel behind them, right? Like, I'm the queen of events. I've got a great marketing, great CMO. So I'll help them build out their personal brand and create a little bit more structure around about them becoming a little bit more out there.

And I just know if they grow, I grow. So let me amplify who. who you are to help you grow. And so that's the strategy that I'm rolling with. And I'm enjoying it. Like it's fun for the people that were coming in and proximity and growing with just kind of like the three of you. You guys are,

you guys are having fun together, right? You're like, hey, let's go and do this. I'm like, so that's my strategy there as well. I love it. What was most impressive to is that you're doing this, you know, when we started hitting, it was, so we moved our brokerages over 2017. It was August.

I moved over in August. Jay and Michael, John, I think it was October. So maybe just a couple months after that. And we caught this momentum. And it's fair to say that that momentum isn't what it was a year ago today. So for you to set this lofty goal, you set a 10x goal, which is, you know, inspiring. And we're going to watch you win. We're just loving, cheering you on and doing it.

But the timing of it's, I mean, let's just be honest. We had a blue ocean. We had no competition. We were kind of all on the take. People were coming by the droids. And then all of a sudden, real comes along. And then another cloud based and another cloud base that is revenue share stock. And now all of a sudden, we have, there's options.

And those options. And I guess why I wanted to mention that is that how cool is that that, that, that, Competition breeds innovation. This co-sponsorship idea, it wasn't even, I never even thought of it until I heard about Real doing it. And Jane, you think we should tell the story? Because we learned about it, like really, really learned. When I first heard about co-sponsorship that Real was doing it,

the first thing I was like, who would want to do that? Like, who would want to give up half of their revenue share? There's the first thing in my brain. I just didn't know what I didn't know. and Jay, we lost a giant team. I can't remember the name of the team. David was the team leader. And one of his agents was in my market.

In fact, she used to be on my team. And I was like, hey, I wish you all the best. I know that you guys are taking off this now. But just curious, you know, why did you, why did you, what made you go have the decision to go to real? And she couldn't give me an answer. But she did say, I will give you. you on the phone with my sponsor and i was like yeah let's do that who is it and she said charon chavista and i was like okay done so j and i hop on a call

charon us were like hey yeah nice to beat you and he starts telling us the other side of co-sponsorship and our mind was freaking blown so thank you charon i mean i don't know who thought of the idea but when you think about collaboration these cloud-based companies everyone you know know claims and rides on the horse of collaboration because it's true we are the most collaborative out of any of the traditional brands but co-sponsorship pours gasoline on that collaboration but we we just didn't understand it until we heard charon you remember that that conversation oh god yeah he hesitantly you know once he got into his pitch he know he couldn't not say everything he always says like he he believed in and what they what real was doing at the time and um yeah so that it was great

because I love listening. I'm notorious for listening to my competitors and understanding what they're selling because we were getting poached in a big way. And so I wanted to hear what everybody else was hearing. And yeah, and I remember I got off that call and I had to drive somewhere and I was driving and I was just replaying the things he was saying. I was like, why did that sound so good? And, you know, obviously it was, you know, some specialist dust that he had put on it. But it wasn't all necessarily true, but it sounded good. And so, you know, just unpacking that helped us to, you know, understand what what the benefit was there. And certainly completely different, guys, everybody that doesn't know the difference, one is division of the other is multiplication.

So like there's no difference between real co-sponsorship and ours. There's nothing to like about it. It's it's massively different in terms of if you're a builder. Yeah. But you know what's calling our attention, what he said? What? He said, you guys, you guys have seven levels. We only have five. but you know that we have infinite levels.

We have people that have 20 levels deep. And that's what that was the stopper for us. We're like, what? Okay, now you got our attention, but, you know, we were paying attention twice as hard at that point. Yeah. Yeah, but let me give you contact. You're jumping at the bit.

Yeah, I'm like, let me, let me. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And strong's like amazing. He's such a great presenter. Yeah. Yes. And you can go multiple. layers, but when you're dividing, because the way that it works is the company takes 45,

I mean, you get 45%, your code gets 45 and the company takes 10, right? So as you start getting them in and there's coes, it starts dividing. So as it starts going down, that the amount of roughshare being paid out can be pennies, pennies. Like, so you might have multiple lines, but like it's not, it's not like you're getting a mass amount of money on it. here's what I would say. What I love about the EXP co-sponsorship is I do love that it's like you can come and you take that position and it's what you're making.

