Under Contract

Tim Donovan
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  • Entrepreneurship

Under Contract is a show for real estate agents and team leaders who want to build a real business, not just chase the next transaction. Host Tim Donovan sits down with top-producing agents and brokers across the country to break down exactly how they built what they built. Their lead generation systems, follow-up philosophy, pricing models, team structures, and the turning points that changed everything.  No fluff, no recycled advice. Just real numbers, real strategies, and the operational details most agents never get to hear straight from the source. Plus an honest look at where AI actually helps a real estate business, and where it doesn't.  New episodes drop regularly. Subscribe if you're serious about scaling.

Episodes

  1. 4h ago

    Flexibility Comes at a Cost: Jase Leonard's Time-Blocking Blueprint for 228 Deals a Year

    Guest Bio Jase Leonard leads HousingAroundAZ, a real estate team based in Chandler, Arizona, in the Phoenix metro market. Before real estate, he built and directed a corporate call center — and walked away from the job rather than lay off half his staff. His first six months in real estate produced exactly one transaction, and his wife gave him one final shot to make it work. Eleven years later, Jase runs a 14-agent team that closed 228 transactions last year, built on a foundation of expired and canceled listings, pre-foreclosure and probate outreach, and one of only 23 Zillow Flex partnerships in the Phoenix metro area. Show Notes Tim sits down with Jase Leonard, an 11-year real estate veteran and team leader in Chandler, Arizona, who came into the business with a strong sales background from running corporate call centers — and still nearly quit in his first six months. Jase is candid about what it actually took to turn things around: watching and emulating agents who were already succeeding (specifically Joshua Smith), leaning hard into the one lead source that fit his strengths (expired and canceled listings), and slowly building the discipline his wife's ultimatum forced him toward. The conversation is packed with tactical detail: Jase's "stool of the chair" philosophy on lead generation (3-4 sources, never fewer, never chasing more than you can master), his team's "War Report" system that scores every agent's weekly money-making activities, and his exact follow-up philosophy — including the specific, permission-based language he uses to justify calling a lead six times without it feeling pushy. He also gets into how his team diversified beyond expireds into pre-foreclosure and probate outreach as DNC regulations made cold-calling harder, and how Zillow's lead-referral partnership became an unexpected lifeline during COVID. On AI, Jase describes something few other guests have mentioned: building a custom Claude skill that generates an AI-created CMA specifically to preempt tech-savvy sellers who've already run their own numbers through Gemini or ChatGPT before the listing appointment even starts. The episode closes with his take on what can't be taught — strive — and his prediction that agents will increasingly resemble lawyers: less about search, more about advice, negotiation, and guiding people through a process AI still can't fully see behind the curtain of. In this episode: From building corporate call centers to walking away rather than laying off staffOne transaction in his first six months — and his wife's "one more chance" ultimatumLearning the business by emulating agents like Joshua Smith on podcasts and YouTubeBuilding a career on expired and canceled listings — and why it still worksThe "stool of the chair": why you need 3-4 lead sources, never fewer, rarely moreHow DNC regulations pushed his team toward pre-foreclosure and probate outreachBecoming one of only 23 Zillow Flex teams in the Phoenix metro areaThe War Report: scoring every agent's weekly money-making activitiesTime-blocking as the antidote to "flexibility comes at a cost"Jase's follow-up philosophy: 14-15 touches, task-based, and the permission to "blow them up"Why he built a custom AI-powered CMA to preempt sellers who've already Googled their priceThe one thing Jase says he can't teach: striveWhy he believes agents will start to resemble lawyers — advisors, not searchers

    Flexibility Comes at a Cost: Jase Leonard's Time-Blocking Blueprint for 228 Deals a Year

