Welcome to Action Solves Everything, the show for those who want to stop overthinking and start producing. I'm your host, Alex Montagano, broker, leader, and founder of Lockstep Realty. Around here, we believe movement creates momentum, clarity comes from doing, and the agents who take action are the ones who win. Every episode is built to help you grow your skills, your confidence, and your career. Now, let's get to work. So today we've got somebody that's very special to me. I've known him since he was 12 years old. I coached him in baseball early on in his life. Jared Cowan, co-owner of LiveIndy. He'd been in the business since 2021 and his stats are off the charts. So this year his team at LiveIndy did 230 transactions. They'll do $80 million in production. They've got 18 agents and their growth is like hockey stick on steroids. Jared, man, awesome to have you Yeah, thanks for having me on, Alex. Obviously, that's consistently changing as we grow and figuring out what works, what doesn't work. But the main focus right now is obviously Getting good people in the room, making sure they're good culture fits, making sure they have similar identities and goals, and then working together as a collective group to hit our end goal, which we've typically Can you talk a little bit more about that? So there's a lot there. So let's unpack this little by little. Let's start with the end and then work backwards. So end goal, if you'd be willing to share that with us, I'd love to hear what that is. And then how, the impact that sharing that, what Yeah, so our three year goal, which is what we share is we want to do 1000 transactions with 100 agents. a consistent basis. And what that does from what I found with sharing that with agents is it gets them all geared towards allowing that to happen and pushes the compounding effect of agent growth, agent success, deal count growth. When everyone is rowing in the same direction, it's been the biggest momentum shift we've seen after sharing our So we started sharing our vision about six months ago, as far as increasing agent count, increasing growth. And that's really when we kind of saw a lot of our agents working with us in that mindset of growing agent count and growing deal count. So we went from in July, we had nine agents, we've doubled in the That's insane growth. As someone that runs a real estate team, holding your culture together while pushing growth is something that we found to be like, if you could protect your culture, growth is something that is very healthy. Healthy, good growth makes the room better and it challenges the room. How have you guys doubled in six months while protecting your culture and then Who's helping you with that? And then what systems are you guys using to Yeah, so we've got three full-time staff members, marketing coordinator, ops manager, transaction coordinator. We actually just brought in another transaction coordinator. So a lot of the employee focus, and they obviously have their own roles and their own goals that they have set, but a lot of it is on in-person culture, events, activities, Getting the group together on a consistent basis, even though we're, you know, we have people all over the city. Creating a hub or central location to where we can all come and work together. I found is pretty impactful when it comes to maintaining the culture. While What is your day-to-day involvement in all of this? And so I'd love to tap in, what is a superpower for you? And then how do you evolve and grow in your roles as well? And Yeah, so it's kind of a unique situation. So obviously, I co-run the team with my partner, Kyle Gatesy. And one thing that we've kind of changed over the last year was really getting specific about giving up our role specifically on what we're doing for the team. Obviously, Kyle and I are both still in production. So we still are out working with home buyers and sellers, and then also running the team. But with that, like, giving up finance, marketing, transaction management, all the different things that go into running a team and making sure that our time is best use versus us both doing the same activities or going back and forth over That's awesome. Can you talk about the strength of your guys' partnership? Years ago, I had an accountant that I worked with, and we talked about partnerships in the business. it's really put up some red flags. Just for me, it's like a roadblock that I work through on business partnerships. And we talked about, my accountant always talked about flipping houses with somebody, and he was like, somebody's going to want the door red, and somebody's going to want the door blue, and then you have a problem in conversations you don't need to have. But from an outsider's seat watching you guys, you have crushed what partner, like you've taken what partnership can be and then it's like gas on the fire for you guys. So can you talk about how you found each other as partners and then how you guys have like leveraged each other's strengths and what that looks like? And then talk about how you've divvied up those roles because I'm sure it always hasn't Yeah, obviously, with anything, there's trials, tribulations, learning curves. But Kyle and I met back in 2022. We were both at the same company, eXp, both in the same office, cross paths. At that time, I was in the process of running my own team at three or four agents. you know, was seeing all of the things that I was struggling with, and running a team early in my career, and was consistently wanting to learn from Kyle, he was substantially more involved in the investment side of real estate, which really intrigued me. So he had, you know, some apartments, a ton of doors, and I'm like, really want to meet this guy, like, what's he got going on? What's the trick? Like, how'd he get to this point in his career? And we just started kind of brainstorming together, like some of the things that he was really good at, some of the things that I was really good at. And we're like, we're kind of good