But here's what I really love about it is the number one thing that your competitors, our competitors have said in the past is that, oh, it's siloed. Oh, they've got these groups. Like I actually screenshoted the other day, one of my old peeps at Rill post. So it was like a jab of like, oh, they've, they've got these silos that they're saying as communities. Do you know what you mean? And it's like, no, we do have communities. But here's the thing that they describe their networks that they're saying are communities.

But here's a deal. It is now with the way this works is there is a lot of collaboration and people don't have to pick. You do get what the company offers, which is all the corporate things with fast cap and fast track and all the stuff that EXP offers and then you go get in alignment with the other people that we're going to help you grow your business. And the difference is at Real, which I love them. I actually really am grateful. I have nothing negative to say. And the difference though is they can't offer you shit. Like it's your joining Real. Here's what the company offers. Pick your sponsor who you like. Like at EXP, it's like, oh, I'm going to go partner with Jay because he's going to go help me build this.

or I'm going to partner with John. He's going to coach me here. Alby or, you're like spring. Like, you get value with who you partner with. There's no value of who you partner with over there in context of like a written out here's what you're going to get because it's not,

it's just not their model. Yeah. You know? And so it's just, I think the EXP actually flipped the script. It's no longer like, oh, you don't want to go there because you can't,

you can't be in, you have to be in their silo. And it's like, that's not how it works, you know? So it's a game over. I'm, I'm actually seeing so many people coming from the other models that are reaching out saying,

I feel lonely. I see what you're doing. Can we have this conversation? And so I think you're going to see people who want more than just being at a rev share brokerage. Right. Of course. Yeah. And, you know, we were talking about conversation I had with Sloan last week.

And that's the number one thing that he's hearing. And it's exactly what you said, Spring, is that, you know, they feel a love. own, right? There's agents out there. They feel isolated. They don't, they don't have the support. And environment is greater than anything. And, you know, having that community to where you can, you can step in is so powerful. Spring, I want to zoom out with you a little bit. And, you know, for us, obviously, Al, touching on it and giving you a little, little backstory before we jumped on, you know, we're big vision guys, right? I mean, all three of us are massive on, vision and that's why we have to have great teams around us to be able to help us

execute on the vision. And for us at the time, we were going down the partner path back in 2015, 2016 timeframe. And we hit, we hit the gas from jump 225, 2.2 GCI and like from standing still at zero in 12 months. And so we, you know, we had some momentum and definitely going the partner route. We were partnering with agents, market service. areas throughout DFW. We had just signed our first regional partner out of Atlanta. And we were going down that path. And I think because what was it,

like 2000 partners by like 2000 partners by December 27, 2024. There you go. And so once we were locked in on the vision, we look for whatever vehicle was going to get us there faster. And that's where, you know, that we had been sent.

But it was forced without going down the path. It's like, dude, I think this is something, right? And then having the conversation with Jay and there was like, dude, that vehicle can get us there faster. And so that was part of the reason of letting go of that monkey bar to grab onto this one. So I guess my question for you is what's kind of what's the vision. And then obviously, you know, jumping from what you had built the empire at Real to step into over here with us at EXP, obviously you saw a better vehicle to possibly get you there

faster. So I'm just kind of curious, you know, the vision for you and the kind of your decision-making process that you kind of go through as you make the decisions to help you get to the vision. Yeah. So part of the reason I said yes was I did get in at the early stages. And I do believe that I would have continued to grow. But as to what we were talking about, there's five levels and seven, right? and I also know that companies hit their plateau like everybody like look at Keller Williams look at EXP look at and Real was on the app right um however at at a certain point real is going to hit their their plateau as well they all do right and so I was looking at and saying okay well what's going to happen when we start having churn and I have no value proposition like I'm the OG

that got in early and my agent or churning because that's what happens, right? Like, there's no, if they're not collecting revenue share and I don't have any value proposition, then what's going to happen in three, five years? Like, I'm never going to grow, right? Because you're going to have that churn. It's just business. So when I started looking at it and being like, well, could I go rebuild?

