Keys to the Future: EXIT Realty’s New Chapter in Real Estate

From closing deals to opening doors to new opportunities, Tami Bonnell, CEO and Co-Chair of EXIT Realty, shares how EXIT’s human-centered approach is changing real estate for good. 🏘️

Featured on:
Tomorrow's World Today - S4E06 – Science Behind Relocation

Learn more about this topic:

• Evolution of Real Estate
• Psychology of Real Estate

Transcript

(0:00 - 0:28)
Welcome to the Tomorrow's World Today podcast. We sit down with experts, world-changing innovators, creators, and makers to explore how they're taking action to make tomorrow's world a better place for technology, science, innovation, sustainability, the arts, and more. On this episode, host George Davison, who is also the host of Tomorrow's World Today on the Science Channel, sits down with Tammy Bonnell, the CEO of Exit Realty International.

(0:28 - 1:56)
Tammy shares her remarkable journey from cleaning houses at the young age of 11 to leading a company built on human potential. She reveals how seizing opportunities, embracing failure, and fostering a culture of giving back transformed her life and career. Welcome, Tammy. 

Thank you. I'm glad to be here. I'm hoping that today you can talk with our audience a little bit. 

Maybe we could take two different directions today. If we could map your journey a little as an individual and how you accomplished what you've done in life, and then we'll map another journey like the business that you're working for and how that came to be. Does that sound fair? Yeah, that'd be great. 

Okay. So I'm sure you didn't start out as a CEO when you were in your high school days, did you? Absolutely not. So what were the days like when you were first starting out? Can you take us back into some history? Actually, we started working really young. 

I'm a daughter of Irish immigrants, so I started cleaning houses for new construction, subdivisions that were being built. I think I started when I was 11, and I worked on weekends because I could be dropped off in a subdivision and picked up at the end of the day because obviously I didn't drive, and I could still go from house to house and I didn't need anybody to drive me anymore. So I started out at $2 an hour, cleaning homes, scraping windows, getting all the new stickers off of everything and making the home immaculate for somebody to move in.

(1:57 - 2:35)
When I was 13 and still doing that, I was sitting in a window, scraping the window, and buyers came in for a final walkthrough on the house to see the house they were relocating from another part of the country. They came through and the wall between the kitchen and the dining room was not supposed to be there. It was supposed to be more of an open concept, and the realtor never shared that with the builder. 

So there's screaming and yelling and everybody's fighting and woman's crying, and I'm just in the window going, Dear God, please make me invisible. When they left, he put his fist through the wall because he was so mad. Now he has to take down the wall, and he's got so much more work to do, and it was because they didn't do their job.

(2:36 - 2:54)
I said, I think you hit a stud. I think you broke your hand. He said, Drive me to the hospital. 

I lied about my age. I drove him to the hospital, and he did break his arm. We're driving back and forth, and he's complaining about how hard it is to find somebody that's professional, and how hard it is to find somebody that can sell.

(2:54 - 3:20)
He's so frustrated, and I said, How hard is it to sell a house? We started having this conversation, and I said, You just have to paint the picture for them of what it's going to be. He said, You think you can sell houses? I said, Yeah, I do. He said, Good. 

Start Saturday. I got paid $500 a house, and my world changed dramatically. All the way back to even being really young, my dad always said, Watch for opportunity.

(3:21 - 3:53)
It didn't matter whether that was an opportunity to help a neighbor that looked like they were struggling, or an opportunity to teach somebody something, or if it was an opportunity for you to grow, he would say it all the time. He would drive down by something and say, That's worth money, and that's not, and this is why. I loved, I used to beg to go to the planning board meetings and watch him work. 

He was masterful with having conversations with people and remembering them. I just begged, Please, just let me go. I don't know too many kids that really got a kick out of that, but I did.

(3:53 - 4:10)
I loved working with people and finding out how they ticked. I took him at his word, I guess, of watching for opportunity. I was very lucky. 

What great advice. Wonderful that your dad shared that with you. For an innovator and an inventor, you can't do anything if you're not looking for opportunity.

(4:10 - 4:29)
You're always seeking the challenges. What's causing the challenge for that person over there, or these groups of people? If you can find solutions, then they reward you with their business or bring you on board. That's my statement to everyone we have in leadership, be a solution.

