Conscious Success Co (00:00.997)
Hi, Blakely. Thank you so much for coming today and being on the pod. I'm so excited to have you. And for those listening, I have had the privilege of getting to watch over the last, I don't know, like six years or so as you have made this pivot from tech into real estate and really built this thriving real estate business. think you're in the top 1 % of agents at Engel & Volcker. Is your current company, is that what we call it?
Blakely Hull (00:28.044)
Yeah, yeah, Rich, yeah.
Conscious Success Co (00:29.807)
Brokerage, exactly. And it's been so cool to see as you've disrupted the space, focused on first time home, focused on first time home, my God, why can I not say that? Focused on first time homeowners and really like used marketing in innovative ways and just getting to see you build this like so boldly and so authentically has been such a privilege. So I'm so excited to have you here and personally get to ask you.
Blakely Hull (00:40.172)
You
Conscious Success Co (00:55.277)
all the questions behind the curtains of what that journey has been like. Thank you so much for giving us your time today.
Blakely Hull (01:01.291)
Of course, I'm excited to be here.
Conscious Success Co (01:03.481)
Okay, so let's go way back to the beginning. I love to start with kind of our origin story. Tell us a little bit about Blakely as a little girl. Like what were you like and what characteristics can you see now maybe that even show up in your life and career that can be tied all the way back then to Blakely as a little girl?
Blakely Hull (01:21.13)
I love that question. So I actually come from a family of real estate. So it wasn't totally foreign to me. My mom was a very successful broker in Texas and I was an only child. So for better or for worse, I was drug along to all of her showings and client meetings and all of that. And from a very early age, she would tell me, say this, don't say this, do this, don't say this, go turn on all the lights, whatever it was. So I got to see a lot of the behind the scenes with her and just shadowing her.
My dad was an entrepreneur slash lawyer, which don't usually go together, but he definitely raised me to be very business minded. And so what I mean by that is, for example, every single year in January, we would sit down and we would have a man to woman talk from the time that I can remember as five years old, probably six years old. I don't even know how early we started, but I would have to set goals.
And he would literally take out his legal notepad and write them down in different categories. So goals around friends, goals around school, goals around household things. I don't even remember how, I just remember them for my entire life. So it had to have been when I was five, six, seven, eight, I don't know, whenever he started them. And then we would, to my dismay, he would bring out that same legal pad the next year and we would check in on our goals.
Conscious Success Co (02:23.532)
How old were you when you were having these man to woman talks? Like, what age did this start?
Blakely Hull (02:41.204)
and we would revisit those and then reset new goals for the next year. And that's actually a practice that I still do today. So that, and he would do other things like, I started a lot of businesses as I think probably a lot of kids do, a bracelet making companies and lemonade stands and car washing and present wrapping and all these different things. But he would take it to the next level. And this is definitely something I wanna do for my daughter. And I would have this vision or I had this idea of a company, a company I wanted to start.
And he would say, okay, great. I will give you a loan for whatever supplies you need, the wrapping paper, the yarn for the bracelet making company or whatever it was. But you have to pay me back and with interest. And we would sit down and he made me write a business plan for what my business was going to be. How much was I going to charge, et cetera. And he would critique and give me feedback. And then once we established the business plan, he would give me the cash. I would go buy all the materials.
and he would hold me accountable to paying him back and showing my revenue and all that good stuff. he was, I didn't realize it at the time, I thought it was annoying, but like now looking back, I again, wanna do this for my daughter because it was really that early training in entrepreneurship that is definitely practices that I still use today.
Conscious Success Co (03:57.153)
That's so interesting. And so you mentioned you found it annoying. it like every year that you did it, you're like, moaning, kicking and screaming, kind of going to the table to do it.
Blakely Hull (04:04.11)
No other kid had to do it. I was like, dad, no one else is doing this. I want to go outside and play. But he was consistent.
Conscious Success Co (04:09.156)
Right, but you were still internalizing those lessons regardless. And did you feel like pressure to follow in his kind of entrepreneurial path or what was kind of modeled in terms of like the definition of success that you saw between, you know, your mom and your dad growing up? What did that mean to you?
Blakely Hull (04:14.232)
for sure.
Blakely Hull (04:29.346)
That's a good question. mean, I so you know, this is also before the time of iPads at the dinner table and all of that. So, you know, we had family dinner every night and we would sit down and inevitably almost every night, you know, again, I was an only child, so I didn't have siblings to say, oh, what was your day like? And did you know who did you play with at school and all of that? It was what happened to my mom in business that day? What deal did she close? What new client did she? What frustration did she have? What, you know, problem did she have with the contract, etc.?
And my dad, being the lawyer and being the business-minded person that he was, would always jump in and assist and ask her questions and think through problems and all of that. And so I remember their partnership, certainly. They weren't formally partners, but just in a spousal way as something that I really aspired to. And my dad and I were, my dad unfortunately passed when I was in college, but I was a total daddy's girl. And he and I were...
really, really close. I interned for him a few summers and worked for him early on. And I always wanted to be a lawyer just like him until I realized I had to go to law school. And I was like, I don't want to do that. But I always have had that entrepreneurship mindset in the back of my head. And it is as annoying as I found it at times when I was little, I also secretly enjoyed it.
and loved starting my own businesses and loved how much he pushed me and let me go and thrive in these different things and was always incredibly supportive. It was not met with critiques or beating me up if I made a mistake or anything like that. It was always pushing me forward. And I think just subliminally or however you want to say it, that was something that really stuck with me. And while I didn't go directly to entrepreneurship out of college, I had a couple of different careers actually, until I got into real estate, it was always something that I kept coming back to.
Conscious Success Co (06:16.773)
And did seeing, I think especially for young girls, seeing our moms working or how that looks and how they're balancing that and family. And it can create either something we want to run towards and emulate and model in our own lives or something that we really resist. I think I saw a mom who is a consultant and who would be working really long hours and super stressed and struggling to balance everything. And that became something where I was like,
Blakely Hull (06:32.129)
you.
Conscious Success Co (06:42.797)
I'm not sure that's it for me, but it's very interesting that you've gone into real estate. So do you remember having that impression of like, that's something I want to do back then, or did that come later after kind of trying different paths first?
Blakely Hull (06:55.502)
Well, it's funny. So my mom always wanted me to go into real estate and her dream would have been that she could retire and pass the business in Texas to me. And so she felt like she was raising her next little generation to take over the business. But like any good kid, you don't do what your parents tell you to do. And so I went my own journey, went my own path. And we can talk about kind of how I made the transition or how I realized real estate was the next journey for me or the right journey for me.
But when I was at Uber, I was super happy in the beginning, loving what I did, but ultimately I sort of plateaued and was just not as happy anymore. And that's when I decided ultimately to make the pivot. And I'll never forget, I called my mom and my dad had already passed and my mom and I were close, but my mom never really understood what I did. She understood that I worked at Uber because she used the product, but as a consultant before that, she was like, I have no idea what that means. And so I called her and I was like, mom, guess what? I have had this epiphany. I have done a lot of soul searching.
I am going into real estate, what you've always wanted. Aren't you so excited?" And she was like, what? How could you do that? You have such a great career. You've done so great. Like, why would you go into real estate? Do you know how hard this business is? And I was shocked. I was like, wait, I thought this was what you always wanted. And of course I didn't do it for her. I did it for me. But it was this moment I was like, oh, you know, maybe that wasn't always her dream for me. But I do, now it's really fun because we talk.
You know, we talk about my deals all the time and she's retired now. So like she gets to live vicariously through me. And it's such a fun, know, unique part of our relationship that we never really had before.
Conscious Success Co (08:24.463)
So fun.
Conscious Success Co (08:29.189)
Okay, so I want to get into all of that in the pivot, you so you went to USC and then out of school joined Teach for America. that right? Talk to us about that, you know the motivation behind that like did you think you were gonna become a teacher or what drove that decision initially out of college?
Blakely Hull (08:36.887)
Yes.
Blakely Hull (08:46.926)
Great question. one thing I didn't mention when you asked about qualities as a child, I also loved to teach. So I, again, only child had entertained myself. And when my mom was cooking dinner, I had a room in my house where I would sit out all my stuffies or my dolls and teach them something. And I would get all the younger kids in the neighborhood over and teach them something. And I had a whiteboard. I remember one year for Christmas, was the best Christmas ever. I got an overhead projector, if you remember what those were.
which I was so excited about. It was the most amazing gift and totally, totally. And like mark up the overhead projector and it was awesome. But I, so I always sort of had this passion for teaching in me and just something that I did from an early age. I remember I was, I did an internship in college and I was the guy who I interned for was, ended up being a great mentor of mine. And he told me, he was like,
Conscious Success Co (09:18.735)
You're like, can do slideshows now and project those.