  2. 4h ago

    Don't Hire Another You: Roxanne Humes on Building a Team Like a Band

    Guest Bio Roxanne Humes is a real estate agent and team leader with Coldwell Banker in the Pittsburgh area. Before real estate, she spent years as a buyer for May Company (Filene's in Boston, then Kaufmann's in Pittsburgh), and later helped grow a wholesale apparel company to $40M in revenue — until the 2009 financial crisis, tied to the owner's real estate investments, ended that chapter. At 42, with her husband's blessing and her father-in-law's nudge, she got her real estate license and started over from zero, with no local network and no built-in client base. Fifteen years later, she leads a team of roughly 12 agents alongside her business partner Chris Ellison and regional VP John Perry, pacing to close in on 200 team sales this year while personally handling 50-60 units of her own. Show Notes Tim sits down with Roxanne Humes, a Pittsburgh-area Coldwell Banker agent whose path into real estate started with a layoff, a career in fashion buying and wholesale apparel, and a blunt question to her husband: what do we do now? She got her real estate license at 42, was written off by nearly every broker she interviewed with for having no local friends-and-family network, and built her business anyway — first through relentless open houses and professional photography (a rarity in her market at the time), and eventually into a team built on a philosophy she compares to a band: nobody needs to be the lead singer, everyone just needs to want to make good music together. Roxanne walks through her three-question hiring filter (are you nice, are you actually nice, and are you interested in growth), why she brought on a business partner instead of "hiring another her," and where she believes most agents leak business — not from lack of leads, but from failing to categorize and follow up with leads by urgency. She's candid about not being the most tech-forward person on her team, but she's become genuinely dependent on AI for listing descriptions and reverse-prospecting the MLS, cutting tasks that used to take over an hour down to minutes. The conversation closes with a sharp insight from her partner Chris on why buyer-side commission is headed toward full decoupling — and Roxanne's take on why the 2020 industry lawsuit was actually the best thing to happen to the profession. In this episode: Roxanne's path from fashion buyer to a $40M wholesale apparel business — to starting over at 42Getting written off by brokers for having zero friends-and-family networkThe early differentiator: professional photography when no one else in her market was doing itHer three-question hiring filter: are you nice, are you actually nice, and are you growth-mindedThe band analogy: why she doesn't need agents who want to be the lead singerWhy "don't hire another you" was the advice that shaped her partnership with Chris EllisonRoxanne's A/B/C lead framework — and why most leaked opportunities are a follow-up problem, not a lead problem"We think about them 24/7. They think about us once — when they want to buy or sell."How AI cut her listing description process from 90 minutes to a fewReverse-prospecting the MLS: a 15-minute task now down to 1 minuteWhy her partner Chris believes buyer-side commission is headed toward full decouplingWhy Roxanne thinks the 2020 industry lawsuit was the best thing that happened to real estateReinventing herself at 42 — and finding work that finally felt meaningful

    Don't Hire Another You: Roxanne Humes on Building a Team Like a Band

  3. 7h ago

    We're Not Saving People in the ER: How Richard Berman Sells 150 Homes a Year Without Losing His Evenings

