Leadership isn’t about control—it’s about creating opportunity for others.

In this episode, Matt Farnham sits down with Leo Pareja, CEO of eXp Realty, to explore his journey from top-producing agent to executive leader. Leo shares how his immigrant upbringing, entrepreneurial drive, and desire to leave a legacy have shaped the way he leads—and lives.

This conversation is packed with insight for real estate professionals and business leaders who want to build something meaningful while staying grounded in purpose and impact.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• How Leo’s childhood experiences shaped his mindset and mission
• The tension between rapid growth and intentional leadership
• How to lead at scale while staying personally aligned
• What it means to build a business with legacy in mind
• Why impact matters more than image

Top 3 Takeaways:

• Leadership at any level begins with clarity and humility
• True success is about multiplying opportunity, not just personal achievement
• Building legacy starts with making decisions today that serve others tomorrow

Special Guest Leo Pareja

Leo Pareja began his real estate career at the age of 19. By 28, he had become the #1 Keller Williams agent worldwide. Over his 15-year career in sales, his team personally sold approximately 4,000 homes.

In 2012, he co-founded Washington Capital Partners, transforming it into one of the largest private lending companies on the East Coast, with over $2 billion in originated hard money loans. In 2016, he co-founded Remine, which quickly became the fastest-growing MLS platform in the industry—capturing 80% market share and serving more than 1.1 million users.

After successful exits from both WCP and Remine, Leo joined eXp Realty’s executive leadership as a named officer of EXPI. He has served as President of Affiliated Services and Chief Strategy Officer, leading strategic initiatives that have strengthened eXp Realty’s competitive edge and agent value proposition. He currently serves as CEO of eXp Realty.

Leo has been named to the Swanepoel Power 200 (SP 200) six times, recognizing him as one of the most powerful and influential executives in residential real estate.

In 2020, Leo co-founded the Pareja Family Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to addressing economic disparities by equipping individuals with the tools and opportunities to achieve financial independence. The Foundation supports women, minority-led startups, and underserved communities through education, mentorship, and financial assistance. It offers a Financial Literacy Course—developed in partnership with Miami Dade College—that teaches essential financial skills for long-term success.

By investing in economic equity and empowering the next generation, Leo continues to drive meaningful impact beyond the real estate industry.

Connect with Leo

https://www.instagram.com/leopareja/?hl=en

https://www.facebook.com/leo.pareja.104/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/leopareja/

Let’s connect!

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All right, well, great to have you back on the One Life podcast. I'm so thankful for you listening and being a part of our One Life community. I am absolutely thrilled to introduce the guest I have with me today, Mr. Leo Pereja. He is the CEO of EXP Realty. He started his real estate career at 19. Leo became the number one Keller Williams agent worldwide by 28 with his team selling around 4,000 homes.

He went on to co-found Washington Capital Partners, one of the largest private lenders on the East Coast, and Remind, which grew to serve over 1 million MLS users nationwide. At EXP Realty, Leo has led major strategic initiatives as president of affiliated services and chief strategy officer before stepping into his current role as a CEO. He's a six-time Swanpool Power 200 honoree and co-founder of the Preyhaw Family Foundation, a nonprofit focused on advancing financial literacy,

and economic opportunities for underserved communities. a big welcome, Leo. Thanks for being here, bro.

Thank you for having me, I appreciate it.

Absolutely. So hey, to kick this off, kind of set the heartbeat for this episode, if you will. ⁓ You are the CEO of the largest and most productive real estate company in the world, on the planet, which is so cool. You are constantly on podcasts. You're on stages all over the country, probably multiple times a week, but you're usually talking about clear cooperation or brokerage or leadership or scaling business and all these things that you're so great at, right? You're as good as anybody, these things, but that's not why you're on my show. ⁓

You're on this show because of what one life is all about man is I'm just really passionate as you know about helping realtors entrepreneurs But primarily realtors in our space Finding that that elusive harmony between work and life that everybody wants to find and man you exemplify that ever since I've been partnered at the brokerage with you I've seen that from you. I've seen it publicly said from the stage. I've seen it on your social media

And it's something that you you consistently go back to. So man, so that's why you're here. So we're not going to get into stuff you're usually talking about. I hope you're OK with that.