Blakely Hull (09:39.822)
I was like, I don't know what I want to do. And he's like, well, think back to when you were five, when you didn't have the constraints of the world around you, when you weren't limited by creativity, when you weren't told what you should do because you were this or that or in this family or whatever. Like, what were you doing? What were you passionate about? And I was like, my God, teaching. That was what I was passionate about. And my dad had just passed and he was always, he believed in giving back and always supporting folks that weren't as privileged as I was growing up.
He always modeled that from a very early age and I just, know, Teacher America was, you know, kept recruiting me and all that as they do in college and I just realized like, you know, this is something that my dad would be really proud of and I wanted to give back in his honor and, his legacy and it was a passion of mine. And so I didn't necessarily think that I was going to be a teacher forever, but I was incredibly honored and excited to get to be a part of that journey and, you know, I...
taught for two years, special ed in LA. And it was life changing. I I probably grew more than my kids did, frankly.
Conscious Success Co (10:46.327)
Yeah, and I'm sure today you use some of those skills so much that were present back when you were a little girl and also I'm sure really honed in those couple of years. So it's so interesting when we can do that retrospective and then see how there are all these building blocks. Yeah, I imagine so. Okay, so you did two years of Teach for America, then you joined Deloitte as a consultant, is that right? And then talk to us about what then took you to Uber in its early days.
Blakely Hull (10:52.334)
you.
Blakely Hull (11:00.613)
teaching the deals is harder than teaching kids.
Blakely Hull (11:16.59)
So, you know, interestingly, I was really happy at Deloitte. I felt like I had great projects, I had great mentors, I had great partners looking out for me, and I had just, it was great. But I had met someone who was actually my onboarding advisor when I joined Deloitte, who became a mentor friend, and he had moved over to Uber. And so he kept kind of calling and saying, hey, I'm having so much fun. I actually ran into him at a Deloitte alumni event, and he was just glowing.
like in a way that I had never seen him before. And he was so excited by what he was doing. And I was like, I'm kind of curious. what, I mean, I love what I'm doing, but you look like a whole nother level. Like what's going on? What's in the water there at Uber? And so he was pretty early on. And so he, they actually didn't even have a role. He just like, you need to join this company. And so he kind of, throughout the interview process, I just interviewed, not even, I mean, I wasn't even planning on taking the role.
Conscious Success Co (12:10.032)
for a job, you're just like, hey, it's me. Do you want me?
Blakely Hull (12:11.798)
I think it's like one thing happened, the next thing happened to Legend X and I was all of sudden interviewing and I like, I didn't even mean to do this. I'm happy at Deloitte, I'm not trying to leave. But that's usually when you say yes to things and you're at least open to the ideas usually when some of the best things fall in your lap. And so I did end up getting a job and the role that they had had for me or described for me in the interview, I didn't even know what I was interviewing for because they kept changing the role based off of what I was saying in the interviews. well, we're going to pivot this. Actually, we could put her here. We could put her here.
And so ultimately they ended up like carving out a pretty perfect role for me. And I, you know, just as it was early and Uber was just taking off and I was like, you know, as a consumer of the product, I was like, this is cool. So I joined and, you know, always felt like Deloitte will always be there. I can always go back. But this opportunity may not always present itself.
Conscious Success Co (13:01.444)
And to be able to join a company like at the time, Uber was like red hot growing, not even, know, what it is today and you're on that rocket ship. And it sounds like even through that interview process being like, okay, we're gonna put you over here, put you over there. There's so much opportunity and so many jobs being created and so many pivots available that that just seemed like the energy, the current was flowing in that direction and you decided to trust it. Was that hard or were you like, Deloitte is this like...
Blakely Hull (13:05.634)
Mm-hmm.
Blakely Hull (13:19.629)
morning.
Conscious Success Co (13:28.9)
big name or the stability or I'm still learning here, like how did you actually back yourself in that decision or did it just seem like so obvious to you?
Blakely Hull (13:37.038)
It was super hard. I actually talked to a lot of mentors of mine. I reached out to people that had been mentors throughout all phases of my life and my journey and they all had different opinions on it. Some were like, go with the tried and true, go with a new company, you're young, who cares, whatever, just you have no kids, just do it. And so I ultimately had to trust my gut. What was interesting though, I didn't mention is I also, because I was at Deloitte and they will help sponsor an MBA program, I'd always had the idea of getting my MBA.
And so I actually, but I didn't want to leave the Bay Area, so I applied and got into Berkeley Business School. And I was planning on doing that with Deloitte through the program that they will sponsor it. And I naively asked my manager, so I was not only saying no to Deloitte, but I was potentially also saying no to Business School after I'd taken the GMAT and done all the work to get in and all of that. And so I asked my manager naively at Uber, I said, hey,
Do you think if I could switch this to an executive MBA program, could I just do both? Do you think I could work here and do that so I don't have to give up that dream also? And he just politely laughed in my face and said, there's no way. You have no idea what this rocket ship that you're about to join, you will not have time for that. But here's what I promise you. If you join this company and you stick with me for the next two years, you will grow more here.
getting the experience on the ground with this leadership here than you would ever have grown at business school. This will be your real life business school. And I trusted him and it was the best decision. And so I don't ever regret not doing the MBA. I guess you'll never know, but it's always still there, but I could have.
Conscious Success Co (15:08.996)
Clearly you haven't needed it. I've been able to drive a lot of business success regardless. you talk to us about the role there and the experience that you built while at Uber that you leverage today.
Blakely Hull (15:24.014)
Gosh, everything. mean, it was a, in the beginning it was, didn't really matter. I I mentioned my job title change and the role change and all that. It didn't even really matter at end of the day. You were rolling up your sleeves and doing everything from, you know, I was running, I was in HR in the people development team and it was just, at the time it was myself and my manager and we ended up growing out at like a 40 person global org.
But we were doing everything for, you know, from employee onboarding, we were flying people, we were hiring so many people, we were flying like 200 people in every other week, 200 to 500 people depending on the week, every other week from all over the world to onboard them into the Uber culture and the Uber way of working and all of that. So I was running that program, I was running leadership development, manager training, recruiting training, hiring, we were culture building, like all this.
Conscious Success Co (16:08.996)
You had your projector. You're onboarding everyone.
Blakely Hull (16:11.118)
Totally. And, you I was, I mean, I was negotiating, you know, this was like even we didn't even have really a full procurement team or anything like that. So I was negotiating anytime we were flying people in, we put them at a hotel here. And so I was negotiating, you know, many, many, multimillion dollar contracts with hotels in San Francisco. We were doing happy hours every week. So was negotiating the, you the bar tab with all of these different bars across San Francisco. So everything, you know, doing everything from
marketing this program, to running the program, the logistics of it, to creating the program, designing it, to all these different programs. It was mostly Uberversity, which is like the onboarding program, but all these other programs as well. And negotiating contracts, working with leadership, et cetera. So looking at the data, making sure that we were tracking and we were getting good results on our metrics and all that.
So I got to do everything, which definitely is translated, know, wearing so many different hats. I think as the company got bigger and more frankly, bureaucratic, my role, even though it was technically a higher level role and a bigger role, it actually ended up feeling smaller because I was much more confined to my lane and I didn't like that. And so one of the things I love about real estate is I get to do it all.
Conscious Success Co (17:26.01)
Yeah, it's so interesting hearing you say that because I think, you know, not the same role, but kind of similar journeys. When I was at Twilio, you know, I joined at 300 something and it was also this rocket ship and I was wearing all these hats and like writing sales playbooks for the first time to like distribute across the org and like running this enablement training and figuring out how to like build this deck and how do we, you know, talk to these customers about this certain product and working with the product team. So it's different things, but so many hats, so cross-functional, every day is different. And it sounds like,
Blakely Hull (17:36.014)
Totally.
Conscious Success Co (17:55.697)
For people like you and I who have that entrepreneurial spirit, that stage of startup or like fast growth scaling company can be super aligned and super exciting. But similarly, at a certain point when Tulio became a true enterprise with like 8,000 employees and you're kind of like more stay in your lane, more focused, even if you're more senior, for me, it started to feel constraining and not as interesting and not as creative. Is that something you also ran up against?
Blakely Hull (18:24.27)
Totally. And I had a great mentor at Uber, a leader there who, you I was very honest with how I was feeling, you different times. I was a top performer, so they were always, you know, trying to check in on me and see, you know, make sure that I was happy and all of that. And I was always just very honest. And as I started getting more bored because I wasn't wearing all these hats, I was very open about that. And he told me advice that I think has always stuck with me is at any point in your career, you need to stop and think about, are you learning and are you having fun?