(4:30 - 4:41)
I think that's really where it starts. You can solve people's problems and help them with issues, but you have to really pay attention. I think the most important thing is that you have to meet them where they are.

(4:42 - 4:56)
So often people want to lead somebody and they take them off into here, but that person's right here. You have to meet them on their level, you have to meet them on their turf in order to be able to be the solution and help them go to the next level. I also think you need to surround yourself.

(4:56 - 5:17)
I say this to my children and my grandchildren. You want to surround yourself with people that push you out of your comfort zone, people that make you want to be a better person, people that just make you want to be better. You also want to keep a few people around you that keep you grounded, that tell you you're getting too carried away or you've got to be prepared for that.

(5:17 - 5:32)
So having somebody that's a little bit like the last Boy Scout around isn't such a bad idea either. You want to expose yourself to experiences. The more you experience, the more you can see that there are so many choices out there for what you can be.

(5:32 - 5:50)
A lot of times we stay in a little bubble. Whatever our family worked at, and the immediate close family and friends around us, a lot of times we see that as the bubble and that's the picture of where we are. Or we look on people that are famous and think that that must be a wonderful life.

(5:50 - 6:01)
Technology, unfortunately, has brought that to us. I think that you really need to find out what are those things when you feel the best about yourself. What are you doing? It really isn't such a bad idea to really put together a list.

(6:01 - 6:31)
What are the things that I really enjoy? What do I really love doing? I know for me, the best part of my job is that I get to catch somebody doing something good all the time. So I can see something in someone and whether I point them one to five degrees in a different direction or completely turn them around, people become what you tell them they can be. So finding somebody that can mentor you, that you feel like you really resonate with that person, I think that makes a really big difference.

(6:31 - 6:51)
Not only is that the biggest difference between happiness and fulfillment, fulfilled when you really feel like you're making a difference and you're adding value somewhere, and value definitely equals income, so over time, the more value you add, the more you're going to have. It's not just income in dollars. It's really in that fulfilled life.

(6:51 - 7:11)
But you've got to try new things in order to find out what are you really good at. That's wonderful. I'm sure there are some folks out there right now wondering what is real estate? Maybe how some real estate is more valuable than other real estate so they can get a little vision there.

(7:11 - 7:19)
Can you provide some insight there? Sure. Well, the number one dream in the United States is to own your own home. So it's a pretty good thing to represent.

(7:20 - 7:35)
Usually people, especially in their first home, it's the most rewarding thing. There's a value in home ownership of really feeling like you belong to a community. In fact, they show that communities are improved the more people have home ownership instead of renting.

(7:35 - 7:51)
So you start to see a value there. There are a tremendous amount of people that are making a great living listing and selling real estate so that they're a real estate agent or they own a brokerage and they're really good at getting more and better out of other people. But there are also great people that represent a certain lane.

(7:51 - 8:08)
They represent strictly working with people serving in the military and helping them understand what their benefits are and working down that lane. Or they work with just selling waterfront. Or they work with widows and single moms to teach them how to understand finances better so that they have a more solid future for themselves and their families.

(8:09 - 8:17)
I think the more you tie a purpose to it, the better it is. And there are a tremendous amount of people that invest in real estate. And it's the biggest return you can possibly get.

(8:17 - 8:39)
And so the more educated you become about it, the better off you are. We find that it doesn't matter what your personality type is, most people will find a lane. Whether that's helping people, and you love that idea of helping first-time home buyers, then you need to definitely be more fused to technology because they are and you need to communicate with them the way they want to be communicated with.

(8:39 - 9:06)
But we have people that are helping seniors and helping families stay together so that they're not finding out about what their parents' wishes are when it's too late, after there's something up, right? People that are representing new construction. People that are being amazing innovators. We're seeing shopping malls turned into 55 and older projects because of where we are right now, right? We're seeing hotels going into affordable housing because there are not as many people staying in hotels.

(9:06 - 9:29)
And this advice, by the way, for anybody, not just real estate, but in everything. I've always had a perspective of, I do a six-week action plan so that I plan in advance for the next six weeks, right? How I want people to feel, what I want for expectations, what I need to be learning, who I should be surrounding myself with. But I also look at what I should be paying attention to.