Or A, I do have the seven levels and the six and seven pay substantially more, right? And also being an ecosystem where I do have a value proposition. And the IS Spring can pivot if the market in five years and I need to change what my value proposition is that I can at least still be in control of my business of what I'm offering for an agent to be in our ecosystem. So that was the business side of me being like, okay, yeah, I'm going to start over, but I believe that I can, at least I have control over saying, hey, this is what it's going look like when it starts to go that way. I also truly believe that EXP is in that 2.0 era.

I think that you guys, when you started, started with the, that you were the first. It was an idea, and then COVID hit, and it was just like, boom. Like, it was massive, right? And I think now it's like the model is normal. It's going to be the model of the future for everybody. I don't see any brokerage coming out that's not going to have a revenue share component. And so the foundation where profitable, you've got the infrastructure, like everything is there. So now it's just where all the models are going to be exactly the same. Why not have the foundation of the OG to go build off of, right? And so that was another one of my thought processes. The other component of it to be very candid with you is I'm like, hmm, I have a leadership team totally

cheering me on, meaning like Leo and everybody and you guys, like it's not like I'm like I'm on an island being like, how do I do this? Like, it's great to have the support of like, yeah, we want to see you win. Like, it doesn't matter who you are in the company. You all want to see me win because it is ballsy. And it is one of those things. It's like, okay, well, she's, she's, I am literally an open book, you guys. Like, the only reason I haven't screenshot it my actual income. And put it on is like, I don't need the whole like, whatever it's called of like the disclosures and all of that. I'm like, I don't need that part of it. But I would have no problem being like, I'll show you how I'm going to get back to this.

Right. I just, but I'm like, I don't need the headache of whatever the guidelines of the law stuff. So I was like, someone will turn me in. Yeah, someone to turn me in. So I'm like, I don't need any of that. I'll just show you like where my agent count is. Right. But I just truly, truly think like, and this is for anybody.

I'm not special. I'm just willing to do the work. Like I, it's the same. It's the same thing when I joined real. I joined real being a small. all team in Salt Lake City, Utah. Nobody knew who I was. Like, nobody. I chose to be like, okay, how can I go grow this? Oh, I'll throw an event. Oh, I'll have 40 people to show up to my office. Oh, I got some traction. Okay, I'll, I'll go create a little bit of a coaching program. Oh,

I'll go build out my name. Like, do you know how uncomfortable that was to be like, I'm going to go create a brand called Spring? It was like terrifying, you guys, terrifying. And I was just like, well, I'll put it out there. And then I started running Facebook ads and I started like, like getting a little bit more. Like when I did my first event, I was scared shitless. I did my second event and I cried in the middle of the night. And I'm not a crier just so you know. But it was a fucking disaster.

And I was like, I was my husband's like, what is going on? I'm like, oh, it fell, you know. And but the thing is you just have to keep going.

And so now I'm at year four. I just hosted one. I had over 500 people show up. And it's like, it's a thing but here's a deal like you just have to be consistent and put in the work and be willing to every day I'm like all right let's who am I prospecting am I talking to like what where am I flying to whatever and so I'm willing to do it and so I know that I'm going to win and that's the same with anybody else if you're willing to do it and put your ass out there and like be willing to be

vulnerable or put your name and like you guys should read some of the comments on my if you ever want entertainment go find one of my ads and you'll be like damn this girl get some heat. And it's what it is, you know. So you just have to be willing to do it. But EXP is the vehicle long term for me. And I believe it can be for anybody if you're willing to, if you're willing to put yourself out there. Spring, you said it a couple times. Do the work. When you step back and unpack that. I mean, what, like, there's busy and productive, right? Are we getting results doing the things that actually drive results? What, but in your mind, when you say do the work, what does that mean?

well so when I said I'm okay I'm going to do this then I hate to put it this way but I have to compete with all of you right I have to compete with everybody so I'm like what's going to be my offer and I don't have to compete with you guys you guys are in my upwind but you go what I'm saying like what is my offer so anyway I went in and said okay here's what I'm going to put out there then from that to okay how am I going to package it what got to get a go high level okay I've got to hire these people now I need to go um create some infrastructure now. I need to get in front of people like conversations, webinars. I mean, I am literally doing it all from being on here to I host a weekly webinar

called The Vault that I host, we host trainings every week. I have a biweekly community call just for age and attraction. Like I truly am. I didn't plug into everybody else's like I am a little bit. But I'm like, no, if I'm going to go build spring and people want to be a part of me that I have to have something, right? And so I've gone in and created it. I've hired staff that only works for my EXP world. And like she's flying out to somewhere to onboard a team because they don't have the infrastructure.