And if the answer to both of those is yes, keep going 100%. You are golden, like amazing. If the answer to one of those is yes and one of those is no, like stop and reflect, but don't run for the hills. But just think, like maybe this is a point in time. Has it always been this way? You know, reflect on that and think through how you might make changes to adjust that. And if the answer to both of those is no, then make a change. It's not right. And I got to a point where I didn't feel like I was learning anymore. I wasn't having fun. And that was kind of hit me. It was like...
I need to make a change.
Conscious Success Co (19:24.55)
It's such good advice. And I often talk to clients about optimizing for intrinsic motivation and the extrinsic will follow as a natural byproduct. So if you're learning and you're having fun and you're feeling creative and collaborative and all of those things where just like the nature of doing the job, yeah, it might be hard work and you might be like putting in a lot of effort, but like you're really getting something out of it by the nature of just doing the job. And then the money or the promotion or the recognition comes. But if you don't have that, like you're not meant to...
Blakely Hull (19:32.142)
Mm-hmm.
Conscious Success Co (19:53.029)
be there, you need to pivot or you need to redesign in some way because just being there because it's a sexy company or because you're making a lot of money or have stock or whatever else, like that's when it feels like golden handcuffs. That's when it feels like, disempowering and draining and you lose your motivation and your creativity and your fullest potential. And so I love that you got that advice and you were able to actually...
that and leave while, you know, many would say the party was still going and Uber was still a super hot company to work for, but you're like, no, this isn't right for me anymore.
Blakely Hull (20:20.248)
Okay.
Blakely Hull (20:24.472)
Totally, totally. Yeah, I think that's spot on. And the reality too is like, I am so career driven and like, love, like, I mean, I guess I could call myself a workaholic. Like I don't necessarily, I'm not proud of that, but like I love working and I find a lot of purpose in my work. And it translates when I'm not happy or when I'm not fulfilled in my work. Like I noticed that it was translating to other aspects of my life as well. My relationships, like how I was showing up for friends, like all of that.
that didn't feel good either. And so, you I wanted to make a pivot to something that I was more passionate about and had the right strengths aligned and all of that. And it absolutely, you know, has translated to my personal life as well and how I show up, you know, for my friends, for my family, you know, for my husband, et cetera.
Conscious Success Co (21:07.911)
It's so true. We're not like one dimensional people where if work's going badly, like we're still thriving in every other area of our life and it's all, you know, we're able to show up amazing there, it bleeds over. So it sounds like you realize like, okay, for a lot of reasons, it's time to make a change, time to pivot. And was real estate like the only option you considered in the logical next step? Or did you have to really map your strengths and what you desired and figure out kind of what came next? What did that look like?
Blakely Hull (21:34.166)
It was not the only thing I considered. It was definitely a long journey. And I realized that I wasn't happy. I didn't make a quick pivot. I actually spent about, you know, six, maybe, well, nine, probably nine months to a year actually thinking about it and thinking about in the back of my mind, I kept a journal, well, not a physical journal, but on my phone. And I had two very simple statements. It's like, what am I good at? And what do I enjoy doing?
And any time that I was finding myself enjoying something about my work or just remembering something that I used to do that I was excited about, that would get me excited to wake up in the morning to go to work, I would just jot it down, like as specific as I could. You know, was negotiating a contract or, you know, talking to this executive or whatever it may be, building this presentation. And then I wrote down my strengths. I'm a big strength-based leadership person too. And so I looked back actually at, pulled, I had...
super nerdy, like printed out before I left Deloitte all of my performance reviews at Deloitte. And I'd also always printed out all my performance reviews at Uber. And I like went through and I literally like manually highlighted words that came up over and over from my peer and leaders feedback. And just started writing down those strengths as well under that column. And it was after that list got long on both sides.
that's when real estate actually hit me, right, like smack dab in the face. And I was really, I was not actually thinking real estate at all. Truthfully, I was thinking I was going to go into another part of Uber and pivot to a different role or potentially go into another company, but that wasn't even really on my radar. And when I realized my strengths and my passions and what those were, and real estate was like mapped to all of them, I couldn't like ignore it.
Conscious Success Co (23:15.659)
hearing you say that, I mean, these are like some of the exercises I will do with clients to figure out, yeah, what actually gives you energy? What do you enjoy? And what are you actually talented at? And things like, you know, I oftentimes will have clients send emails to bosses, old coworkers, friends, and be like, when you see me at my best, what am I doing? And so pulling all of those old performance reviews and basically getting that feedback across years, it's just so smart. And I love what you're saying of like, you really focused on
understanding, okay, what is it that I'm good at and I'm enjoying doing versus just like, what do I think is sexy? Or what do I dream about or imagining doing? I mean, I don't know if you saw this, there was a clip going around on Instagram, at least recently of Reese Witherspoon giving a young girl advice. Yeah. And she's like, follow what follow what you're talented at, not what you dream of doing, because that's what we're meant to be doing. And I so believe that because when you focus on what are your talents, what are your gifts that you're like meant to
Blakely Hull (23:55.854)
I was just gonna say that, totally. I love that.
Blakely Hull (24:02.786)
Mm-hmm.
Blakely Hull (24:06.626)
Totally.
Conscious Success Co (24:11.175)
bring and contribute to the world, you do enjoy it and that will lead you to craft your own dream or refine that versus just go after the like shiny object or what you think would make you happy very often isn't aligned or is it actually the thing? And so it sounds like you just did that so naturally.
Blakely Hull (24:30.348)
I mean, I wish I had had you at that time when I was making that transition. Maybe it wouldn't take me nine months. I could have done it a lot faster, but I was actually going to talk about that clip as well because it really stuck with me. totally, I Reese's incredible for so many reasons, but it really stuck with me. I always talk about being, you know, playing to your strengths and knowing your strengths, playing to your strengths, being honest about your strengths, and then being honest about your weaknesses and filling those with people around you that are good at those things.
Conscious Success Co (24:32.678)
haha
Conscious Success Co (24:54.535)
Totally.
Conscious Success Co (24:59.215)
And was that hard for you or has that been hard for you as a high achieving, ambitious woman? Like so many of my clients were not allowed to have weaknesses, right? Like that feels threatening. That feels like that creates insecurity. And so, so often what I see is my clients are like trying to double down and improving and optimizing for the things they're not as good at because they want to be excellent at everything versus actually understanding what they're talented at and allowing them to have weaknesses, especially when you're not maybe running a business that...
or hiring teams around you yet, it feels dangerous to have weaknesses. How have you allowed yourself or navigated that knowing that you can't be gifted and doubling down at everything, at least not all at one time?
Blakely Hull (25:40.526)
It's hard. It's really, really hard. You know, it reminds me of a leadership lesson that I had to learn when I was running a team at Uber, which was a really hard one for me because I am a, when I see a problem, I want to solve it. And like that's just how I am. And if I had a person on my team that was not performing or was not, you know, living up to the expectations, I wanted to focus my attention on that person and helping them and coaching them and pulling them up and making them better. And
It's a very popular, you know, leadership concept that you shouldn't do that. You should actually focus on your top performers. Because if you just focus on your weak performers or your, you the lower tier employees, you know, within, obviously to some degree, right? You have to like help people and coach them and make sure that they are, you know, assimilated into the culture properly and like all these different things and like set them up for success. But if they're just not cutting it, like you need to hire quickly and fire faster, you know, and you need to focus on your top performers. And because if you don't,
they will leave you and then you'll be left with the folks that aren't cutting it. And that was a really hard thing for me because I wanted to focus on the folks that were struggling and needed more help because I could solve, I could help solve that problem versus focusing on the people that I felt like just had it going. And that's not actually the way to build the A plus team.
And so it was a lesson that I had to learn the hard way at Uber when I was managing and leading a team. And so it's definitely something that I've translated as you think about like weaknesses, like your question versus strengths is I need to focus my energy on my top strengths, my top talent, and make sure that that is at a place that it can thrive and be set up for success. And the other stuff, I need to be good enough at it to get by and then find the way, find there's tons of opportunities with
between freelancers and hiring team members and like all these different aspects to now technology tools to supplement your weaknesses. And so it's just about knowing what those are, identifying them and then filling them appropriately.
Conscious Success Co (27:38.472)
Yeah, when you make sure you're choosing a career path that is optimizing for ideally, you know, at least 80 % or whatnot of your strengths, then it's like, OK, yeah, I can figure out the rest. That's not mission critical. I'm not going to not be able to be successful in this type of path or role because of those weaknesses. I will figure out how to manage that. I'll be good enough, or I'll hire or have the tech for it. It's just, yeah, it's such a good reminder. And I think it's something that I know I struggled with is
Once you get that and allow yourself to just lean into what feels good and what you're good at, you see this supercharged acceleration of your career that can come in. gets to be so much more fun. But I think I also see so often with clients is we are taught that it should take hard work. It should feel like work. And if it's fun, then that's just like play. That's just something you do in your free time. That's not a
work. And so oftentimes so many of us also have wiring crossed of like, yeah, but like I would do that for free or I just research that in my, you free time rather than being like, no, that's the thing. That's like the blinking arrow pointing you in the direction you're meant to be going.
