No excuses for stupid behavior in real estate

Leigh Brown took the stage for the #ICNY panel No Excuses for Stupid Behavior in Real Estate. Brown is a well- (and out-) spoken broker/owner of Re/Max Executive Realty in Charlotte, North Carolina.

If you’ve ever seen a Leigh Brown video (perhaps on Inman?), you knew to expect a straight-talking, North Carolina broker who will call everyone out on their shit — and that’s exactly what she did.

But in fairness, Brad Inman told her she could talk about whatever she wanted to, which she said is “the best thing that can ever be said to Leigh Brown.” So here it is:

Why are you being so hateful?

“What happened to showing a little grace to each other?” Brown asked. She said she gets trolled on the Internet all the time.

“You don’t know what people are going through, so why are you judging? Stop it,” she said.

Brown herself has been told to get Botox, and people have called her Gomer Pyle due to her accent. Her response was simply: stop talking shit on my accent.

“We have all become eighth-grade mean girls, and shame on us for that,” Brown said. She believes in being herself sans excuses and that’s a sentiment that echoed throughout.

Leigh Brown

In fact, she recounted making a mistake in the form of an off-color joke and being asked to shut up and stay off stage by the National Association of Realtors. Shame on an organization that doesn’t allow us to be human, she said. Yet, clearly, she continues to be herself regardless of what people say, and support the advocacy efforts of the NAR (more on that later).

She spoke of teaching her children to learn and love the core of a person’s being rather than noticing the differences, while encouraging them to be themselves without making excuses.

Drop the excuses and hustle

However, when it came to excuses that agents make, tolerance was not the message. Rather, agents need to stop making excuses and do the work. Brown told the audience to forget about those coaches who swear they’ll get you 100 deals this year.

So how do agents succeed? “It’s hustle — it’s work. Y’all are gonna have to get off your dead ass and work,” Brown said. “The ones who hustle succeed.”

Shrieks and applause greeted her comment when she said: “We can’t count on the industry to educate Realtors. If you want your broker to do more training, then get your ass in that chair with them.”

“Consumers hate us because we brag about how much money we make,” Brown continued.

Just stop with the #blessed. Jesus didn’t bless you with those sold houses — that was your hard work y’all, she said.

And when we are successful as an industry, we need to stop bragging about our commissions. You might have earned every dollar of that huge commission, but shut up about it, she said.

The big takeaway was: get out of the normal zone. It’s not any fun there. You’re gonna have as many fans as enemies. Be you, and take a stand. She said elections are her Superbowl and encouraged everyone to choose one: Trump or Hillary. She later said she used those examples because they are polarizing (“and the Bernie fans are outside smoking weed”).

However you choose to vote, Brown encourages all to write a check to the NAR because they are the Realtor super PAC.

Email Dani Vanderboegh.