And like, I mean, I'm putting in the work. But I also know that it will 10x return by doing that. And so it's the same, it's the same path you guys went. Like the exact same things you're doing. or that you did and you are doing that you have to just put in some of those pieces to be to be something significant. Well, you're treating it like a business. And that's the, you know, the mistake that I, that I, looking back, I think me,

Mike and now for the last four years, not counting last year, this was like the four years prior. It was 40 million revenue share, the three of us. And it was 96% margin. And, you know, I was always super impressed by that, obviously. And it is a crazy number, right? but but that's not what if what if you invested back into it and that's you know that's that's that's really where you can you can if you want to double and double again you're going to have to help other people double so you have to create there's it is you're treating it like a business that's what

you have to do if you do that then you know it's infinitely easier but this is all about like people think it's about recruiting it's not it's about how do you actually help people from where they're at the where they want to go and that's the cool thing about the model is we're all waking up every day thinking about how do we make it better for the agents that we're trying to help whether it's a team trying to build and scale or you're an agent just trying to get to some consistency and predictability there's just lacking across the industry that help like you know every every agent I always tell when I have a conversation I'm like when you get in real estate you should have just got a certificate that says figure it out because that's what it feels like

and that's what they genuinely all feel like and that's you know that's the cool thing is this is pushing us to all make this industry better and make it better for real estate agents. Right. Well, I think what's cool about it is like it truly is like a win-win, right? Like they grow, we grow, vice versa. And so the model is really built like the people like ourselves that know what we're doing. Like let's pour back in and help them increase their production or if they want to have some revenue share or whatnot. And so it's fun that way. It's also interesting. So I was used to making a. certain amount of income off of revenue share. And I've given myself three years because I was there

for three years. I've given myself three years to get it back because I'm like, oh man, I was used to like having this income, right? And so there is a little bit of fire underneath me too and to be very transparent with you, very, very transparent with you. I've had moments. Even in the last week, I was like, oh shit, I'm on month five. Okay, spring. You gave yourself three. three years like this is a thing like it's go time um because i like to spend money like i like to have like the lifestyle i've had and it's like i chose to do this saying i'm going to rebuild it and so i am like i am going to rebuild this is that is that the fuel is it is it to get get back there or you know it's uh i the fuel is i have something to prove i have something to prove um and though like

like i'm going to europe this week i'm like and i'm i'm i'm i'm like here's the thing i've always had a very um i've always been like i own a part of a mortgage company part of a title company i have a jvm both i have the team i've got the coaching i've got all these things and so that's why i was like yes i'm great to um i don't necessarily need revenue share money so i'm good here um and i also though really like revenue share money we all do right like it's one of those things where like the team right now is not doing as great on the or whatnot. I'm like, I like it. And so I'm used to a lifestyle of just not even thinking about anything because I'm just used to the money coming in, right? And so I, their fuel is there is to

prove myself, but I also really like the freedom that Rob Share creates. And just like all of you, like it creates massive freedom. So it's important for me to, to rebuild that back. Yeah. The one thing I want to correct you and disagree with you on spring is that about 10 minutes ago, I'm nothing special. I have to disagree. You are something special. I mean, the the amount of guts that it took to do what you do, I don't know anybody, including the three of us on this call that would walk away from that substantial amount of semi-passive, let's call it. We know that it's not fully passive. We've already figured that out. But income that's coming in will be able to rebuild it in a market like this. I mean, last year, 2024 was when you came over. It was the worst

year in residential sales since 1996. 2025 isn't going to be looking any better, you know, at least halfway through the year that we're looking. And you made that move. You put a commitment out there and we've, Patrick Bet David, I don't know who actually came up with this, but the three types of people, there's people who are interested, committed, and assessed. And you, you, you clearly are falling into the third category of this. And just impressive. So you are something special. Don't ever undercut yourself because I don't know anybody that can do and set out a goal like that.

And then put it out there publicly like you have. So, kudos. Yeah. Thank you. I mean, too, thank you for saying that. It was really important to me to get in alignment with my husband. And many of you know this story or know. but like he had been working with EXP for about nine months on a large enterprise agreement.