(9:29 - 9:56)
So I have the 30,000-foot view, so you kind of have the world view of whether that's your industry or something else you're interested in. So if I was interested in money, the Wall Street Journal would be part of that 30,000-foot view, right? And then you want to have the 2,000-foot view, your individual province or state, so that you have a perspective of what's available where you live, if that's where you want to stay. Because you have to find a need you can feel better than anyone else and fit the demographics of where you are.

(9:56 - 10:09)
So you really need to understand that state mentality and what is there and what are there for opportunities. But then you need the street-level view of exactly where you are and really having a perspective. And there's two other places you need to have a perspective.

(10:09 - 10:31)
The person that you're serving, whether you're working in a restaurant or you're owning the restaurant or whatever it is, I need to have a perspective on you. And then more important than anything else, I need to have a perspective on myself. What am I really good at? What are the gifts that I have? Because we all don't have the same gifts, but every single person, regardless of their gift, could be in real estate or another field.

(10:32 - 10:54)
Hopefully they find a love for it, because you really want to love what you do. But they can find a gift. We have people that are not necessarily people people, but they're so good with technology that they can get all the information and they can do so much background work that they really help somebody or they can get all the information so that they can really help understand new construction to really help that person make their best decisions.

(10:55 - 11:04)
Somebody that's amazing with numbers can become an investor. So it's just making sure that you're down the level of your genius. You're staying in that lane of genius.

(11:05 - 11:28)
We're going to see so many changes coming down the pike. We're going to see so many things that are going to change that where I'm suggesting to all my people, they pay attention to municipalities and planning boards because there's so many zoning changes that are happening. We're seeing properties, because of affordability, being literally shipment containers turning them into a home, right? Not just tiny homes, but we're also seeing lifestyle.

(11:29 - 11:43)
So we're seeing a subdivision that is 100% organic and they're all growing things together. We're seeing shopping malls turned into a project and they're all entrepreneurs and they all share all the tools in the middle. So there are so many opportunities.

(11:43 - 12:00)
It's just being honestly aware of what's out there and looking at is there a lane here that feels good to me. Right. Great advice. 

Great advice. Thank you very much for that. So let's turn for a moment now that we have some of that.

(12:00 - 12:27)
Let's look at exit reality because we want to understand not only how did this person like yourself, how you started out and how you got here, but the company. How did the company start out? Did it start out in a big international building or did it start in a basement? What happened? It started by literally renting a very small part of a sod company. I thought they owned the building.

(12:28 - 12:35)
It was in a very small part in the back of the sod company. They actually had one room as a training room. They didn't even have an office when they first started.

(12:35 - 12:46)
They sold regions in Canada. So they were individual provinces, actually smaller than a province, about a million in population each. And then when they came to the United States, we bought individual states.

(12:46 - 12:54)
I started off as a regional owner. I bought the rights to the New England states. And by the second year, our founder and chairman recognized that I had some skill set.

(12:54 - 13:15)
So I became vice president over the U.S. The following year, I became president over the U.S. And in 2012, I became the CEO. But what I love is that Ariana Huffington wrote an article, and I think this will really resonate with the people that listen to your show. She wrote an article a couple years ago on the top 100 companies and how so many of them signed an agreement.

(13:15 - 13:29)
Peter Drucker, who's a great business writer, his entire focus was that a CEO's responsibility is to make a profit. And we've evolved over time, and it really took a lot of other companies. Literally, they didn't start until a couple years ago.

(13:30 - 13:45)
The consumer feels that 65% of the consumers feel like a company should give back to the communities they serve. They feel like they should make sure they help with mental health, they help with an opportunity for all of their people to grow, where it was just the bottom line before. But we started that as a company.

(13:46 - 13:54)
As an entire organization, we knew the foundation when it started. So our founder and chairman, 1996. So think of how long ago that was.

(13:54 - 14:04)
Money from every transaction goes to charity. We've actually contributed over $6 million to charity. We started off, and we're always, because we're privately held, we can move like a speedboat.