Blakely Hull (28:49.911)
I love that.
Conscious Success Co (28:51.1)
Yeah. Okay, so talk to us about, so now you did this whole talent skill assessment and you're like, okay, it's meant to be real estate. I know that, correct me if I'm wrong, but moving into real estate, it's a commission-based business, right? So it's like, you eat what you kill and going from having a corporate salary to betting on yourself and needing to start and not necessarily having your client base all built out and not knowing how much money you're gonna be able to make. Talk to us about...
that like, did you have to move through any mindset blocks? How did you set yourself up financially, especially, I mean, you were living in San Francisco, not a cheap city, had a great quality of life. Talk to us about how you navigated that.
Blakely Hull (29:33.186)
Yeah, and I'd actually just bought a house too, so had a mortgage and I was so super scared. And I did not have a partner. yeah, it was, there was a very common mantra. talked with a lot of real estate brokers as I was interviewing different brokerages of which company to join. And they all said, do you have six months of runway? And it's a bare minimum. And I was like, I'm not gonna need that. That's the average. Like I'll do better than that. But like they were right. Like you need that runway.
Conscious Success Co (29:36.862)
perfect.
Blakely Hull (30:01.045)
There's a stat that's like, I forget if it's 70 or 80%, but it's a really high majority of realtors quit in their first year because they just can't cut it and it's really hard business. And so I knew all that going in. I did have the advantage of obviously having seen my mom and what she had done and the behind the scenes. think that was one thing that I definitely, when I did informational interviews, I also asked people, like, what's the ugly of your job?
Like, you there's this feeling that grass is always greener, right? You're just not happy. And so if you just make a pivot, everything will get better. But there were things that I didn't realize about the heart of the business that I learned by the informational interviews. Well, one thing that stands out that I actually didn't learn through the informational interviews that I had to learn on the job was how lonely it was. I was really, really surprised by that.
Conscious Success Co (30:37.98)
Like what?
Blakely Hull (30:47.214)
And I had come from a team where we all built each other up. We all had shared goals that we crafted together. We held each other accountable. We were thought partners on things. If someone needed something, you helped out. You chipped in. It was a very collaborative team culture when I was at Uber, the team that we had built. And you go into real estate and you think it's a people business. You're interacting with people all day long. But you're a sole provider. You're the sole person behind your business. And so there is no one.
holding you accountable to your goals or helping you set goals or pushing you along or just, I I would talk to whoever would listen, including sometimes the mirror of just talking things out loud. Cause I had no one else to just, we would call them jam partners at Uber, like jam with on an idea. And so I had to, I was very surprised by how lonely it was. And I tell people when they are thinking about getting the business now, I'm like, I'm very clear about all the negative and all the bad because people watch the TV shows.
and they think that's what real estate is. And you need to be really, really aware of whatever job you're going into, whatever career you're going into, the ugly and the bad. And every job has something. And if someone tells you otherwise, they're lying. And so you need to know what that is and then know if that's something that you can overcome. And I was able to overcome that because I have a great network and I was able to find other avenues to fill that lonely factor and have people that wasn't just relying on my boyfriend at the time, but it was relying on my network to help.
know, push me and help me think through things and, all of that. But it's...
Conscious Success Co (32:13.308)
It's such a good point. mean, every job has it, but the lonely factor, mean, that's something I work in my career redesign work with clients, a subset of my clients decide to build their own businesses, whether that is because they try to do something like you're doing as a real estate broker or fractional or consulting or coaching or building a brand, whatever that is. But one of the biggest things I've heard from clients and seen is that it's lonely to be a solopreneur. And we come from
know, tech or whatnot in these teams and then go into that. It's not that you don't love building the business, but that journey, especially while you're, you know, building your client base or whatever that looks like can feel really lonely and isolating, which is why I've been driven to now launch a mastermind later this year for female business owners and entrepreneurs to be able to build that in community because you need that goal setting. You need that accountability. You need people in the shared belief who are going to be those thought partners and, or what did you call it?
Blakely Hull (33:09.954)
A damn burger.
Conscious Success Co (33:10.98)
Yeah, there'll be those jam partners together. So I love that you're naming that and that was something that you figured out how to optimize for on your own, but I'm sure would be much nicer or easier if you had had a community to go through that with. Yeah. And so that was one thing that was like, okay, this is potentially a drawback of this job that you were able to say, I'm able to tolerate that. can overcome that. That's a trade-off I'm willing to accept.
Blakely Hull (33:26.478)
Totally. Yeah.
Conscious Success Co (33:38.195)
Talk to me about the financial part, because I think this also comes up for so many of my clients. It's like, but I make multiple hundred thousand dollars a year, and I have bills to pay because I just bought this house and all of that. And so even if we've been these high performers at whatever companies we've been at and have all the skill set and every reason in the world to bet on ourselves, that can feel really daunting. So talk to me about that. Was that a tricky thing for you to get over the hump about?
Blakely Hull (33:40.906)
And yeah.
Blakely Hull (33:54.19)
Thanks
Blakely Hull (34:03.768)
Totally. And sorry, we actually started on that and then I got sidetracked. yes, so I didn't honestly know what goal to set my first year in real estate. mean, again, going back to my dad, like I'm a goal oriented person. So I knew I needed to set a goal. just didn't know. I had no barometer of what that goal should be. And so I just at a sheer like not knowing what to set or what goal to make, I just said, you know what? I want to make as much as I would have at Uber all in, including like equity and like whatever in year one.
Conscious Success Co (34:31.898)
In year one. Wow.
Blakely Hull (34:33.932)
And I knew that was a stretch goal. And so I was like, OK, well, how am going to do that? And this was certainly before, I feel like probably AI tools could help people think through that a little bit more now. But I didn't have that. And so was thinking through, OK, well, how many deals? My average deal size is this. How many deals do I have to do? How many deals do I have to? How many people do I have to outreach? How many people do I think it's going to take me to get prospects in order to get a solid client?
And I just started making metrics and goals that I would hold myself accountable to on a monthly basis. And I would pivot those because I was, again, total stab in the dark. I didn't know what I didn't know. And so I was every month adjusting the goals, which is okay too. Like you don't have to set a goal and always stick to it. Like adjust mid-course if it's not working. Don't give yourself all the slack in the world and just say, it's fine. And you know, whatever, I'll do it next time. But like pivot in the right ways. And so...
I kept doing that. I did use a lot of mentors around me to kind of help push me. And then going back to the strength-based leadership piece of it too, I read all the books about like, what do you do in your first year of real estate? You door knock, you send mailers, you do this, you do that, you do open houses. And I looked into the skill sets, each of that would make a door knocker, for example, super old fashioned, but like a lot of people do that and build their business that way. Like what makes that person successful? And do I have those skills?
And I was like, not really me. Like, so I, you know, I was like, but I have a really great network. Like that's my, that's my skill. That's a strength that I have always had. And so I actually leaned into my network and I found a company that was starting out a real estate prop tech company that was starting out helping people buy homes in a very innovative way. And they were three tech guys that had no idea that none of them had ever even bought a house. They didn't even have any idea. They were just building this real estate company. And I happened to find them because they were in my network and
And you know, peer I talked to with my network, I'm going into real estate, do you know anyone anyone I could talk to? And so I found these folks and I realized they didn't know that I had no business or experience. Like I just set myself up as the expert. I was like, you need me because you don't have any real estate advisors on your team. You don't know what you're doing. And I do. And you fake it till you make it, right? And they trusted me and super grateful. And so I did a lot of, you know, my early deals was through that company.
Blakely Hull (36:50.126)
And every deal was, you know, super hard and challenging because I was learning as I, you know, literally as we say at Uber and it's a very common saying, like building the plane as it's flying, right? Not building it first and then taking off. And so I was, you know, it's constantly challenged, but I again, leaned on my resources. I had a great broker, I had great mentors, and I used all the resources around me to make sure that I was, you know, not letting anyone down or not, you know, doing a disservice to those clients.
Conscious Success Co (37:18.909)
And did you have that like six months of runway set aside where you're like, okay, I can cover my mortgage and expenses for that amount of time and then I'm gonna go for like replacing my income at Uber in the first year? Was that something that you had set up?
Blakely Hull (37:30.19)
Yeah, I had it set aside. I didn't end up meeting it. I ended up getting some commission checks before that. So it was a nice surprise, but I had it ready to go. And I recognized that I was going to have to make sacrifices, like not taking a big trip that year. I did put myself on a very strict budget, where I was literally accounting for my food spend and my clothing spend and all these different things. It's also hard when you're going into business because there's some startup costs as well to going into the business. I even I didn't own a personal laptop.