at different things. And so naturally kind of formed a partnership slash benefits to each other. And then it turned into, hey, why don't we start a team together? And we rolled that team out So we met two years before we really even started the team, and then the rest was history. So in a given day-to-day, what roles are you focused on, and then what are you driving? Yeah, so given my background, I started out in data analytics and finance. So I'm really passionate about knowing my numbers and understanding numbers and running it like a true business. I think that's one thing that a lot of people that run a real estate team don't understand is you got to run it like a business. Otherwise, your P&L will not look great. And you may be thinking you're doing well when in reality, it's the opposite. So that's one thing I focus on heavily is just the finance, accounting, bookkeeping aspect. And then the other thing that I'm really focused on in my role is transaction management and coordinating the pieces that continue the deals to flow through. So, and then as far as Kyle goes, he's really focused on marketing, brand awareness, training, teaching. His background is in training and teaching as well. So we kind of, you know, naturally had this synergy where we kind of had different backgrounds, but also had some things overlap. So when we went to delegate roles, it was Yeah, that's awesome. So you referenced back to your data analytics days. How did you end up in real estate? Let's start there and roll that into when you realized, hey, look, I'm this team thing is something that I can take advantage of and really scale and grow. Because I'm sure one day you didn't roll out of bed and want to sell a thousand houses. So go back to what made you get into real estate? Because I know your story, but I think it's pretty cool. And look, you've covered a lot of ground in a short window of time. And so I'd love to talk about how you got in, how you got here, and then some advice for folks on the other end of the line here to help them see how fast you've been able to do this and how Yeah. So I actually, through Alex here on the call, got my real estate license in college. So I was graduating from Wabash College, was in the process of trying to figure out my job path, career path. My mom and dad were both in the renovation business at the time, flipping houses here locally in the market. And they were like, hey, this is a need. My mom was in the process of getting her license, even though she probably didn't want to at the end of the day. It's not her personality, didn't really enjoy that aspect of it. So I was like, all right, I'll get my license. Got my license in 2021 as I was graduating from college, but always kind of had it on the back burner of, hey, I'll get into it when I'm ready to go full time, maybe three, four, five years. And then I really remember distinctly joining Alex's team and him telling me, you're not going to sell deals in the basement of a hospital with no sales reps. So that moment was pretty pivotal in my career change. So six months into that, I went full-time in real estate, November of 21. And then, yeah, I was on Alex's team for about six months. And the biggest thing that kind of stands out, and I think this is great to mention, just taking action, was I felt like when I first started, it was like, one, I treated it like a nine to five or a full time job. And I never missed an opportunity. So when it came to answering the phone, setting appointments, like never letting anything stand in the way of that was kind of like my main motive at the time. Obviously, that's change and your goals change and your responsibilities obviously changed. But in that moment, I was 21 years old, 22 years old, didn't have a lot of responsibilities. And what I could control was just my output and my action. And so that's kind of what pivoted to where So I think there's a couple of things that would be really neat for you to share. Because I remember those conversations. I remember sending you a lead, you're in the basement of the hospital, I can't get ahold of you, and then at five o'clock getting a phone call being like, man, something just came through. I remember having those conversations with you of like, hey, look, this isn't going to work unless you find a way to give it the attention that it deserves. our conversation being around the income you were making from the data analytics position with benefits and with stability. So would you share some of that? Would you be willing to share some of that? I think diving into that stuff is really good for a listener to understand the risk that you need to take, but then what truly burning boats actually looks like. So Yeah, I remember vividly going into the fall of 21. I was obviously excited about real estate, didn't know when I was going to jump in full time. But when I was sitting there having this day-to-day perspective of, hey, I'm doing a lot of work here, where are the results driving the ship? I'm having direct conversations with CFO of the hospital at the time, trying to figure out what my next steps were in that role. And then as I'm going back to have conversations with the other piece there of, hey, going and getting your MBA, going and getting additional schooling that was gonna take three, four, I kind of had this like pivotal moment I can go do that and And I was like, let me run a cost benefit analysis of how long I think it will take me in real estate to get to that number. And I'm like, I think I can do it now. And like you said, burn the boats. For me at the time, I had some savings and was financially stable enough to go a month or two without a transaction. But we start hitting month three, four, five without anything. It can get stressful. Luckily, I put myself in a position where I didn't have that happen, but it was like a Yeah, let's talk about that a little more. Talk about what your first six months was like. I think so many folks that get into the real estate industry don't have a