(14:04 - 14:19)
So we started off with partnering with Habitat for Humanity, donated $4 million to Habitat, and we all built houses together. And then we asked those questions, what if? And boy, is that a great question to ask yourself, what if? We just did something a little different. And so we wanted to touch more lives.

(14:19 - 14:34)
So now we have the spirit of Exit, so we can touch thousands of communities at a time. And so our offices or agents, they put together a charity and do a fundraiser, and Exit matches the funds. And so we're able to touch so many more lives in such a short period of time.

(14:35 - 14:50)
And the office gets closer, they create a culture, they're part of the community, and it really makes a difference. We wanted to make sure everybody felt part of. So our company has residual income that's provided for anybody in the company can introduce an agent into the company and receive residual income.

(14:51 - 14:58)
But administrators don't end up doing that. So we actually do a bonus for the administrative staff. So money from every transaction goes into that.

(14:58 - 15:19)
And in January, they get a bonus from Exit International, so we can retain really good people by treating them well. So it's important that you're attracting hardworking people who have found something that they like, and they can make a good contribution to what you're trying to build, right? Right. So we looked at the top seven things that people in this industry want.

(15:19 - 15:31)
Number one, they want leadership. So we made sure that we sold regions so that people would own individual states or provinces. We taught them public speaking because he or she who speaks leads to make sure that they really understand that opportunity.

(15:31 - 15:43)
And we actually turned down more people than we accept as franchisees so that they know that it's going to be a good leader that's responsible that's in that marketplace. Then they want education. People that are top in the business want education.

(15:44 - 15:51)
So we provide education from every single angle. I just got my license. What do I do now? All the way to the consummate professional making millions of dollars.

(15:52 - 16:08)
Webinars, Techinars, live interactive, total immersion, so that we can teach them the way they learn best. Number three, they want help with technology. And that's so important. 

It's the help with. Because implementation is the issue, right? Getting them to be able to implement the tools. So we actually have a vice president of technology engagement.

(16:08 - 16:20)
She speaks English, Spanish, and technology. And she teaches them how to utilize it. So they actually bring their device and learn hands-on so that they will actually apply it instead of leaving them to fend for themselves.

(16:20 - 16:29)
Number four, they want help with the details. We had a conversation about that earlier, but with the details. So technology, single entry, user friendly.

(16:30 - 16:48)
Now I have help with the details so I can be in front of people, which is where I want to be, right? Number five, they want a marketing program they can track so our marketing is intuitive. Number six, they want image. What better image than people giving back to people like our charitable organization and giving back to everybody within the company so that we're really paying attention to it.

(16:48 - 16:57)
And number seven, they want a vested interest. So that's why residual income. If we're in the same office together, I'm going to want to help you because as you do better, I do better.

(16:57 - 17:06)
But it creates this unbelievable culture and synergy in the office so that it's much like a family. Everybody can't wait to help each other. That's made a huge difference.

(17:06 - 17:11)
We knew that foundation going in. We weren't winging it. That was the foundation we were going to build on.

(17:11 - 17:16)
So our entire organization was built on human potential. Oh, my. That's wonderful.

(17:17 - 17:27)
So you believe in the human potential. That was going to be one of my questions, close to one of my questions for you today. We'll skip that one because you just hit that one right out of the park.

(17:28 - 17:45)
Okay, so let's chat a little then about what led you in the business to achieving this CEO position. You didn't get here overnight, and I'm sure you had some ups and downs along the way, right? We all fall down. We need to get back up.

(17:45 - 18:01)
Can you talk a little bit about some of your, let's say, failing your way forwards as well as some victories? Yes, I think actually failure is a gift. I'm a martial artist, right? My whole family does martial arts. And the first thing they teach you in martial arts when you start taking it seriously is how to fall down.

(18:02 - 18:17)
The first thing they teach you is how to fall because you will. And I think that that's such a good thing to know that at the very beginning that you're going to fall. If you're not taking chances and you're not jumping in with both feet, you're probably missing some opportunities.

(18:17 - 18:31)
I was really lucky to be around my dad. The biggest thing he said all the time was watch for opportunity. And so it didn't matter what that opportunity was, and I think that was really a great chance at jumping in.