I'd never, like always had a company laptop. It's $2,000 right there, you know, like, so, you know, there was, so I had to budget very strictly for that and be very disciplined with it. But I knew that this was a decision that I really wanted to do and do it for myself. Again, I didn't have the pressure at that time of having kids or anything like that. I can imagine that would be even more stressful and more challenging, but.
Conscious Success Co (38:01.553)
Uber gave it to you, why do you need one? Yeah.
Blakely Hull (38:23.406)
I was very committed to trying this and giving it my all for the first year and not being that statistic that the first 70 to 80 percent first year quit. And so was very determined to not let that be my story.
Conscious Success Co (38:35.753)
And did you hit your goal of replacing your income in that first year? That is so incredible. It took me a couple years to be able to do that. That is like so amazing that you were able to do that in year one and just shows that you're above and beyond. So what do you attribute that to? What did you do in that first year? Because so many of my clients, people listening are thinking about that pivot and what do you do to set yourself up for success in your first year of business? So what are the main lessons that you learned?
Blakely Hull (38:37.612)
I did.
Blakely Hull (38:46.67)
Maybe it was underpaid before. I don't know.
Conscious Success Co (39:05.543)
or the things that you did that allowed you to drive that.
Blakely Hull (39:10.006)
You know, some of the things I've already said, obviously leaning into your strengths, being very disciplined. The other thing I will say too is, you know, realizing this was a shift, a mental shift that I had to make, there's no, you you said it was a commission-based business only, you eat what you kill. There's no second place. There's no prize for second place. You know, you are the bride, not the bridesmaid every time you have to be. And if you, you know, it was great if I was writing an offer and like just...
didn't miss it or I was number two, my client didn't get the house and I didn't get paid. So I was at the end at Uber, was, and I don't mean, hopefully this doesn't come across as egotistical or whatever, but I was really good at my job. I knew what I needed to do to be successful and it was easy and that was part of the boredom too. But I was also really good at kind of phoning it in, if you will. And I had to make this realization, there's no prize for phoning it in. You gotta deliver and that's it.
Conscious Success Co (39:54.025)
course.
Blakely Hull (40:08.153)
And no one else is watching but yourself, and no one else cares as much as you do. And so I had to be very disciplined. I also had never had a job where I didn't have to report into work at a certain time. And so a lot of people would say, oh, it's great. I can have my mornings. I can have leisurely workout. I can do this. And then I'll start working at, oh, noon or whatever.
Like, no, I was like, I'm sticking to my schedule that I always had. And I worked a lot of hours at Uber. So I was like, I'm sticking to that. And I'm adding on more hours than I was before. And I had to hold myself accountable to that and keeping really focused and disciplined. mean, there's this, in the beginning, you're like, OK, I've got all this time today. What do I do? And you could do busy work and phone it in. Or you can do work that is meaningful and actually gets you closer to the prize.
and you have to hold yourself accountable to that and check in every day or every maybe it's not every day but maybe every week like what did I do this week that actually got me closer to closing a deal?
Conscious Success Co (41:07.773)
And that's actually true whether you're in corporate or whether you're in entrepreneurship. Are you just doing the busy work? Are you joining the meeting that takes the hour that you didn't actually need to be in? Are you just like reactively responding to requests or are you figuring out what is gonna move the needle and are you doing that? If you're in real estate, you like picking up the phone and calling people and asking for their business or building those relationships like the things that are gonna actually get you closer to those goals which are very often the...
quote unquote, harder things or the more like activating things for us to do and where all of our like blocks can come up. And I often talk about how like entrepreneurship is like a spiritual personal development journey, because there's no hiding, right? Like you either grow and then you can, you know, accelerate and see success or you stay limited. And it sounds like you were like, okay, I'm gonna have the structure. I'm gonna reverse engineer the plan. I'm gonna figure out how I'm gonna get to my goals and what I need to be doing.
Blakely Hull (41:47.246)
Right.
Conscious Success Co (42:02.725)
each month, I'm going to like lean into building where it's actually going to matter. And I think that I just want to like underline that and emphasize that as being such a differentiator, probably why you weren't a part of that statistic, because so many of us want to stay safe and comfortable, but that's not what's ultimately going to drive our growth. And that doesn't mean we need to be miserable, but we need to be calling ourselves forward into the highest, most empowered version of ourself to be able to drive that.
Blakely Hull (42:30.456)
Totally, and like not to, you know, beat a dead horse, but.
There's the, you know, seven habits of highly effective people book, Stephen Covey's book, and we actually, there's a kid version of it, so I actually taught that at my school and would incorporate those lessons into elementary kids' lives, and one of them is begin with the end in mind. And we would do that with our kids, but we would also do that with lesson planning. And you you have all these things that you have to teach a kid by the end of the year, and they seem really daunting when you start off at the beginning of the year and they don't know any of those skills, but you have to break them down little by little, and you know, it's not, you know,
count to a hundred. First, can learn to count one, two.
That's it. Two, three, four, five, you know, and keep going and identify, you know, you have to break everything down in its tiniest core pieces to teach the child this in your lesson plan, starting on day one and make progress every single day as small as it feels. And that's exactly what setting a goal and working backwards to that goal, reverse, as you called it, engineering, is all about. It's finding the smallest microscopic piece of progress to that goal and just tackling it on day one and then a little bit more on day two and just
keep going.
Conscious Success Co (43:38.6)
It's so important. It's such good advice. It also reminds me of the book Atomic Habits. And it's like, the reason it's called Atomic Habits is because it's about breaking it down into the smallest part, but then like that can have such power, right? Like an atom bomb. Like it's really down to the smallest parts that can lead to that change. And so I think that that's something that I see a lot of people get stuck. It's like, they might just like set the vision if they do that or have these really big goals, but those...
Blakely Hull (43:42.67)
Mm-hmm.
Conscious Success Co (44:04.4)
action steps can't be completed in one sitting and then those feel overwhelming and then you aren't really seeing progress so you're not building positive momentum and then it's very easy to fall off but really getting to like, okay, what is the smallest building block, the smallest action that I need to take and can I cross that off that actually moves the needle and then what's the next one and what's the next one? If you do that, you're also giving yourself these little wins, these little dopamine hits of like, well did that.
I can do the next one. I can do the next one. And you stay and you build that self-trust and you build that positive momentum. And then over time you look back six, 12, 24 months later, whatever it is and be like, holy shit, look what I built. mean, I'm sure you've had that moment. I know I have in my business. Like, yeah, for a while you're like, I'm just pushing this boulder up this hill. It's not a lot of momentum. And then all of a sudden it starts to roll down the other side and you're like, look at everything I built. Like, how did that happen almost? Like who built that? But it's like you did by focusing on those micro actions.
Blakely Hull (44:59.47)
Totally. Love that.
Conscious Success Co (45:01.738)
Okay, so did you have a clear idea of how you wanted to differentiate yourself in the real estate space when you started? correct me if I'm wrong, but I see you as this like super disruptive using social media and new marketing techniques that I hadn't seen like most real estate brokers or advisors, at least in our parents' generation using. you you were working with a lot of first time homeowners, like.
Was that all very strategic? Did you see that as a gap in the market that you were going after? Or did you just find that along the way?
Blakely Hull (45:35.822)
Great question. Thank you for that because you pretty much nailed my brand. So I'm glad that that's working.
Conscious Success Co (45:39.786)
It's coming through, your brand is on point.
Blakely Hull (45:43.566)
You know, I was blown away. So as I mentioned earlier, I did a lot of informational interviews and I talked with agents of all ages. I talked to the agents that were in their 20s that didn't even go to college. I just went straight into the business and I talked with agents that were in their 70s and 80s that were getting out of the business and everyone in between purposefully. Again, anyone I reached out to my network and anyone who had anyone that was a real estate person, would, you know, I wanted to take them out to coffee and learn more about their journey and how they did it just so I could hear different stories and hear different ways of doing it because there isn't one right way.
And I asked them at the end of every conversation, how do you see the world of real estate changing in the next five years? And this was...
You know, this was obviously before AI and like all of that. Like this was, you know, eight years ago or so. And I was blown away. Didn't matter what the age was. You know, I was coming from this very disruptive company, right? Of Uber and like blow, you know, completely disrupting taxi. Like, yes, people still go from point A to point B around the world. They just don't do it in a taxi anymore. They do it in an Uber. And so like, yes, people are still going to buy homes. I believe that for sure. And sell homes and need a home, you know, to, you know, a roof to live under. But how they go about buying
home, I wasn't of the mindset that it was going to stay that way forever, but every single one of them, again, 20 to 80 said, no, no, no, the world of real estate is never going to change. It's always been like this. It's going to be like this. And that stood out to me as an opportunity and as a gap.