No, that's a nice break. I appreciate that.

Awesome. Well, hey, one thing I'd love to just kind of start with, kind of a random question is what's bringing you joy right now? Just anything in your life. What's bringing you joy?

So I recently made a post about this because I love data and there's almost a study or a research paper on just about any concept you want. You just have to go find it. And there's decades long studies on happiness and joy. And my mom's actually a PhD in psychology. I love reading about psychology. And joy boils down to progress. And if you look at

how human beings are wired. There's a part of our brain that is designed to keep us alive, right? Going back to when we were probably in the jungle running away from saber-toothed And so that's the part of our brain that always wants us to keep moving forward because staying still, if you look at the flatlining in the hospital, that's not good, right? Life actually looks like this, right? Highs to lows, highs to lows, highs to lows. And even from week to week, I could have a week where I'm on cloud nine.

And then I have a week where I just want to hide under the bed. And so what I've come to appreciate, especially as I've gotten older in my journey, it's the progress where the happiness lies. And I think there's a couple of quotes that ⁓ are half truths, but not all of it. There's a very classic cliche in my opinion that like, do what you're passionate, you'll never work a day in your life. And I think that's cute, but as a father, as a husband, as a provider, as a leader,

You know that there are days we have to do stuff we don't want to do. And where I think the joy and the happiness comes from is enjoying the progress in the mundane. There's actually super interesting data that showed that the Industrial Revolution was really bad for the human brain because we went from taking something from start to completion and take something like woodworking, like taking a piece of raw wood and turning it into a piece of furniture. There's actually super

interesting emotional process of creation. And I think in business, if you can actually figure out how you're wired and what your God-given talents are and then lean into that. So I've always been a student of myself and my joy and progress and energy comes from doing this, being with people. And sometimes it's one to one and you've seen me do one to many, right?

I can get on stage and in the last 30 days it's happened where I'm jumping on stage in front of a thousand people and I'm like, hey, it's a fireside chat, right? They're like, no, it's a monologue. You don't have slides and go for 45 minutes and I just freestyle for 45 minutes, right? And part of that is it's something that I enjoy, but it's something that I've practiced, right? I just actually did it recently in one of the DM. ⁓

the rallies in the DC area and I script like five minutes before I went on stage, I wrote down like five words on a piece of paper and one of our agents was standing next to me. He's like, what are you doing? I was like, I'm getting ready for the presentation. He's like, but it's because I love it and I've refined it and I've leaned into it. But the interesting part of that is like, I actually got off stage with more energy than I got on stage, right? Because it's something that A, I'm wired to do, but B, that I've really refined over the years.

My script.

And ⁓ that's a perfect example that that morning, ⁓ my flight got super delayed, so I didn't get to my hotel room until like two o'clock in the morning. And then I woke up super early. So I was low energy just physically. And then I did something I enjoy and I got off stage with more energy. Right. And statistically speaking, that same thing is the second scariest thing to human beings after death. Right. Like being thrown on stage and stared at by a bunch of strangers. ⁓ But.

I think the key to joy is to find the progress in everything we do, right? Because there are days where it's not fun, and whether it's being a parent, a husband, a partner, a leader. ⁓ And I think the biggest recognition is that the journey is the progress. The journey is the whole joy in life, right? ⁓ I think early on,

as young folks, we think it's the destination. And once you kind of hit some of your dreams, ⁓ you know, there's all those quotes you see on the internet. like, you know, the you from five years ago would be so incredibly grateful for what you take for granted today, right? It's what you pray for and you're living in the realization of your prayers. ⁓ And we just forget, right? Like, whether it's technology, when we see like, when we saw

chat GBT for this time, it was magical. It was magical, right? And now it's like, what do you mean? It doesn't talk to me in natural language. Like now I expect it from Google and I expect it from every experience. So we get super used to whatever becomes normal. so I think joy is partly a state of mind. And I think it comes from gratitude, right? I'm incredibly grateful every single day of my life for my health, parents.