(18:32 - 19:01)
But we've been through a few recessions, and so I was in the middle of companies that I was working with a company, and we hit the worst recession, and we were selling our home in Tennessee and moving back up to New England with three young children. And the sale to our house fell apart because the market tanked, and I needed to be up to do the job. And in the middle, because we couldn't leave the home behind, I actually had to get a different job, and it was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

(19:01 - 19:17)
I actually sold labor, and I had to do it for 12 weeks until we got the house sold to be able to move up to a new area, and it taught me so much about people in such a short period of time. It was absolutely incredible. In the beginning, I was scared to death.

(19:17 - 19:42)
I was finding people that were homeless, finding people that were coming in and getting paid by the day that had health issues, some mental health issues, and some people that even had addictions. And so it was a very scary environment, but then I realized that people are just people, and I realized most of them, they were just really hungry. And so I started baking bread.

(19:42 - 19:53)
No kidding. I baked banana bread and all these kinds of bread, and I would bring it in there so that I could feed them before they went to work. And a lot of them would take that food with them because they had family to feed that they didn't have the money to feed.

(19:53 - 20:09)
They got paid by the day. And just that humility from that lesson was just unbelievable. I was really successful very young, and so it was really good for me to have a come-up business and really realize that you don't have everything instantly.

(20:09 - 20:31)
You cannot develop character if you haven't had experiences where you've failed. I've failed in jobs that I was not qualified for, and I definitely didn't belong doing. In fact, with Exit, when we were really building, and we were building like crazy, and then the recession hit, and our company, even with looking at all of these obstacles, we were a company in Canada.

(20:32 - 20:52)
They don't have any foreclosures in Canada. So when the recession hit in the United States, and they saw all these transactions that weren't coming together, they didn't understand because they have the best banking system in the world in Canada. So these people with so little of a down payment and now struggling, we had all these homes that were underwater, and short sales back then weren't really short.

(20:52 - 21:13)
They had to go through a foreclosure process, and there was just a tremendous range of emotion. And so myself and the founder, I was president over the U.S. at the time, and we got a call from our chief operating officer, and here we are sitting in a hotel lobby on this phone call, and she said, we're going to run out of money in 90 days. Oh, my goodness.

(21:13 - 21:30)
And I'm responsible for thousands of people that are in the company, and I introduced them into the company, a good chunk of those brokers and regional owners into the company, and the most magical thing happened. All three of us at the same time said, we're not laying anybody off. We built this company on human potential, and humans are too valuable.

(21:30 - 21:42)
And so we decided we would outsell and outthink our way out of the recession, and we did. Good job. And so that built a position of trust with our people, and I'm telling you, I would go two weeks' time, at least two nights a week, I never went to bed.

(21:43 - 22:00)
I would go out till 5 o'clock in the morning, drive home, take a shower, and do it again. It was unbelievable. But the respect and the level of trust that we got from everybody, when COVID hit, our competitors were laying people off with just a broadcast email, so nobody even got a personal conversation.

(22:01 - 22:11)
150 to 300 people just let them go like that, or they'd do a Zoom call but not look at anybody's faces. And we said, what are we going to do? And it wasn't just us. We said, we're not laying anybody off.

(22:12 - 22:16)
We'll take a cut and pay. Everybody in leadership, we're responsible. We're going to take a cut and pay.

(22:16 - 22:22)
I tell everybody all the time, my responsibility is for our people first. Nothing else matters. The rest will take care of itself.

(22:23 - 22:47)
And so we put together a stimulus package worth in excess of $50 million, and we taught them Eckhart Tolle, and we taught them meditation and yoga, and also how to ramp up their business for us to get back out again when they were sheltered in place. And it wasn't just the people in leadership this time. It was everybody all the way down to the person answering the phone because they felt trust from how we handled a crisis during the recession.

(22:47 - 23:07)
They all trusted us and had complete trust, and everybody raised their hand and said, how can I help? That's wonderful. So you brought these skill sets into the organization, and you're teaching and leading your organization with these kind of basic principles, and that's how you build a stable organization. So people trust you.

(23:08 - 23:13)
Very helpful information. Can we continue? Absolutely. I think there's a lot more here.