Conscious Success Co (47:07.466)
And not as something like, well, if this is conventional wisdom and everyone says this, it must be true. And you doubt yourself. You're like, no, this is where I can disrupt if everyone's thinking this way and I think differently.
Blakely Hull (47:17.102)
100 % I've always felt like if everyone's running this way, run this way and you know, find the opportunity on the other side. And so that was something that stood out to me. And I said, yeah, I, you know, and I actually then started interviewing people that had bought in Soulhole and it didn't even matter if it was the Bay area or not. I just said, what was your experience like? Did you enjoy working with a realtor? Why or why not? And I realized that, you know, most realtors weren't thinking, you know, in the 21st century about how to help their clients and leverage tools and resources, not to replace them, but to enable
and to empower them to be even better. again, coming from this disruptive company that was kind of already in my DNA that I just really wanted to lean in on.
Conscious Success Co (47:56.307)
So interesting. I love that so much. And so I remember you started using your personal social media account and posting about real estate, right? Was that hard for you to start making these teaching videos about real estate or property tours and putting that out there on your own friends and family type of feed? Were there any blocks of
am I going to be judged? Or what if I fail at this? What if I am a part of that 70 % to 80 % statistic and then everybody knows? Like, I think that can be such a big hurdle that so many of us contend with. Was that something that you had to overcome? Or you just like so bet on yourself you knew that you whatever, had what it takes, nobody who mattered would judge you. What did that look like?
Blakely Hull (48:42.542)
That's a great question. I remember thinking really deeply about it. the beginning, didn't all the posts that I did were, you know, I used Canva and things like that to build them, but I didn't put my face in them. I was too scared to be on video or be the talking head in the video and, you know, be like the influencer style video. Like I was way too scared to do that. I hate being on video. And I had to push myself on that. But, you know, you referenced the stat and I mentioned it earlier. Like I just, I didn't focus on that. Like I heard it a lot, but I just never let that be my reality.
And I just really tried to tune it out and just say, no, I'm going to be different. And like, that's just my reality. And so I didn't worry about like, what if I don't make it? also, it was my friends and my family and my, you know, my sphere. So, you know, they would know if I didn't make it regardless of whether I was on Instagram or not. And so I was, you know, I was okay with that. But I did have to get much more comfortable with posting different kinds of content and posting about myself and bragging about myself. Because like, I needed people to know that so that they would trust me.
in my sphere that I was good at what I was doing and that I was having success. And they would never have known that if I hadn't posted that. And I was helping other clients and get great outcomes. And that was really uncomfortable for me because I hate bragging. I hate talking about myself. But I had to, I realized that because my strength was my network and because that was the network that I was going to lean into to grow my business, I had to do something differently and I had to just get in front of them and be vulnerable.
But was super uncomfortable.
Conscious Success Co (50:12.328)
And so you're just like, okay, this is a requirement if I'm gonna be successful. So am I willing to tolerate the discomfort and choose it anyway? Was that like basically how you got over the hump?
Blakely Hull (50:20.462)
Well, there's the
Totally, there's like, there's gonna be discomfort in anything. Like, you know, door knocking, I mentioned that earlier. Like there's gonna be discomfort. You're gonna get the door slammed in your face over and over. And so it's just like, you know, gearing yourself up for that discomfort, whatever it is, and realizing like, is, no, this is still my best path forward. Like this is my strength, my network, and my sphere. They trust me. They, you know, they told me that I'm gonna be great at real estate. They believe in me. Like I'm going to prove them right. And like, I just didn't face the discomfort of door knocking. I didn't face the discomfort of some of the other stuff that I could have done.
was my marketing strategy of lead generation strategy. And I realized that there was going to be some level of discomfort. But for me, was the lowest risk versus some of the other alternatives.
Conscious Success Co (51:03.284)
love what you're saying there because truly everything does have a trade-off. And so often I think people get stuck in being like, I'm just going to find the thing that doesn't require me to be uncomfortable or to make any trade-offs versus I'm going to look at what my various marketing strategies could be. And I'm going to choose the one that feels most aligned. And I'm going to accept the trade-offs or what that requires of me. It could be door knocking. I don't want to choose that. I'm going to choose with my network that requires social media in this day and age. And OK, here we go. And I think that that's just like so
so great to hear and it's so true. Like we can't look for the path that isn't going to have any of that discomfort or any of those compromises or you're not going to be successful. That doesn't mean it's not aligned. That doesn't mean that's not what you actually want, but it is going to come with some of that challenge.
Blakely Hull (51:48.142)
And then do that discomfort, that thing that has the most discomfort first thing in the morning. Or just get it done. Put it on your checklist. I'm a big checklist person. I'm a Virgo. I'm the kind of person that will write things down that I didn't, that I already did, just to check it off the list. And put it on your list and don't let yourself miss it that day. Just get it done in the beginning and then go on to do the things that you enjoy throughout the rest of the day.
Conscious Success Co (52:11.925)
Yeah, I'm.
Blakely Hull (52:12.398)
because it'll loom over you. You'll keep saying no to it. You'll keep finding an excuse. You can always do that for as long as you want until you just do it.
Conscious Success Co (52:20.683)
Yeah, and you don't even think about like how much time and psychic energy that takes up the things that you know that you should be doing that you're not doing and finding different things to distract yourself. And it's that like low grade like guilt the whole time. That's so unpleasant versus just being like, okay, this is important. This is what's gonna get me to my goals. All right, take a deep breath, put my big girl pants on and do it, right? And yeah, sure, we can learn and iterate and figure out how to make things.
more enjoyable as we go or how we can continue to pivot the marketing strategy to maybe be more effective or whatnot, but not avoiding the thing that you know that you need to do.
Blakely Hull (52:56.438)
It's so true. I feel like the more you let it build up and you're worried about it and you put it off and you put it off and you put it off, it's always those times that I do that because I certainly do that too. Like I'm not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. And I will do the thing that I've been putting off forever. And then I'm like, that wasn't so bad. It's always, you know, when the buildup and I'm like, why did I stress about that for four days? Like just do it.
Conscious Success Co (53:19.698)
Totally. You know, it's so funny. There's a lot of reasons I kind of pivoted from focusing more on my Instagram to the podcast. But one of those was like having interviews with people is a forcing function. Like I have to show up whether I think that I'm ready or not. Like I have that person's time dedicated and like the interviews going down. Whereas when it was just like me creating a reel or doing a post, like I could get so in my head or rewrite the caption 100 times versus be like, nope, it's getting sent. And so also figuring out like how do you
Blakely Hull (53:44.066)
Mm-hmm.
Conscious Success Co (53:48.62)
create that accountability or the structure where like, you just have to get it done. How are you setting those deadlines? How are you making that public in some way? Where it's like every week I release a podcast episode. So I just have to get it done, right? Totally. Okay, so I remember in COVID,
Blakely Hull (54:01.454)
You don't know what I'm doing.
Conscious Success Co (54:09.451)
the market started to totally change. I'm not an agent, but from what I understand, there were so many headlines about San Francisco is dead and homelessness has taken over and nobody's coming back and property, the real estate market prices came down or there were a lot less offers on places. So you were a Bay area or a San Francisco even more acutely at the time, if I remember correctly, like real estate broker. How did you navigate that? Did that shake you? Were you like, oh shit, I need to like,
move and find a new market or like I need to pivot in some way? How did you navigate that?
Blakely Hull (54:45.55)
Yeah, it's a good question. I'm going back to March 2020. several, so first of all, I never believed that narrative. I thought it was completely overblown. You we were also, was also in the time that we were worrying about toilet paper, right? Like it was, there was a lot of things that were just, you know,
Conscious Success Co (54:49.192)
Ha ha.
Blakely Hull (55:04.428)
And of course, I never knew how big COVID would be and how long it would be and like all those things. But I just never believed the narrative that San Francisco was dead and subscribed to that school of thought. So that was maybe like one just protective measure that I did for myself. I don't know. It wasn't necessarily I didn't think of it that way, but I didn't let myself believe that. have, you know, the first few months were really, really hard because I just had closed a deal in February, like middle of February, and then the world shut down. There were no we couldn't even show houses. Everything was
We couldn't leave our house. Everything was completely, you remember. But my livelihood was showing houses and getting people into houses. I helped someone get out of a deal that I had just gotten them into because the wife got COVID and she got really scared about the whole thing. And she's like, I can't move forward on this home because the world is changing. It's too scary right now. And so I was like, hmm, that February deal, that might have been my last deal of the year. Like, this is kind of scary. Like, what am I going to do? And so.
The first few months when we couldn't do anything, I was like, well.