⁓ And I think part of my journey I've learned to appreciate that nothing's guaranteed, right? And you've probably heard me say it more than once. I tell all the agents, you guys are a super distant second in my priorities, right? It's my family over everything. I actually have it on a custom Nike that I will wear sometimes when I keep it up. says family over everything. yeah, that's where I think joy comes from.

Yeah, we're going to get into that for sure.

mention it on another episode, I have for up and visual for years in my office. It's a picture of my family and the quote says no other success can compensate for failure in the home. That's kind of what you're saying, Leo. And man, I got so many quotes running through my head as you're talking, but I mean, the day we we stopped growing, we start dying, right? One of the mantras I have that that I adopted from our church years ago, but the joy is in the journey, right? We have the the saying those are the good old days we put up in our house. These are the good old days like just a reminder, right? That we're living probably the best days of our our lives, but

In the the grind, it doesn't feel like that every day, right? So 100 % resonate with that. So I'm sure you would agree with the statement alignment matters, right? I know we talk about alignment a lot in our businesses. So you lead an executive team, a team of brokers, growth leaders, 85,000, maybe more than that agents international now. So massive platform of leadership and influence. But what's unique about the limited time I've been with the brokerage is

We have this variety and this autonomy that we see at eXp Realty, but yet there's this alignment at the same time. It's really interesting that you could have so many different people with different personalities, but yet this alignment. So how do you create as a CEO of a massive organization, how do you create alignment, yet allow for such autonomy?

I think one of the realizations in business ⁓ is you need to figure out who you serve, who you're in business, and what your business model is. Let's just stick to US, for example. In the US, we have 4 % of every licensed agent in America. Roughly 65,000 in the US. We're in 27 countries now. We're third or fourth largest in Canada.

top three in the UK, we're number top four in Australia and South Africa. We actually have scale. Some of the companies that say they want to be us, a single country, we have larger operations than them, than they do in the entire United States, which has a large total addressable market. When I look at what our growth opportunity can look like in the US, we're early. We're early in our journey.

Like I think we can 3X in the United States. And ⁓ I spoke on T360 stage where the organization that puts that Power 200, Swannapool list last week when I did a couple analyst calls for Wall Street this week, and they all want to know like when and what's the timeline. And I actually said, I don't care as the timeline. I don't care if it's three years from now, five years from now, seven years from now, 10 years from now, because that's not the actual goal.

The actual goal is to build the most agent-centric company on the planet. And that is my single mantra, period. And it's interesting because I think even some of our newer competitors in the last couple of years started to use it against them and be like, well, obviously, I'm like, just because it's simple, it's not easy. It's not a slogan. It's actually my North Star. So what does that mean? It's making sure that we become more operationally efficient from a unit economic standpoint so I have more

free cashflow to get you guys more tools and services. Let's just say when we execute and we get to 150,000, I think 150,000, 170,000 is the highest any single brand, single brand has ever gotten to in the US and that would have been Keller Williams. Again, people, sometimes those lists come out and they're like, how do you claim to be the single largest brokerage in the country when KW is three times as big as you in the US? Well, Keller Williams is

1200 offices independently owned and representing those 150,000 agents. So the largest single Keller Williams owner operate is probably 4,000 agents. Right? So us at 65,000 or globally at 82,000 plus, it's an order of magnitude how much bigger we are. But let's just hold that like 100, 150,000 agents. That's roughly 10 to 15 % of all agents in America.

Look at the flip side of that. That means at any given point, at whatever scale we ever get to, that's maybe 10 % of all agents are with us, meaning that 90%, 85 % to 90 % of them will never be with us. And more often than not, I actually have a conversation with someone where I'm like, we don't have product market fit. We are not for everybody. And that's perfectly okay, right? I think the journey of life is to finding

a tribe that you connect with, right? And I'm actually very careful with my words and words matter. It's something my team says that I say all the time. You've never heard me refer to EXP as a family. I refer to it as a tribe. My family is my family. And the reason that distinction is important to me is because I would never fire my family member. would never, you know, like to me, a tribe and a high performing in organizations, a lot more like a championship sports team.