concept of like, how long it takes to really get going. I think you had some great things in your corner. You joined a team. Your parents had knowledge of the industry. You had a great network. That stuff helped. But talk about what the first six months was like for you and if there's anything that you would have changed when you got started to even Yeah, the first six months were fun. Probably a lot more fun than most people experience when they get into real estate for me. But I think a lot of kind of what Alex had on there, but just going back to the resources that I had at my disposal, and then taking full advantage of those resources was where I felt like I took action and catapulted fast. I remember it was doing the things that most people wouldn't do in those moments. I remember specifically, fun story of sitting in the basement of my parents' property, watching a football game on a Saturday after Thanksgiving. And my phone rings, and there's an opportunity right there. And I was like, you know what, I'm going to completely leave the situation, go show houses. And I'm showing like 10 houses in two days. Those are my first three deals I got under contract. um, that weekend. And then it kind of just took off from there, but like doing something that in the moment was uncomfortable or was maybe a pain in the ass, quite frankly, and Talk about, I mean, I think those stories are so cool. Everybody that gets in and has success, they remember the days of like when you, you act based on what you had to do. Um, and I remember when I got in the business, I was broke. Everybody goes through this phase where it's like, I only have X amount of dollars in the bank to sustain a lifestyle for a certain window of time. Talk about how you really felt. I want to drill into that. You're 21, you're leaving a high five-figure, nearly six-figure position with great benefits and stability. Can you talk a little bit about how you felt and then how did you know that you needed to take action and what things in your life helped push you to that? Because it's not just like, man, I got into real estate and I'll figure it out. You could have always gone back to the corporate world, and I remember that conversation vividly with you. But the reality is we knew that the second you were moving and the second you were going forward with what you were deciding to do, there was no turning back and the future was bright. But look, I've known you since you were 12, and I knew the work that you put in as a 12-year-old baseball player, trying to get better, to try to get more at-bats and try to have more success. Go back on that type of stuff. What makes you you and how are you here today versus like, we could cut your production in half and still call you successful, but you're further away from 1,000 deals. You're further away from everything else that you have goals for. Yeah. One thing I've always been going back to, you mentioned it, but baseball, like I always wanted to be the worst player on the team. That was like my mindset in everything I did be the worst player on the team. If you're the worst player on the team, that means your team is pretty damn good. And you're probably in a position to where you're going to elevate your game or elevate your situation or elevate your skillset based on your surroundings. And so that's one thing that like, as I scale and as I grow, change the room, change who I surround myself with. And then all of a sudden your goal of maybe it was 150 deals a year seems small. And so that's one thing that I've always pushed myself to do is just change the room, change If you feel like you're hitting your goals, you should probably change That's pretty powerful, and it's awesome for you to recognize how fast you need to evolve those rooms. Let's talk a little bit about success and winning. Look, you gave your three-year goal of 1,000 deals, but talk to me about winning day-to-day. How are you experiencing that? Define what it looks like for you to feel like you're winning, and then what are some key attributes that you give every Yeah, for me, when it comes to winning on a day-by-day standpoint, I think it's one, accomplishing everything that I had set for the day prior. So every day, I kind of end my day with prepping the next day. Obviously, things come and go, but if I accomplish everything that I had planned for that day, I think that's a win. And then moving the needle in some fashion, whether it be through agent attraction, growing my personal deals, growing a business venture, outside of real estate, all those things. If I can accomplish one of those things every day, good things will compound and happen. I think one thing early on in my career that I got a little bit distracted by was just the shiny object syndrome of there's so many different things you can get yourself into within real estate. How do you focus on one thing and become really good at it and become an expert in it? And so I think I did a pretty good job of that early on in my career. Now, as I've created a little bit more flexibility and financial stability in my life, it's giving me more opportunity to get more creative when it comes to looking at other opportunities or looking at other business ventures. So for me, It's maybe not real estate related as far as a successful day, but it's how am I growing my net worth? How am I growing my long-term wealth building strategies? How am I doing that? That's more of a win for me from a day-to-day standpoint. Can you talk about what some of those ventures may look like for you? Is it you're trying to buy rentals, you're trying to flip houses, you're trying to get into commercial stuff? I know you bought a building this year. That's a huge success for you guys. Talk about some of that stuff and then how have you welcomed those opportunities to you while also continuing to scale and grow? Because I think if you zoom out 10,000 feet and look at what you guys have accomplished this year, your numbers are insane, your growth is exponential, all the