    Guest Bio Richard Berman is a real estate agent with RenoSparksHomes.com in Reno, Nevada. He got into real estate eight years ago after a mentor showed him his GCI and Richard asked, on the spot, how to get his license — leaving a $140K/year B2B sales job in the process. His first year netted just $14,000 after expenses. Eight years later, he closed 120 transactions last year and is on pace for roughly 150 this year — with a lean team of himself, one buyer's agent, and three full-time assistants, no additional agents under him. He's built his business on a rigid, professional's schedule and a hard rule: after 7pm, the business day is over. Show Notes Tim sits down with Richard Berman, a Reno, Nevada agent doing what most agents chase but rarely achieve: 150 transactions a year, run by a team of four, without sacrificing his evenings or his marriage. Richard traces it back to an early lesson from his mentor Alan, who caught him doing handyman-level tasks on a listing and asked him point blank: "Is that how much your time's worth?" From that moment, Richard organized his entire business around a small number of money-making activities — prospecting, lead follow-up, appointments, and negotiation — and delegated everything else, starting with hiring his own wife as his first assistant. The conversation goes deep on Richard's follow-up philosophy (motivation and timeframe decide everything — the 3-3-3 method for hot leads, quarterly touches for everyone else), his original vendor-partnership strategy for building a database from zero, and the FAQ system he built by simply writing down every repeated question he ever got asked. But the most memorable thread is boundaries: Richard runs his business on a fixed schedule, tells clients upfront exactly when he's unavailable, and lives by his mentor's warning — "we're not saving people in the ER." Nothing he does after 7pm moves the needle, so he doesn't do it. In this episode: The "Wolf of Wall Street" moment that got Richard into real estateHis brutal first year: $58K gross, $14K net — and the decision to keep goingThe handyman lesson: "is that how much your time's worth?"The handful of activities that actually generate money — and why everything else should be delegatedWhy Richard hired before he "needed" to, based on self-belief in his business planHis original database-building strategy: cold-calling small local vendors for coffee, not big companiesRichard's follow-up philosophy: motivation and timeframe over "the hot lead"The 3-3-3 method for high-motivation leads, quarterly touches for long-term nurturesWhy Richard tells clients his exact hours upfront — and why almost no one objects"We're not saving people in the ER" — the boundary that protects his marriage and his eveningsThe FAQ system that eliminated dozens of repeat questions before they're even askedWhat would need to be true operationally to double his business in 2 yearsWhere AI genuinely helps (transaction management, more human-sounding follow-up) — and where his own system still falls short

    We're Not Saving People in the ER: How Richard Berman Sells 150 Homes a Year Without Losing His Evenings

  4. 8h ago

    Throw the Party, Own the Market: Chip Hodgkins' One-to-Many Playbook

    Guest Bio Chip Hodgkins is the broker/owner of Hodgkins Homes in Syracuse, New York, leading a 10-agent team with a database of over 123,000 contacts. A serial entrepreneur who built and sold roughly 14 businesses — including scaling a bearings company from $350M to $720M before selling to Emerson Electric — Chip "retired" at 40, only to be pushed into real estate by his wife days later. He closed his first two listings within 48 hours of getting licensed and finished his first year ranked #3 in RE/MAX New York State. 26 years later, he's built a business on leverage: one-to-many webinars, celebrity radio and TV endorsements (including Glenn Beck and Barbara Corcoran), and a relentless personal brand built on showing up everywhere in Syracuse. Show Notes Tim sits down with Chip Hodgkins, a serial entrepreneur turned Syracuse real estate powerhouse, for one of the most colorful founder stories the show has featured yet. Chip walks through his path from selling a $350M-to-$720M bearings company to Emerson Electric, "retiring" at 40, and getting pushed into real estate by his wife within days — closing a $700,000 listing in his first 48 hours in a market where the average deal was $160,000. The conversation centers on leverage. Chip breaks down his one-to-many philosophy: running live Thursday-night webinars that turned $350 in Facebook ad spend into 8 real conversations (and multiple five-figure commissions), and his signature move — calling up restaurants before they open and throwing invite-only parties for 120-150 people, covering the bar himself, in exchange for pure word-of-mouth positioning as "the guy who gets you into places before they open." He's also candid about the two moments that each doubled his business: getting endorsed on-air by Glenn Beck, then later by Barbara Corcoran. But Chip is just as clear about the limits of leverage — he doesn't skip one-on-one relationships, citing "never eat alone" as a core philosophy and explaining why his highest-value referrals still come from individual coffee catch-ups, not big events. The conversation closes with Chip's team's follow-up standard (90 seconds, not 10 minutes), where AI genuinely helps (follow-up, not cold outbound), and a cautionary story about accidentally texting someone on New York's Do Not Call list. In this episode: From a $350M-to-$720M bearings company sale to "retiring" at 40 — and getting real estate within daysClosing a $700K listing in his first 48 hours in a $160K-average marketFinishing his first year as the #3 agent in RE/MAX New York StateThe one-to-many webinar system: $350 in ad spend, 45 attendees, 11 appointmentsChip's signature move: throwing invite-only pre-opening parties for local restaurantsWhy two celebrity endorsements (Glenn Beck, then Barbara Corcoran) each doubled his businessWhy "never eat alone" still matters even with a 123,000-person databaseHis team's follow-up standard: 90 seconds, not 10 minutes — and what happens if you miss itWhere AI is genuinely valuable (follow-up) versus where Chip won't touch it (cold outbound)A cautionary tale about AI, Do Not Call lists, and New York State compliance

