Context with Mike DelPrete

Rory Golod, president of Growth and Communications at Compass, and I discuss his 10 year journey at Compass, focus as a luxury, building boring products, being a lightening rod in the industry, companies as confusion machines, the inventory strategy and its momentum, outworking your competitors, a 2019 fortune cookie, and the lack of brokerage innovation.

With $7.3B in mortgage origination volume in 2024, Justin Messer, CEO of Prosperity Home Mortgage, and I discuss being affiliated with Berkshire Hathaway, why attach rates top out at 25%, where tech is having an impact, why being on the road is a winning formula, powering a 15 minute pre-approval, starting a mortgage company from scratch, lead source durability, and why mortgage is so hard.

Steve Sanders, with deep brand and marketing experience from working with Zillow and Pacaso (and fellow CU Boulder professor), and I chat about key learnings from iBuyer consumer research, the power and limits of Zillow’s brand, the importance of differentiation, which iBuyer is getting it right, what consumers really want from their agent, how to do real estate branding wrong, understanding unmet needs, the Homes.com ad strategy, and a great case study in defining Pacaso’s brand.

Damian Eales, CEO of realtor.com, and I talk about the necessity of disciplined focus, the origin of the flat white, turning negatives into opportunities, partnering with your closest competitor, leveraging News Corp assets, doing the right things in the down cycle, why everything starts with audience, scheduling think time, investing in MLS relationships, and “debate, decide, deliver.”

Joe Rath interviews me! We discuss trends in real estate tech, what’s surprised me, the impact of AI, the best product not winning, great ways to incinerate millions of dollars, the only thing that matters to portals, the “perfect house” fallacy, the decreasing value of a lead, psychological bulwarks, news vs. entertainment, strategic planning advice, and competing where you can win.

And in case you missed it, check out my interview with Joe from February 2024.

Sean Soderstrom, CEO and co-founder of Courted, and I discuss goat yoga, working in a sauna, motivation vs. inspiration, predicting agent migration, solving actual problems, strategic mistakes, unbundling the brokerage business model, recruiting innovation at Compass, the value of the Hub, making data easily actionable, and trusting your instincts.

Tamir Poleg, co-founder and CEO of Real, and I discuss work days beginning at 3pm, how agents are underserved, growing from 800 to 22,000 agents in four years, what he would do as CEO of an incumbent, how everyone failed with tech, the one stop shop graveyard, replacing 90% of agent tasks with AI, and the most important thing he does as CEO.

Wendy Forsythe, CMO at eXp Realty, and I discuss why the industry is so slow to change, tech that’s moving the needle, the last mile solution, what agents really want, the power of scale, international network effects, how to talk to human beings, corporate bingo, and rate the job performance of eXp’s CEO.

Jeremy Wacksman, CEO of Zillow, and I talk about taking big swings, celebrating failure through learning, constructive feedback from customers, why clear cooperation is such a big deal, extending the Zillow brand, the changing value of a lead, solving the last mile problem, making less people cry, and what the CEO of Zillow actually does.

Mark McLaughlin, interim president at Compass, and I discuss the 9x Pacific Union turnaround, downsizing until someone screams, either growing your market share or slowly going out of business, the hardest part of getting acquired, brainstorming without financial constraints, his greatest recruiting tool, the key post-acquisition message, the cost of low performers, and leading with confidence.