(23:13 - 23:18)
We're going to unearth it, Tammy. So did you go to college? I didn't finish. You didn't finish.

(23:18 - 23:22)
I didn't finish. I started making so much money I decided to stop. Good for you.

(23:22 - 23:32)
And it's been through waves, so it wasn't just about the money, but I found my passion, right? So I didn't finish. I stayed passionate about the lane I was in. Yes.

(23:33 - 23:51)
So if you find what you love and you're passionate about it and you put the hours in and you're helpful, people will notice that, won't they? Absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, you can get involved in other organizations that you're passionate about, even if it's some sort of charity, or a lot of times you can find your passion by accident.

(23:51 - 23:55)
Right. I mean, just getting involved in other things. Yes, so true.

(23:55 - 24:15)
I got involved with Boy Scouts, and I loved science when I was younger, and it led me to innovation and invention. And so they didn't have a class on invention when I was growing up, you know, so we had to kind of invent the class on inventing. And it's fun because it's always different, a new challenge.

(24:15 - 24:26)
But you have to really want to solve challenges for people. You can't do innovation or invention if you really are looking at things as it's just going to be a job. No.

(24:26 - 24:40)
You must bring your own observational talents and a desire to do good, and then opportunity will be found. That's right. And, you know, the happiest you are is while you're growing, and so you don't want to be in a job that you're just going to atrophy in.

(24:40 - 24:43)
It's just a job. Yes. It's just about going and getting that paycheck.

(24:44 - 24:50)
You really want to find something that can be a passion project for you. Okay. So let's see here.

(24:50 - 25:18)
Do you believe anybody can become successful? I absolutely do. And I've witnessed so many people that were – I just had a conversation with a broker yesterday that the only time they ever got Christmas presents was when Red Cross showed up, right? And so they have so many stories of the Salvation Army coming in and that being their only gifts and that being their only food. And so many of them not knowing.

(25:18 - 25:27)
We have a regional owner that's in Mississippi and Alabama. She didn't have running water. And they didn't have any running water, and they had no electricity.

(25:27 - 25:39)
Wow. And she lived on a farm, and they had to literally grow or kill what they ate, and that was it. And she didn't know that she didn't have anything until she got to school, and she was bullied like crazy.

(25:39 - 25:59)
And you wouldn't believe what a strong, elegant, professional woman she is and how many people she's helped and how many people whose lives she's changed. I've witnessed people that were addicts that are now helping entire communities and rebuilding entire communities, building homes all across the community. You can do anything you set your mind to.

(25:59 - 26:14)
And once you show interest, it's amazing how many people are going to be interested in you and wanting to help you because you showed interest. I say this to my kids all the time, but it takes ten seconds of courage. That's it.

(26:14 - 26:30)
Ten seconds of courage to ask somebody for a little advice or a little help or say, I'm interested in this. Can you give me a suggestion on where I should go? And you wouldn't believe how many people. Most human beings are inherently good by nature, and you wouldn't believe how often they're willing to absolutely help you.

(26:31 - 26:48)
I go, I travel, and I normally, when we're not in these circumstances, I speak a couple hundred times a year. And right now, it's probably this year, it'll probably be about 60, and then it'll go up over that. And I always go into communities and find an opportunity, as long as my time permits, to go into a school or to go into a university.

(26:49 - 27:06)
And I know there's tons of other people that do it too. And sometimes it just takes somebody asking, right? Yes, that's right. Hey, I'd love for you to give us some advice, or I'd love to bounce something off you, or do you have a few minutes? And most people that are successful, by the way, they went through a lot to get there, so they know what it feels like.

(27:06 - 27:14)
So they're absolutely willing to help somebody else. That's great. Ami, you've been so kind to our guests today.

(27:14 - 27:22)
I can't thank you enough for being on the show. We wish you the best of luck, and thank you so much for coming out. Thank you. 

It was great. Thank you. It's been a pleasure.

(27:23 - 27:41)
Thank you for listening to this episode of Tomorrow's World Today Podcast. Join us next time as we continue to explore the worlds of inspiration, creation, innovation, and production. Discover more at tomorrowsworldtoday.com, connect with us on social media at TWTExplore, and find us wherever podcasts are available.