    Throw the Party, Own the Market: Chip Hodgkins' One-to-Many Playbook

  5. 8h ago

    Med School to $41M: Ali Keys on Delegation, Consistency, and Building a Real Estate Brand

    Guest Bio Ali Keys is the broker/owner of Got Keyed Realty, serving Dearborn and the greater Southeast Michigan area. He was studying to become a doctor when limited finances forced him to step away from medical school — a decision one of his professors warned him he'd regret. Instead, Ali closed three sale-by-owner deals in his first 30 days in real estate and never looked back. Over a decade later, he's trained hundreds of agents and built a business that jumped from $12.5M to $41M in production in a single year after one pivotal hire. Show Notes Tim sits down with Ali Keys, broker/owner of Got Keyed Realty in Dearborn, Michigan, for a conversation that starts in medical school and ends with one of the most dramatic growth numbers featured on the show so far. Ali walks through the moment he almost became a doctor instead of a realtor, and the blunt exchange with his professor that still echoes years later — "if you leave now, you're never coming back." He left anyway. The heart of the conversation is delegation. Ali spent years doing everything himself — showings, offers, negotiations — until he hired a director of operations who asked him one question in their first five minutes together: "How can I help you?" That hire took his business from $12.5M to $41M in a single year. From there, Ali breaks down his three-part framework for keeping leads from going cold (consistency, follow-up, and value), the specific, non-generic ways his team follows up with clients, and why he believes AI's real value in real estate is entirely on the back end — never replacing the human relationship at the front. In this episode: Why Ali left medical school despite his professor's warning — and never looked backClosing 3 sale-by-owner deals in his first 30 days in the businessThe delegation moment that took his business from $12.5M to $41M in a yearWhy "how can I help you" was the question that told Ali he'd found the right hireAli's blueprint for starting over in a new city with no database or reputationThe "recycle approach" to lead generation — no paid leads, fully organicAli's 3-part framework for retention: consistency, follow-up, and valueSpecific, real follow-up tactics that don't feel like a sales pitch (the door-knocking example)Why Ali believes "AI won't take your job — people who use AI well will take your job"Where AI actually creates value: the back end, never the client relationshipWhy the human touch in real estate isn't going away, even as consumers get smarter with AI

    Med School to $41M: Ali Keys on Delegation, Consistency, and Building a Real Estate Brand

  6. 1d ago

    If You Don't Answer Your Phone, Somebody Else Will: Sondra Hernandez on Responsiveness in Real Estate

    Sondra Hernandez is the broker/owner of Cobblestone Realty Partners in Enid, Oklahoma, with 23 years in the business. She spent two decades running an accounting department before a friend nudged her into real estate — a career she says she's never once looked back from. Sondra built a multilingual brokerage (three languages spoken in her office) and a business defined by one non-negotiable standard: she responds to clients in 10 to 15 minutes, every time, from 8am to 8pm. Show Notes Tim sits down with Sondra Hernandez, a 23-year real estate veteran and broker/owner out of Enid, Oklahoma, for a conversation about the one thing she believes separates her business from everyone else's: she actually responds. Not eventually — in 10 to 15 minutes, whether it's a call, text, or email, seven days a week. Her take is simple and a little blunt: if you're a realtor and you don't answer your phone, somebody else will. Sondra walks through the turning point that took her from selling $20-30K homes working 15-hour days to a fundamentally different price point — not by working harder, but by advertising differently. She talks candidly about why she deliberately built a multilingual office, why she's not afraid of hard conversations with buyers, sellers, banks, or lenders, and why she ditched every automated lead-nurture program she ever bought in favor of a personal spreadsheet system. The conversation closes with her take on where AI actually helps (branding and advertising) and her conviction that no amount of technology will ever replace the human relationships at the center of real estate. In this episode: The advertising shift that took Sondra from $20-30K homes to $150K+ — without working more hoursWhy "I respond" is Sondra's entire competitive differentiatorHer actual standard: 10-15 minute response time, 8am to 8pm, every dayWhy she built a multilingual brokerage — and the disservice she believes agents do by not offering itWhy she walked away from every paid lead-nurture program she ever boughtHer personal, spreadsheet-based follow-up system — and why she avoids automationSondra's two-part advice for any agent wanting to grow: treat it like a career, and educate yourself constantlyWhere AI actually helps her business (branding and advertising) — and where she won't hand over controlWhat she believes NAR will lose in the next 5-10 years, and why she expects a national MLSWhy she believes the human relationship in real estate can never fully be replaced

