Walk into almost any real estate office and you’ll spot the same handful of books on the shelf. The Millionaire Real Estate Agent. The ONE Thing. And somewhere in that stack, almost without fail: Start With Why and The Infinite Game, both by Simon Sinek.
Jason Abrams sat down with Sinek on the Millionaire Real Estate Agent (MREA) Podcast to talk about purpose, entrepreneurship, and how agents can stand out among the crowd.
Spoiler alert: as a client, Sinek says he has zero loyalty to any agent he’s worked with. Not because they were bad at the job, but because none of them made him feel special.
Stop Being a Commodity
Sinek has no interest in easing into what it’s like to sit opposite a real estate agent during transactions. He explains that nothing about it has been memorable so far.
“I have no loyalty to any of the agents I’ve worked with before,” he said. “At the end of the day, they were a commodity, and they made me feel like a commodity.”
The example he shares is hard to forget. Once, a seller’s agent showed up to their appointment in the biggest Rolls-Royce he’d ever seen, wearing the most expensive watch he’d ever seen. Sinek didn’t want to work with him. “He was so flashy,” Sinek said, that he felt like just another source of income to be counted. “I did not want to work with this guy.”
Sinek says the problem goes beyond taste. For most clients, a home sale is a really big deal, and an agent who flaunts their wealth can make them feel small. In his view, that agent had forgotten there was a customer to relate to.
The takeaway: When a client is making one of the biggest decisions of their life, flash doesn’t signal success. It signals that you’re in it for yourself. His advice for a $2 million listing? Maybe leave the Rolls-Royce at home.
Money Is a Result, Not a Why
Ask most agents why they do the work, and you’ll hear about mortgages, college tuition, and vacations. Sinek isn’t buying it. “That’s not the why,” he said. “That’s a result.”
His point isn’t that money is bad. It’s that when money is your only motivation, you can be very successful and still pay for it in relationships, joy, health, and sleep. “I don’t want to be the richest guy in the graveyard,” he said.
What he’d rather you have is a true north. Everybody has a why, Sinek says, and once you know yours, it works like a compass. You make decisions with more confidence, including the decision to say no to something that looks great on paper but doesn’t fit the bigger picture.
That clarity matters most on the hard days. “You love your kids every day. You don’t like your kids every day,” Sinek said, and work is no different. You don’t have to enjoy every task. You just have to know why you’re doing it.
Entrepreneurs See the Bagels
Sinek has a soft spot for entrepreneurs, and he’s quick to say we use the word too loosely. Small business owners own businesses. Entrepreneurs solve problems.
To explain the difference, he tells a story about free bagels at the end of a race. The line was long, and his friend decided it wasn’t worth the wait. Sinek just saw the bagels, so he stepped in between two runners, grabbed a couple, and walked away. “I could only see the bagels. He could only see the line,” Sinek said.
In real estate, the line is always there: the market, the competition, the daily grind. The agents who thrive keep their eyes on the metaphorical bagels.
Tell the Story That Makes It Worth It
Here’s where Sinek gets practical. Real estate, he says, is a commodity for many, which means the agents who start with why will “stand out like crazy.”
His advice: Before you pitch yourself, tell one real story. Think about your favorite client or your favorite experience, and share why you love being an agent and why you keep showing up when the business gets hard. As Sinek put it, tell a story that makes the sacrifices worth it.
Most agents do the opposite. They open with how they grew up in the neighborhood, he says, and never ask what the client cares about. Lead with your why instead, and you become the agent who feels like a person, not a pitch.
Hold the Champagne
The most practical stretch of the conversation is about what happens after the contract. Sinek says the standard closing gift, a bottle of champagne left in the fridge, is a missed opportunity. Same bottle, same note, every client. “It makes nobody feel special,” he said.
His alternative: Use the hours you already spend with clients to listen. What do they cook? Do they entertain? What are their must-haves and deal breakers? He points to a story from Will Guidara, author of Unreasonable Hospitality, which Sinek published. A buyer is obsessed with finding the perfect nook for yoga and meditation. At move-in, they find a yoga mat, some incense, and a note congratulating them on the spot they found. “You made somebody feel seen and heard and understood,” Sinek said.
The same goes for staying in touch. A generic “just checking in” feels like a program, and clients know it. Send something personal instead, like an article on a topic the client mentioned. “That makes me want to do business with you because you care about me,” Sinek said.
Give a Gift, Not an Ad
Then there’s the logo-stamped water bottle. Sinek’s rule for client gifts is simple: If your name is all over it, it’s not a gift. It’s marketing. “I’m not going to use anything with your website on it,” he said.
His fix is to give something thoughtful, useful, and high quality, the kind of thing you’d use yourself. Better yet, make it personal. If your client mentions loving the color orange and you hand them the best orange mug they’ve ever seen, they’ll tell people where it came from. Nobody has ever spotted an agent’s name on a water bottle and decided to buy a house. A client who says “my agent knows I love orange” is a referral waiting to happen.
Catch the full conversation with Simon Sinek on the MREA Podcast, and check out his books, Start With Why and The Infinite Game. He’s also started a Substack for more personal writing.
From Ideas to Action
Ready to take your real estate business to the next level? Good news. Gary Keller and Jason Abrams wrote the playbook. Literally. Volume 4 of The Millionaire Real Estate Agent Playbook is out now!