Right? And I want to draft the very best I can and I want to compensate them in the best way possible. And I want to create the most economic win-win model. Family, sometimes you don't choose, right? Tribes, you choose. And so it's very intentional for me who we are in business with. And I think that's where the alignment comes from, right? It's... And I'm also aware that I serve multiple avatars, right? So I'm super proud to be in business with our top...

⁓ performers, team leaders and solos. And I think people are surprised how close I am to them and how I actually know them. And I have all their cell phone numbers and I'll bump into them. And I know everything about their business because I'm obsessed with it. It's the coolest thing in the world for me. ⁓ But guess what? ⁓ I probably took two phone calls yesterday with agents doing less than five million bucks ⁓ who are struggling in some areas of their business. And they reached out. And I actually put them on my calendar because I love understanding that.

Because if I can solve a problem for one single person, I can normally multiply that times thousands of people. If I can tweak something, if I can figure out how to tell, and a lot of it is just awareness. We might have already built the systems and processed for it. ⁓ I say my number one problem leading this organization is society's number one problem. It's ⁓ communicating. Matt, ⁓ I have a bet going with Glenn that if... ⁓

If at any point I were to send out an email, do these three things and I'll send you thousand bucks, get 3 % of you would. Right? And it's not right or wrong. It's just like attention is the most expensive thing on planet. maybe you didn't, you read the email, you missed the email. You, you're skeptical that it's spam, right? Because if you think about it, we're, fighting with Google and Meta and all these multi-billion dollar companies for attention at any given point in time. ⁓ so there's, there is

I think you choose your tribe, you attract the people you want to be in business with, and that doesn't necessarily mean you all have to have the same end goal. So to me, the simplest way I've distilled what we are is we are a platform that allow entrepreneurs to build whatever size dream they want. And that's a very personal journey. If you want to do eight deals a year and have some extra money to vacation and your spouse is the breadwinner, I love it.

Right.

She said, well, because I was like, no, no, You need to, like, if there's a problem at 50 or 20, there's gonna be a double the size problem at the next one, right? And it's also appreciating the season of life you're in, right? She was just telling me she had a six month old. And I was like, well, you're exhausted because you're not sleeping, right? And so it actually doesn't matter if you get to 20 to 50, if the season of life is the season of life you're in. And sometimes you just need to know that it's a sprint, not a marathon, in portions of it.

Yeah.

And after a sprint, you normally needed to take a break and regroup and re-breathe.

That's good, Leo. love the visual. The entrepreneurship can build whatever they want. It's the sandbox, right? That's one thing I love about the platform is I've just seen the sandbox. Everybody's getting to play in and build their own thing, but yet it's still aligned. It's a really cool thing. And one thing I want to just lean into, you said, for the listener right now, because you've heard me say it before, a lot of people might not subscribe to this philosophy, but Leo, it sounds like you do. I coach with Dan Sullivan, with Strategic Coach, if you've heard of his program. He wrote,

who not how gap in the game 10x is easier than 2x, know, great, great entrepreneurship coach. But that's one of his biggest things is remove the deadlines. Like the biggest stress we put on ourselves as entrepreneurs is deadlines. But if we're building a life full of purpose and meaning, then we're building a life we don't need to retire from. And you're chasing that North Star for the company you just described Leo, then why do we have to have a deadline to that? Like this just the joys in the journey, right? Let's enjoy the life by design as we get there. ⁓ So hopefully that encourages.

You guys listening right now. So I want to pivot here and talk about time, Leo. Time is something I've heard you in the short time I've gotten to know you. Time is probably the thing I've heard you talk about the most. And I want to actually read a recent Facebook post that you put out because I think it tees up this conversation so well. And here's what you said. You said, value time above everything. It's finite. It's the ultimate equalizer. I just spent four nights away from my family, which is extremely rare for me. So I packed as much into that trip as humanly possible.

From this stage, I challenged our top performers to protect their time ruthlessly. My entire calendar is built around my family schedule first. I'm not missing anything important. I'm hyper aware that when I take my last breath on this planet, my only hope is that it's as an old man with no regrets, surrounded by my bloodline, who always knew they were my first priority. That's the clarity I carry into everything I do. It fills my cup so I can show up fiercely for my EXP tribe, not family, ⁓ as I do for my family, right? But let's be clear.