    If You Don't Answer Your Phone, Somebody Else Will: Sondra Hernandez on Responsiveness in Real Estate

  7. 2d ago

    The $300-an-Hour Filter: How Jayson Burtch Built a Southwest Florida Real Estate Empire

    Guest Bio Jayson Burtch leads a top-producing real estate team in Southwest Florida, expanding up the state's west coast into St. Pete, Sarasota, and Naples. He got his start in real estate at 18 after inheriting exposure to real estate investing through his grandfather's rental portfolio, but the real turning point came a decade later — a coaching program in 2012 that took his business from reactive and market-dependent to fully systematized. Since then, Jayson's business has roughly doubled every two to three years, built on a combination of relentless work ethic, diversified lead generation, and — more recently — AI-driven database reactivation. Show Notes Tim sits down with Jayson Burtch, a Southwest Florida team leader who's spent over a decade turning raw hustle into a systematized, scaling business. Jayson doesn't sugarcoat what it took — by his own account, his team is regularly working north of 70 hours a week, and his philosophy is blunt: "nobody works harder, I won't be outworked." But underneath the grind is a business built on real systems, starting with a 2012 coaching experience Jayson calls the single most educational year of his career. The conversation covers how Jayson's lead generation philosophy evolved from pure cold-calling to a diversified mix (still 60-65% past clients and sphere of influence, even with heavy paid lead spend), why he holds his team accountable with a hard "5 conversations before new leads get turned on" rule, and how AI is reshaping both his marketing (the shift from SEO to AEO) and his team's ability to reactivate the massive graveyard of old database leads that would otherwise convert with a competitor. Jayson also gets candid about what surprised even him about his own business — the chaos behind the curtain, and just how many hours it actually takes. In this episode: How a $400/month tool called Zillow first changed Jayson's approach to lead gen back in 2012Why "nobody outworks me" is Jayson's actual operating philosophy, not just a taglineThe coaching program Jayson calls the most pivotal moment of his careerJayson's follow-up accountability system: 5 real conversations before agents get new leadsWhy 60-65% of his business is still past clients and sphere of influence, despite heavy paid ad spendThe "$300-an-hour job" filter Jayson uses to evaluate whether he's actually working like it mattersHow AI is helping Jayson's team re-engage old leads that would otherwise convert with someone elseThe shift from SEO to AEO (answer engine optimization) as more buyers start their search with AIWhy Jayson believes the agent population will shrink 65% in the next 5-7 years — but agents themselves aren't going anywhereJayson's advice to his younger self: get properly educated, and don't listen to negativity about coaching

    The $300-an-Hour Filter: How Jayson Burtch Built a Southwest Florida Real Estate Empire