And if you guys know anything about real estate tech or even the tech industry, it's effing brutal. Like it is one of those things like he started the company from our upstairs. Like it's been bootstrapped. It's been a grind. Like it's been a whole thing. Right. And so when EXP was like, hey, we want to do an agreement with you, but it's not, it's kind of funky.

wife's the number one agent at Rill. And then they ultimately said yes. They're like, well, we still believe in the product for our agents. We're going to, we're going to do this agreement with you regardless because I had said no. I was like, sorry, guys. Like, we're a separate entity. We're not the same. You got to do what you're going to do. I'm going to do what I'm going to do. And when they said yes, it was like, it was the first brokerage because he has plenty of brokerages and other companies that have been like, sorry, your wife's at Rill. She's really loud. It was, EXP was the first one that said, yep, we're fine. It springs at real.

It's good. The second component of this was as much as I am independent, the platform, the Sisu platform creates a lot of audience for me because I do co-events with them. I coach their new agents coming in. Like I am the face from an agent perspective. And so Brian came to me back after. EXP con and said, spring, I love you so much. And I'm great that you're saying it real. But if you're saying it real, then we need to sever the relationship with Sisu because it's not fair. The

EXP sends us their, their agents. And then they end up in your world somehow, you know. And he's like, it's just out of alignment. And I had to take a hard gut check and be like, oh, that is out of alignment. and it's not as a family as much as we are independent. Like we go so much further when he and I are on the same page and we're working as a team. And so it was ballsy. And I know a lot of people are like, what the hell is she doing? But at the end of the day, it was like, I really want to be in alignment. I believe in the company.

I'm like, I know I can rebuild. Like I, it took me from going from I think I can and I did a lot of processing and a lot of like chis to get to. know I can, but once I got to, I know I can. I was like, all right, game on, let's go. And so thank you for saying that, I'll be. But that's the, that's the real behind the scenes of like, it was important to my marriage and, um, here I am. So that's awesome. Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. That's, that that is, uh, that's really cool. And a little, little, uh, under the hood of decision making. And that's kind of what we, we, we, we geek out on just from a strategic thinking standpoint. So that's cool to hear yeah yeah it's it was important to me like i mean we've been married for 11 years

and we've always operated like he's him i'm me like separate everything and when i took a step back and i was like a lot of my growth has come from the support of like having a husband that's just been like oh spring can do this or spring's out in front and center or whatever and um and he he wasn't coming to it from a negative other than like this is an important account spring and it's not going to be an alignment if you're in front of all these ex-p agents. And I was like, you're right. So here we go. I want to add one more thing, too.

If you ever have a chance to go to one of Springs events, make sure you go. Cabo was not your event, but you spoke. And it was the first time we heard you speak. And we're getting transparent and raw and real here. I was in tears in the crowd, listening to your story. I had no idea what you had been through early. earlier with, of course, the accident and your comeback. And it literally is giving me chills right now.

Thinking about I did not know that, that you had gone through, you know, a major accident. You were in the hospital, injured, you know, with burns. And I mean, we're not talking about a little accident. I mean, this is life changing. And how much would you say that, you know, that negative, awful thing that no one would want to ever go through has impacted who. spring is today. Yeah.

Before and after, have you thought a lot about that? Yeah, of course I thought about it. I mean, I was young. I was 20. And so I think that being young and being 20 was part of like not understanding the full scope of what it really was. Now, if I was in my 40s, it would be a completely different thing, right? I shared on stage that when I almost passed away, I had my roommate in the burn unit,

all those sirens and lights were going off because she did pass away. And I was so drugged. And I just remember like, what the heck is going on? And when they all came rushing in, I'm like, am I dying? And the doctor was like, no, you got to choose. And I just remember like a light bulb literally was like, like, oh, this is a choice. Like everything is a choice. And he's like, you could to choose if you live or die.

And I'm like, I just remember thinking like, I haven't. seen how I marry. And at the time, I was super in love, like I was there on that boat with my boyfriend, right? And I was like, I haven't seen how my children. I'm like, oh, I'm going to choose. And that week, it just started like turning, like the mental component of it started like shifting everything for me. And so, yes, in the context of I have always taken from that moment, like, everything is a choice. Like, I don't get to choose what happens to me, but I do get to choose how it respond to it. And that's something that I teach. Like, we don't control the real estate market. We don't control what's happening Iran. We don't control any of that. But we can control how we respond to it.