I have time. What can I do that I've been putting off? And so I just, you know, maybe call it busy work, maybe call it just keep doing something like I kept myself busy by doing the stuff that I didn't, you know, redesigning my website, building out my CRM, all that like back end stuff, the foundational stuff that like my business has just grown so fast. I hadn't really had the chance to do. I took advantage of the time to do that. And then I was like, you know, I was seeing so much myths out there and I was like, no, I need to stop some of these myths because people are feeling, you know, people can feel whatever they want, but like some of the
stats and the information that I was seeing out there was just wrong or that I was hearing from people. And so I started doing webinars about the market and what the realities were and what was happening. And that was obviously as things started opening up a little bit more, at least we became an essential service so we could actually start showing houses and deals were actually happening. And so would tell those stories and just get those stories out there. And I did actually focus on the Bay Area. So I didn't just focus on San Francisco. It's kind of always been my strategy to focus
Blakely Hull (57:05.104)
across the Bay Area for a variety of reasons, which is kind of atypical here. And so a lot of my business was outside of immediate San Francisco. There was still a lot of business in San Francisco, but I did a lot of East Bay. did some Marin, I did Peninsula. Again, going back to my sphere and my network being my...
my lead generation, those folks were reaching out to me saying, my 1,000 square foot apartment or 800 square foot apartment or whatever is not cutting it in San Francisco anymore. I need to move. And rates were so low that people were generally saying, I need to buy, which was, that was just lucky for real estate agents for sure. And the world actually ended up, the real estate world ended up taking off.
Conscious Success Co (57:43.284)
Mm-hmm.
Conscious Success Co (57:48.042)
Right. Well, I just love how you like turned lemons into lemonade and it's like, okay, I can't show houses, but what can I do? I can rebuild my website. I can, you know, figure out how to, you know, do various things that I haven't had time for versus get into the like, woe is me or buying into the narrative and feeling disempowered. And I think that's something that's coming through and I hope the listeners are hearing this. Like you have a rock solid mindset from everything that you're saying. And it's like, you focus on what you can control, what you're empowered to do. You keep doing it. And like,
That is truly the difference so often between those that make it and follow their dreams and do so successfully and those that don't. And I think so often we can fool ourselves into believing, that person must be more talented than me or got luckier than me. And it's not that in my experience, most of the time, it's not that you, of course, weren't aligning to your talents and all of that, but it's like, you just continue to figure out like, okay, how do I put the structure? How do I put the strategy? How do I take the action? And that's gonna win out.
So like, you know, nine times out of 10 over someone who just has the talent alone.
Blakely Hull (58:51.286)
Mm-hmm. Thank you for saying that. I don't think of that myself as that way, but I guess hearing you say that, it makes sense.
Conscious Success Co (59:00.939)
So I'm curious, you then started bringing on, like building a team, going from being a solo real estate broker to starting to build a team. Can you talk to us a little bit about that? Like who was the first team member you brought on? How did that change the way you operated or thought about your business? Like talk to us about that inflection point.
Blakely Hull (59:22.456)
Yeah, I mean, I would love to say that it was super strategically thought out and all of this, but sometimes it's just about being flexible and saying yes to the opportunity in front of you and being open to seeing the opportunities. knew, I mentioned earlier, I was super lonely business, so I knew I wanted to build out a team. At the time I thought not necessarily for more arms and legs and help, it was more just for a thought partner and finding a partner. And so was very committed to finding an equal, someone just like me, but maybe thought things a little bit differently or whatever.
that we could partner on things. And I just wasn't finding that. And I was really struggling with that. so, but then COVID hit and it was, you know, we, was back in the day where we had, were no open houses. You had to have a, there was Calendly links in order to schedule an appointment. The market was bonkers. And so there were literally, you know, like if you, if maybe if you were lucky, you got one slot opportunity to go see the home on the Calendly that wasn't already taken. And, you know, you had to disinfect in between everything and you just sign all these forms and all this.
And so it was sheer just like necessity of I need more arms and legs. Like I cannot be in 10 places at once. If my client is only opportunity to see the home is at 2 30 on Tuesday and I've got another commitment. I have to be in both places. And so it was I you know, I was talking with agents. I you know, always out there networking always out there, know, trying to continue to grow my network in my sphere. And I found an agent that was representing the seller on a deal where I was representing the buyer. And I was just super, super impressed with her and she was pretty new in the business.
but she was someone who just, our values aligned. She was a hustler. She was out there working hard and determined. And I just really resonate, she and I hit it off and I was like, I need you, I need.
like I need arms and legs and I need you. And so it grew that way. And I, and I always believe in doing like trial periods ahead, you know, making sure that someone really is, you know, not just saying the right things, but actually can do and deliver. And so I did put her on a trial, three month trial. So I wasn't, you know, immediately like throwing her out to all of my clients and my network and leads and all of that. But I was using her services and her help in the backend and then, you know, opening doors as well were needed and all of that. And she was just, you know, incredibly
Blakely Hull (01:01:35.23)
capable and incredibly just aligned with my vision and my values and all that. And so we ended up, we're still partnering, you know, five years later, six years later, however long it's been. But it was necessity at first and it grew into just saying yes to the opportunities and being open to it. And then pivoting along the way was, was super helpful. I did try to grow the team and you know, I've tried other team members that have not, that did not pass the trial period. And so.
Conscious Success Co (01:01:59.533)
And what did that trial period actually look like? Was it like a defined amount of time or just when you thought?
Blakely Hull (01:02:04.599)
RUMORS
Yeah, so define amount of time and I would set goals for them and say, this is what I expect you to deliver in this time period. And those were realistic goals based off of they were brand new to the business or seasoned or whatever. So the goals were different per person. But real estate, as you said earlier, you eat what you kill. So you can say whatever you want in the interview, but it doesn't matter if you don't deliver. And a lot of people get in this business thinking that it's flexible, that it's easy, that it's just like the TV shows that you can have, you can control your own destiny, you can control your own schedule.
and they say that they want to hustle and all that but they don't actually want to and so the ones that have failed I've realized you know I didn't push them hard enough in an interview to really prove that they said what they meant or they meant what they said rather.
Conscious Success Co (01:02:48.3)
Mm-hmm. And it's also such an important leadership lesson to define what success looks like and make that very clear and achievable, stretchy. But also, you are saying, like, based on how many years of experience or whatnot they have, but be able to say, OK, you have three months. Here's the goal. Here's what I expect of you. Like, for anyone listening who is a leader, like, people who report in to us, people on our teams need to know that. And the ones that are going to
you know, run through doors and be successful. They love that. They're like, OK, perfect. Now I know versus being like, do your best and, you know, we'll see how it goes. Like that doesn't actually set our team up for success. So I love that that you are speaking to that. Talk to me last question before we go into our rapid fire. What's next for your team for Best Coast Collective for your real estate, you know, broker future? Tell us what's on your vision board or what's at the top of the next mountain that you're working towards.
Blakely Hull (01:03:42.222)
So I tried to pick, and part of my goal setting, I tried to pick a word of every year, like the word of the year. And last year, or it was the first year that I had my daughter, and I didn't take a mat leave, I was like right back to work. And so my word of the year was a combination of grace and patience with myself. Like, it's okay, I can't be everything. Let me figure this whole mom thing out. And this year has actually been...
going back to the, when I mentioned like redoing my website and the CRM and those are foundational things that I really spent a lot of time in COVID 2020 doing. I haven't, I've iterated on them, but I haven't like really come back to like, is this still working? So my word of the year this year is really foundational.
Conscious Success Co (01:04:28.044)
My Word of the Year is foundation. I did a podcast on it not too long ago. So I love that we have basically the same Word of the Year.
Blakely Hull (01:04:33.13)
Okay, well, we definitely need to talk more about that. So yeah, it's really about like growing out the systems and the tools and all of that behind the scenes because what I want to do is, know, I've always, as I've mentioned a multitude of times on this podcast is using my sphere and my network. And that's always been, my business has always been a hundred percent referral based and that's awesome. And it is, you know, it's grown tremendously and I am incredibly grateful and humbled by what I, the success I've had. But if I want to take it to the next level,
I also have to think about other additional strategies and tools to grow the business and to grow out the team. And so that is tapping into the second, third, fourth, fifth degree connections as well. And so I can't reach that scale without the right foundation. And so it's like, the foundation in place now so that the, again, begin with the end in mind. Like the end goal is to grow the business even more, more rapidly to be able to
to tap into those more cool leads versus just the warm leads. But I can't do that well if I don't have the right foundation in place.
Conscious Success Co (01:05:41.133)
I mean, we could do a whole part two or have a side conversation about this and you know, yes, absolutely. I love it so much. And you know, we didn't even get to talk about Dawson and how that affected things, but maybe just really quickly talking about that. Like you mentioned not having taken a mat leave. Was that like a conscious choice? Did you feel good about that because you love what you're doing and you just figured it out, you know, driving or...