  8. 4d ago

    Social Media Won't Build Your Business... Here's What Actually Does

    Guest Bio Ben Nemec is a real estate agent and team leader in Huntsville, Alabama, running Team Nemec / Huntsville Homes For You. He got his start in real estate after his mother-in-law, a longtime Huntsville agent, brought him on as a partner following an unconventional path through hospitality management, nonprofit sports sponsorships, and a near-miss Coast Guard officer application. Thirteen years later, Ben leads a team built on referral-driven business, disciplined database follow-up, and a firm conviction that relationships — not platforms — are what actually grow a real estate business long-term. Show Notes Tim sits down with Ben Nemec, a 13-year real estate veteran and team leader out of Huntsville, Alabama, for a conversation that pushes back hard against one of the industry's most repeated assumptions: that social media is the engine of growth. Ben's take is blunt — it's a facet you have to lean into, but it will not bring you long-term success. What does? The relationships you build, how you treat people, and the job you do for your clients, compounded over years, not months. Ben walks through his own unconventional path into the business, the moment he realized real estate has no overnight success stories, and the specific systems — signed calls, open houses, database touches — that have quietly outperformed paid leads for his team for over a decade. He also opens up about the boundaries he had to learn the hard way to protect his family, and gives a clear-eyed take on where AI actually fits into a relationship-driven business. In this episode: Why Ben believes social media "will not bring you long-term success" — and what he tells his team insteadBen's unconventional path into real estate — hospitality school, the Orange Bowl, and a near-miss Coast Guard officer applicationWhy there's no such thing as overnight success in real estate ("a slow burn, month after month, year after year")Ben's actual lead generation philosophy: sphere of influence, signed calls, and open houses over paid leadsThe #1 way agents leak opportunities they already have (and it's not lead volume)Why Ben credits his CRM (Brivity) for keeping follow-up from falling through the cracksThe moment that changed how Ben protects his time with family — and why he got emotional telling itHow Ben's team uses Claude Cowork — and where he still won't let AI near a client relationshipBen's advice for any agent wanting to grow in the next 12 monthsLooking 5 years ahead: what changes in real estate, and what never will

    Social Media Won't Build Your Business... Here's What Actually Does

  9. 5d ago

    Why This Indiana Broker Charges 1% and Still Sells 100+ Homes a Year

    Guest Bio Drew Wyant is a real estate agent and broker/owner in Columbus, Indiana, running a 1% Lists franchise that now spans nearly the entire state. After leaving a 10-year healthcare career and getting licensed in 2021, Drew built his business from 11 sales in his first year to 130+ in a single year as an individual agent — while also growing a team of 23+ agents managing roughly 100 active listings and 75 pendings at any given time. His full-service, 1% commission model has become his core differentiator in a market of 1.8 million+ competing agents. Show Notes Tim sits down with Drew Wyant, a 1% Lists broker/owner out of Columbus, Indiana, who went from cold-calling For Sale By Owners in his first year to running a 23-agent team covering the whole state. Drew breaks down the pivot that changed everything — realizing he was already netting 1% on relocation deals and deciding to just charge that upfront — plus his philosophy on follow-up, referrals as "compound interest," and where AI actually belongs in a real estate business (hint: not between you and the client). In this episode: How Drew went from 11 sales his first year to 130+ in his best yearThe relocation-fee insight that led him to launch a 1% commission modelWhy "good customer service" is not a unique value propositionHis actual follow-up cadence (7-8+ touches before a lead converts)Running a 23-agent brokerage while staying personally active in salesWhere AI helps (compliance, paperwork, transaction coordination) vs. where it hurts (client relationships)The "flywheel" argument for prioritizing deal volume over margin early onOne piece of advice Drew would give himself on day one

    Why This Indiana Broker Charges 1% and Still Sells 100+ Homes a Year
  • 9 Episodes

About

Under Contract is a show for real estate agents and team leaders who want to build a real business, not just chase the next transaction. Host Tim Donovan sits down with top-producing agents and brokers across the country to break down exactly how they built what they built. Their lead generation systems, follow-up philosophy, pricing models, team structures, and the turning points that changed everything.  No fluff, no recycled advice. Just real numbers, real strategies, and the operational details most agents never get to hear straight from the source. Plus an honest look at where AI actually helps a real estate business, and where it doesn't.  New episodes drop regularly. Subscribe if you're serious about scaling.

Information

  • Creator
    Tim Donovan
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    9
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Under Contract
  • Show Website
    Under Contract