while, oh yeah, all this stuff over here is happening too. Share some of that stuff with the listeners and just kind Yeah, so I've always had a pretty big passion for real estate investing. I remember when I bought my first property and house hacked that, turned it into a rental, and then I've scaled that since. But that is definitely one aspect of whether it be side business or ancillary pieces of real estate that I enjoy doing is investing. A lot of my time or a good portion of my time is looking into investment opportunities when it comes to buying properties and getting a lot of my properties out of residential and into commercial, which has been a change for me over the last year. Then ancillary businesses, one thing I started doing over the last probably two years was Instead of taking a coffee meeting for a specific reason, I went into that coffee meeting and said, maybe it's not real estate that this coffee is even about. And that really changed my perspective on meeting new people, getting to understand how small businesses are run. And then finding people that can help benefit long-term when it comes to needing resources, whether it's through tech or other things that maybe I'm not skilled in, but having people So much going on. What is the most demanding thing that you're working through on a day-to-day? And that could be personal development, it could be around your team, it could be around these investment opportunities, but Yeah, I would say the most demanding thing right now in my business is obviously still selling houses and running a team. I think that probably takes up most of my time and being or trying to be in as many places at once. I think putting people into the right scenarios around me to help me, you know, delegate some of that's helped adding staff members, adding employees, but it's always kind of the scenario where you want to do as much as you can do and But for me, that's been huge is just delegating some I mean, look, I think some of that stuff is so real, especially when you're like The concept of focus that you talked about, the idea of being welcoming of opportunities to you, I think is huge. I think sometimes we get so zeroed in on a particular thing that a good opportunity could hit us over the head and we wouldn't even recognize it. I think it's worth talking about when you know that all of these things are demanding on you, you're trying to be focused in a particular area. As somebody that does all of that and is taking all of these things on, can you talk a little bit about like what you work through, like how much work is going into all of these things in a given week? Because I remember when I was early on in my career, it was like the opportunity to say yes to everything and the opportunity to create as many opportunities as possible. And I think it's incredible how much of that that you're able to do and you're taking advantage of. You have this superpower of time and then an ability to have an attention to the opportunity that presents itself. Not everybody does that. Just because you have it doesn't mean that people do it. How do you work through those decisions to have everything while still growing and scaling and I think it's becoming obsessed. Like, I talk about it all the time, but like, you have to become obsessed with what you want. And For me, if I am not obsessed with what I'm doing or not, doesn't get me going, doesn't drive me, I need to find something else to do. Because for me, there's different types of obsession, but obviously I'm obsessed with winning. But that can mean so many different things, whether it be through real estate businesses, investments, and they kind of all lead to that one goal for me. But When did that light bulb go off for you? About So I think I was always, you know, always had the winning mentality, winning mindset, but taking it being an obsession of making it happen was probably about a year and a half ago when I'm like, Hey, we either need to go all in on this or I was running the team and doing deals and buying investment properties, all that. It took more time than what Can you, I think of like, The obsession thing is such an interesting conversation because obsession, people chase work-life balance, and there's this negative perception around what obsession is, can you go a little deeper on what it means for you and how it's changed from when you started? You brought some baseball conversation into this. Can you talk a little bit about how this has evolved for you to your benefit? How it's evolved relationship, how Yeah, I think going back to the beginning of it all, it's like one obsession within whatever you're doing, but then how are you cultivating every little thing in those moments to lead in the same direction? But for me, it was like, hey, I'm becoming obsessed about this. Why am I becoming obsessed about this? What is this going to do for my family? What is this going to do for my lifestyle? What is this going to do for all the things that are incorporated in my life. And when I sat down with my financial advisor about a year and a half ago, like the goals that I wanted to hit weren't going to happen if I didn't become obsessed. And so that's really what triggered me to make that change and make that jump. I think I've always been not a perfectionist, but just like wanting to master my craft, always hardworking, like never lacked that. And I think I owe my parents, the world for giving me those, that skillset and that determination and that mindset. But beyond that is kind of what's shifted. And it's not just about work ethic, but it's, it's about, it's about a lot of things, but But yeah, the obsession piece I think is definitely a term that probably people look down upon, but me personally, I've never had what I would call like perfect work-life balance, but I Yeah. I think, um, a couple things, um, You had a fork in the road decision. It was like, change your goals or change your commitment to the goals that you have. And James Clear talks about if