I'm never confused about my priorities. Figure out what matters most to you and make those your non-negotiables. So Leo, I know when any of us post on social media, we're limited on characters, right? There's so much more behind the post. So give us a little bit more perspective about what you were really feeling like in that moment when you wrote that.

And so, like I said, team always says, Leo always says words matter, right? I said my tribe, right? And then I reference my family. Because it's two different groups. And I belong to many tribes, and so do you, right? But I belong to one family. And so, a perfect example for the listeners, I rescheduled this call, right? Like this was scheduled for Wednesday. It turned out that Wednesday was the last day of second grade and fifth grade for my two kids and the school, of course.

Yeah, I got it. Yep.

kind of last minute told me. And this was already on the calendar and I reached out, I was like, I have to reschedule this. Like there's not a cold day in hell I'm missing my son's second grade graduation award ceremony, right? part of it comes from pain and having learned painful lessons. And part of it comes from just the pretty cool, humble experience I've had in my life where I've, since I was a young man,

Because adjusted for inflation, that's like a half a million to $600,000 GCI a year. And I was able to break bread with my quote unquote aspirational people that I wanted to be around. And every time I met a gentleman or a lady in their 50s or 60s or 70s that was killing it, I always asked them the same question, which was, what would you change? And 99 % of them said, don't screw up the time with your kids. Because there's always an emergency.

there's always something that's gonna be a fire. ⁓ And so one thing about life is we can be told what to do, we still have to go learn it experientially. part of the journey that I feel is just dumb luck and a gift was the fact that I made money early and lost money early. And so there was a couple things that I experienced super young. I missed some of my childhood best friends bachelor parties and weddings.

because there was something so urgent. And Matt, right now I can't recall what I was. And I regret it to this day, right? I missed super important moments. And again, like I did live like no other so I could spend the rest of my life like no other to quote Dave Ramsey, but there are also the prioritizations on the relationships that matter. And then when our kids were born, we were in the middle of building Remind. And I say we, because Ariana is my co-founder and we flew all over the country.

separately, dividing and conquering, selling product. ⁓ And I will say that the first three years of both my kids' lives, I was not there. I was going 200 days a year. ⁓ And luckily, they don't remember. They actually ⁓ have no recollection of it. And we were able to sell and move on with life. And when Glenn approached me about this opportunity, I was super clear about my don'ts.

A lot of people are clear about their wants and do's, but more people are not clear as what they're not willing to do. And so when Glenn and I were negotiating, if you will, all my things were about what I don't want to do. And what I don't want to do is travel. So the agreement with Glenn was I have to attend EXPCON, and I have to attend probably one in many a year. basically, it was my call, which again, I travel way more than that.

Wow.

I

would have assumed much more than that.

So you assume that because of what we've built and designed. So part of it is how do we create content? How do we capture content? So FYI, I'm going to ask for a raw version of this film. And then we'll snip it up. And after this, I have a one hour call where we're going to slice and dice the last 60 days of film. And we'll create 60 posts. And a lot of it is on stages or in podcasts.

One is figuring out what your gifts are and then leveraging that. So like I'm not nearly as good at some of the other leaders and influencers that I admire at talking to the camera by myself. I'm just, and by the way, I'm going to get better at it because I'm working on it, right? But this is a way more natural state for me. So A, if you're one of our agents, I have a yes policy. it's not if I'm willing to come onto your show, it's when, right? So sometimes it's like, hey, it's an August, like three months out, but

I think you were probably booked about a month out, right? Like it's not if, it's just when. But you know, also leveraging it and just knowing that I'm going to maximize it for reach, one to many, and also for a form of communication. just know how you're wired. And then like we plan out our company events almost a year in advance. And the part that for the people that don't know me that seems surprising when I tell them, like,

The Rivera Day School in determines a lot of our dates. So that's the first thing that goes into the calendar for the year. And then the second one is making sure that we don't have any family stuff, reunions are something that's super important because we got to black that off. And then we look at the calendar. Because saying no is a superpower most people don't really develop. ⁓ I have more opportunities on a daily basis than I can say yes to.

especially in this world today. For example, we did a retreat in Dallas last week, and that was planned by six months ago. It is also planned around a keynote invitation I got to do T360. I do four QBRs a year with the leadership team in person, quarterbill business reviews, and then I do three retreats with both the attractors and the top producers.