Right. And so that's been a game, a massive game changer for me and everything. I would say, though, to be very, to be like very candid of like my actual growth really has happened in the last five years. And it's when I went to a training, and I won't get too far into it. But it's when I understood, it was actually with William Lamb, who just got his license to join me at Yixby. It's why the community I started is called Upgrade. His program is called Upgrade. And it's about upgrading your mind. And when I understood that like the human brain controls everything for you and when you, the way that I like to articulate it is most of us are running off a really shitty old programming.

So think about it this way. Like your computer, like most of us are running off from Microsoft DOS, but it's old stuff that doesn't serve you anymore. And when you can realize that you can upgrade to the new iOS and how to do that with removing the trash and the old beliefs, like it changes everything. And so in 2020, I went into a 14-day immersion course and started understanding like, holy crap, like this is how this works. It's not the woo-woo manifesting stuff.

It is like full on, like how to remove all this stuff. It's shifted. And a year later, my whole world, like, started down this path. And it started off into a massive personal development space from I've done it all at this point. So when you're talking about vibrations, I'm like, I am like the ooey-gooey, like mindset, all of that stuff. Because it's truly like, I'm a believer. You can truly create anything you want. But it really started about five years ago.

That's freaking awesome. Yeah. And it is. You know, I mean, that's definitely the hardwiring of a honey badger. And really it's mindset first with everything. And so, I mean, this is part of the reason, you know, I do a lot of the endurance stuff I do, right? Just because once you go through hard things, I mean, the trivial things really don't matter. And they don't stress you.

And it's just there's always a path. There's always a way. definitely mindset first. Yeah, I just climbed. I've done the endurance event 29-029. I don't know if you know what that is. Yep. But I just climbed it last week. Like I have done it nine times in the last few years. And every time I do, I'm like, why am I doing this again? But it's just that reminder of like, of just going and how accomplished you feel when you're finished. That's Jesse Hitzler? Yeah. I was supposed to do that on my 40th birthday and I skipped it and went to eat. EXPCon right before joining to see behind the scenes. I was like, I can't not do this. Like I had to go.

So my best partner, Mike, and was that who were going for my 40th birthday, they went and climbed the mountain. And I went to EXP con and we joined EXP. By the time they got back, we were already joining it. You made the right decision. You can climb a mountain whenever you want. So I haven't regretted that. I do kind of remember it, but not really.

No, don't regret it. How about we'll go find them together. I do. Yeah, we'll go do an event together. We'll get a Honeybadgers Nation group there. It would be fun. You can all wear the hats. There you go.

Well, accepted. Spring. Amazing. So guys, listening in, it's like honeybadger nation.com, go-to resource for everything, being able to tap into. But the big thing that we started this month, last month, actually, we gave away our first Honey Badger of the Month award. So spring, we are nominating honey badgers out there that are doing Honey Badger stuff

and definitely one of the hardest markets, headwinds that we've encountered. So when you guys catch a Honey Badger doing Honey Badger stuff, get out there, honeybadger Nation.com. Nominate Honey Badger of the Month as well as pick up some of that swag. We got a pretty good candidate in here with Spring B. If you want to nominate spring, go on to honeybaggernation.com. The links right up at the top. Click it and nominate her.

I am a honey badger. I am a good as well. Like, it's super fun. So I'm grateful for you guys. I'm grateful to actually get to know you a little better. And I would love to collab. So whatever I can do to be a value to your community. Let me know because I'm just here to grow and have fun with people.

Like that's the whole thing. Leo messaged me the other day. And he's like, from an outsider perspective, it looks like you're having fun. And I'm like, I am having. So much fun. Like, if anything, however this turns out, it's a effing blast. And I just think you all should join us, you know. That's it for sure.

So good. Well, appreciate you guys. Fellows, always great. And Spring, thank you so much for jumping in, sharing some great nuggets, as well as being vulnerable and sharing a little bit of your story. And can't wait to continue the conversation. Thank you, guys. I appreciate you all.

Thank you for the inspiration. Bye you guys. That's a wrap for today. I hope you got something valuable from this episode. If you did, hit follow and visit john kitchens.coach for more ways we can work together. See you on the next episode.