you're unwilling to perform the tasks and behaviors needed to achieve the goal that you've set, rid yourself of the desire. and change the path you're taking. And so like, so often you see folks that have these huge aspirations and they go tell everybody, or they put them on Instagram, or they eat, sleep, live, and breathe them, except the reality is they don't do anything to support them. And it's like, well, it would just be easier for you if you changed what the outcome was that you were pursuing. And so for increase your action or change your desires, and your decision's been pretty clear with It was a cool moment for me and just my personal growth and my personal mindset of, making that decision for myself. And I think obviously things are consistently changing as you mature and priorities change. But I go back to the idea of like, this is a very common thing. A lot of people say is, well, I just don't have time. I just don't have time. Well, I think the thing that you're saying you don't have time for just isn't a high enough priority. If your kid was in the hospital tomorrow or right now, and you said, I don't have time." No, you're going to go see your kid in the hospital. It's about a priority level and then making sure Yeah. The concept of like, show me your calendar and I'll show you I think we could get into some vulnerability for you. What is something that you know you want to take on that's been a goal of yours for a while that you're avoiding? And then what's I would say more of on the personal growth side in becoming a healthier person. That's been something that I've avoided forever. Growing up, I worked out all the time. I was active in sports, active when I was in college. And then as my life has transitioned, I'm blessed and healthy right now and don't have anything going on. But a lot of people, or at least myself included in that, don't make time for working out, taking care of your body, taking care of your health. So that's been like a vulnerable piece that I have yet to make impactful in my life. And I'd love to switch that and change that. I just have to find how that correlates to my goals. And Yeah. Concept of making the time like you had talked about. For someone listening today who feels stuck or feels like unsure about taking the next step or You know, why are you wanting to make a change if you are or why are you wanting to make a leap or Whatever you're trying to do, and then make sure that the people around you are holding you accountable to do that. I think a lot of the times it's yes, personal accountability, but. Same time, if you're surrounding yourself with people that. aren't doing what you wanna do, it's gonna be very easy to succumb to the peer pressure of fitting into the narrative of your surrounding. So I would say, one, surround yourself with where you wanna be, and action becomes a lot easier, because it's no fun to be the guy sitting on the sidelines when everyone else is winning. So that'd be like my one piece of advice is, if you have an area that you wanna go or a place you wanna be in, you have to surround yourself with that, and it becomes a lot easier to take action. Well, I think that fits the concept of what you had talked about earlier of being like the worst player on the team. And look, that's where friends are made. That's where relationships are built. And if you're the worst player on the team and you don't work at it, your jokes aren't as funny. You're not as cool. Like nobody cares about what you really have to offer because you're not building and you're not growing into the operation that you're a part of. And so, When you're the worst player on the team, you're pushed every single day. just to fit in. And I think that's a special thing. I mean, I walked down at Butler and played baseball there. And I remember the opening tryout my freshman year. And some of the guys that I was like trying to become friends with as a new freshman at school, like had concerns about me getting cut. And look, I shared those exact same concerns. And I remember when practices started, it was like I had to be the first person there. I had to be the last person to leave. I had to catch every bullpen. hit every extra round of batting practice just to get good enough to fit in. So then when I went to a party or I went to class with guys from the team, it was like, okay, this guy's all right. And it's like the Sandlot, if you've ever seen them, you know, like if you've seen the Sandlot, you know, like when Smalls catches the fly ball and then throws it into the infield, everyone's like, ah, he can play, he's all right. And so it's that extra work and that action you got to take to get better, you know? Yeah, I love that analogy. If you could leave the listeners with one principle around action, or what true action means to you, let's Set a two-week goal, not a year goal, and It's amazing what we oftentimes overestimate what we can accomplish in a day and we underestimate what we can accomplish in a year. Jared, where can folks find Yeah, you can find me on social media, all the platforms. We'd love for you guys to reach out to our team, Live Yeah, I can find it here. Give me 30 seconds. It shows you how poorly I am on social media. Realtor Realtor Jared Cowan, C-O-W-A-N on Instagram. Jared, this was awesome, man. Again, 230 deals, 80 million bucks. One of the top teams in Indianapolis. Kudos to you, man. I appreciate your time today and we'll catch you on the other side. Awesome. Thanks, Alex. Thanks for listening to Action Solves Everything. If today's episode pushed you, challenged you, or helped you even take one step forward, send it to someone who needs that same nudge. We all get better when we grow together. And if you're looking for a partnership that actually believes in coaching, collaboration, accountability, and becoming the best version of yourself, shoot me a message online on all social handles, alexmontagano, or at alexmontagano.com. Remember, Success rewards the ones who move. Now, take action, and