Blakely Hull (01:05:42.99)
We'll definitely have to get lunch over this topic for sure.
Conscious Success Co (01:06:07.304)
you know, building the plane while you fly it or can you touch on any kind of takeaways or reflections from that?
Blakely Hull (01:06:14.112)
Yeah, it was a really hard choice and it was a couple different things. was one, like yes, I love what I do and I was working with some amazing, like I always, I would way rather work for the client than this specific area or the price point. Like it is all about working with great people and I had amazing clients that I was working and I wanted to deliver for and I didn't want this pregnancy that, you know, was not.
their thing, get in the way of me giving them the best service I could. And so part of it was, yes, I love what I do. Yes, I wanted to serve these clients. I felt a commitment and a dedication to doing so. also, there was an element of self-consciousness of like, you know, sure, in the corporate world, you can't discriminate on someone because they're pregnant or you can't fire them because they're pregnant. But if someone is buying their home, it's a really big financial decision. And it's a really hard thing. And you want someone who's like 100 % there. And I
I had this self-conscious fear that, you know, or insecurity that people were just going to not hire me as their realtor or look past me or fire me because they just were like, she's busy with that. So like, we'll just, we won't bug her. We'll just hire someone else. And I didn't want to be passed over. And so I was really scared, frankly. I mean, I didn't show for a really long time, so that was helpful, but like, I was really scared to tell people that I was pregnant. And it was, and you know, now that I've come out on the other side and realize like I can do it and I have the skills.
and people will hire me for me if they want me. I've now kind of overcome some of that self-conscious feeling, but it was really hard. So it was a combination, but I'd say it was honestly probably driven more out of fear and necessity than probably anything else, if I'm being totally honest.
Conscious Success Co (01:07:54.966)
Yeah, I mean, it is hard when you eat what you kill and you don't have a corporate mat leave. mean, similarly for me, right? Like taking maternity leave, I make that choice, my husband and I do to be like, okay, I'm forgoing income for this period of time. And that's a trade off or what was that going to mean for my client relationships? And so there are those and it is interesting for you to realize, I mean,
Blakely Hull (01:08:08.59)
I
Conscious Success Co (01:08:16.585)
I wonder if you perhaps would do it differently the next time now knowing that like, that might have been more of a fear based decision and clients will still choose me or not. Does that affect how you think about it if you were to have another baby?
Blakely Hull (01:08:31.454)
I've thought a lot about that, because I would like a number two. I, I don't know. I mean, I'm still kind of thinking through what the right approach is for me. I think that I do regret some of it. Like I do look at moms that, you know, had this, you know, sleep with the baby sleeps or like let the baby sleep on you and do all the contact maps. Like I didn't have that luxury because when the baby slept, like I was working and so was like, put it down, get in the crib, like go. And I do.
Conscious Success Co (01:08:53.069)
Yeah.
Blakely Hull (01:08:57.27)
you know, regrets and that go, go, go, go, go. So I probably would be a little bit more thoughtful and disciplined about what I say yes to and how I, and I now have a even stronger, even better team that is like a hundred percent capable. And so I have that, I have the luxury and the benefit of having the confidence in that, that I, you know, not that I didn't have that before, but I had that even more so now that they've risen to the occasion of as I've had the first kid. And so I do trust that. And honestly, like I, you know, I am a workaholic, like I love working.
I love what I do. And I don't know if I would have wanted to keep working at Uber, giving up a mat leave when I was at that corporate job. I was kind of OK with it this time because I love what I do. But I do need to find that right balance and that right trade off of what I say yes and what I say no to.
Conscious Success Co (01:09:45.762)
And that gets to be a part of your foundational word of the year if you choose for it to be. And it's so great to hear that like you've built this great team and I'm sure great systems and tech and all of that that would empower you to still keep the business moving and still, you know, be able to show up for clients in a way that can look however you really want to make it look. Okay, so very quickly, rapid fire, her five questions. What does conscious success mean to you?
Blakely Hull (01:09:49.507)
through.
Blakely Hull (01:10:12.45)
Hmm, I'm not rapid firing on this one. It's such a big question. I think it is having a vision, having a...
Conscious Success Co (01:10:15.677)
Hahaha
Blakely Hull (01:10:25.998)
I love again Reese's point about having a dream, but not necessarily a dream, a dream that is a realistic dream based off of who you are and your strengths and playing to that and building understanding, like what does success even mean to you? Is it a financial thing? Is it an impact thing? Like what is that? And then backwards mapping to how you actually achieve that.
Conscious Success Co (01:10:47.893)
Even the people that we admire most are still growing and evolving. So what's one area of your life where you're currently being stretched or learning something new?
Blakely Hull (01:10:55.968)
I mean, the kid thing for sure is definitely, know, she just went through a sleep regression. That was a whole challenge. I was beating myself up over that and realizing like, nope, this too will pass. I need to be patient and give myself that grace. And just finding the right balance of, know, I am on my phone a lot is what I do. And so, and I don't like that. I don't like that I'm always looking at my, not always, but that I'm looking at my phone a lot when I'm around her. And so trying to set up those right boundaries for myself that doesn't let my clients down, but also
Conscious Success Co (01:11:07.693)
Solace stage.
Blakely Hull (01:11:26.074)
allows me to be present for my family.
Conscious Success Co (01:11:29.975)
Who's someone in your world today that you admire for how they live, lead, or succeed? And what is it about them that inspires you?
Blakely Hull (01:11:39.074)
Wait, say the question again? Sorry.
Conscious Success Co (01:11:41.314)
No, no problem. Who is someone in your world today who you admire for how they live, lead, or succeed, and what is it about them that inspires you?
Blakely Hull (01:11:50.19)
Hmm.
Blakely Hull (01:11:56.206)
I this maybe is not one individual, but I...
I am very blessed to have incredible friends and many of whom are my college friends. Some of them are from other phases of life as well, but we're all in different passions, different careers, different journeys. Many of us, most of us are moms and I am just constantly blessed and just humble to be their friend and get to learn from them and trade secrets and support each other and push each other and...
just cheer each other on. And so I think it's not necessarily like one person, but the combination of all of that and getting to see all that success. I want to be better because of who I'm surrounded around or who I'm surrounded by.
Conscious Success Co (01:12:40.567)
I love that so much. If you could give your 10 year old self one piece of advice, what would it be?
Blakely Hull (01:12:49.624)
These are really good questions.
Blakely Hull (01:12:58.712)
Say yes to things.
Don't be scared to say yes. Don't feel like you have to have like I'm always a planner. I felt like I had to have my journey planned out that I had to know what I was going to do with my career. And I've had like four different careers. And so, and they've all taken me and taken me on this kind of zigzaggy journey to where I am now. And I'm at the right place now. I know it, but I would have never gotten here. I'm convinced if I hadn't said yes opportunities along the way and let myself kind of follow that zigzag. So it doesn't have to be a straight path. You don't have to know what you're going to be.
when you grow up. You still don't have to know what you're going to be when you grow up, but just follow what life throws at you and be opportunistic, be open-minded, say yes to opportunities, be curious, and let the path take you where it's going to take you, with some intention.
Conscious Success Co (01:13:46.583)
I love that even for a Virgo structured planner to be like, let the path unfold. That's a part of the journey. I love that so much. And lastly, if you could give women listening, maybe someone who is thinking about making the jump into real estate and pivoting, or who's just like wired to build something or disrupt, but getting in their own way or worried about failing or not actually getting started, what would you tell them?
Blakely Hull (01:14:09.666)
Lean on the people around you. Lean on mentors of all kinds, whether they look like you, don't look like you, are older than you, younger than you, people that you respect.
Lean on your friends, lean on your spouse, if you have a spouse or a partner or whatever, lean on your parents if you have parents here, like lean on those around you because they believe in you, sometimes maybe more than you believe in yourself, and let them help prop you up and let them give you that confidence and be clear on what you need from them too. Like sometimes I'll just call my mom and I just, I just need to vent. Like just let me vent or hey, I'm really struggling with this and then she just knows I'm going to go into mom mode and like, you know, tell her she's great and lift her up.
So tell people what you need, lean on the people around you, and don't be scared to be vulnerable with people.
Conscious Success Co (01:14:55.533)
So good. I've loved this so much. You have so much wisdom and so many good insights to share. So hope everyone listening was truly taking notes because there were so many leadership takeaways and success takeaways from this conversation. Lekli, thank you for being here. I've so enjoyed it. And I'm going to follow up with you about getting lunch because we have more to discuss on foundational. All right. Thank you so much.
Blakely Hull (01:15:15.214)
I can't wait. you so much. The opportunity was so fun.