I will do those three day marathons where from like, um, and by the way, in those four days, I also recorded five, one hour podcasts, one with John Shepard, one with your coach, Tom Ferry that you po you saw a Tom tease on the, on Instagram. Um, one with Glenn Sanford, one with one, one of Mike Del Preti. like I was up six in the morning. I did, I would do two podcasts in the morning, then lead an eight hour retreat, then go record more content, then go to dinner.

Wow.

Do.

Right, so while I'm not home, I will, like that's a sprint. I can push myself 12 hours a day for four days. But then I got home and took Friday off and slept for a day, but was present for my kids. So when I'm home, I have unmovable rocks, which is I wanna make breakfast and take him to school. Not because I have to, because I want to, right? And my entire life is designed around what's important to me, right? So we live in this kind of fairy tale neighborhood in Miami.

The kids' school is three blocks from the house, two blocks from Whole Foods, three blocks from the gym that my son and I go to. And I'm very intentional about everything. I'm always shocked when I hear the automatic programming people's voice of, this happens and I have to do it. I'm like, you don't have to do none of that. And again, as a super involved parent, the amount of people I hear that are slaves to their kids' world in the sense of, I got to drive an hour for practice. I'm like, we're not doing none of that nonsense.

I'm there and I'm super involved, at the same time it's like, is this reasonable? Does this make sense? ⁓ And then I make my kids select what they want to do as their choice, right? Like I don't want to, I want to support them and nurture their curiosity, but at the same time I don't want them to burn out and resent us.

Yeah, that's good. ⁓ So much we could lean into there on what you just said, but I think the one thing I'd want to highlight is is guys. I hope you heard Leo say so many people try to include into their schedule include into their life what they would say is most important. The difference the right way to do is order your life around that, which is most important, and that's what Leo just unpacked for you. Hope you guys caught that.

And I think the

one additional takeaway that I want to be intentional about is it's not a secret, right? Like you just said, you hear me say this from stage. You hear me emphasize this and prioritize this, which by the way, if you ever asked me to do something and I say, hey, I can't because of this, there's no surprise. There's the expectation that that's my priorities and my behavior. And like I say from stage, like,

I will never say yes to dinner. If you fly into Miami, I'm not having dinner with anyone. But I'll have breakfast and lunch with you. ⁓ Tuesday I left because right after the holiday I opened my calendar and there was an agent that drove down to have breakfast with me and four agents that took the Bright Line from Orlando to have lunch with me. And I cracked up because I was like, look, I have an open invitation of not if but when.

And again, if we have breakfast or lunch, it's of one of two places within like eight minutes from my front door. And it's still time blocked. to me, it's no different than doing this, right? Like if you had been in Miami and I'd blocked off this time for you, I would have given it to you. Because it's important to be in relationship with you all. But I think a lot of people feel obligated, right? Like we are reciprocating machines as human beings. That's why when you lead with abundance and giving.

and normally comes back to you in fold. So if somebody were to fly into town to see you and they're like, hey, I wanna have dinner, a lot of you would feel inclined. But it's okay to have rules and just say, I don't do that.

The ⁓ one thing I want to say to elaborate on something you said, this was actually brought up in a prior podcast, but this quote really just impacted me. And I think what you just said, Leo, is this idea that fame is working tirelessly to gain the approval of those who really don't care about you at the expense of those who do. So all those keynotes, all those opportunities that you are saying no to, you're trading that for who really does going to be at that bedside, as you said, on that Facebook post, right? So I admire that.

Well, I'll

give you a different quote I heard and I'm not sure who authored it, but it resonates. It's like, hey, if I ever say something that hurts or feelings, call or text me. And by the way, if you don't have my number, you shouldn't allow it to hurt your feelings.

⁓

That's good. I like that. So hey, you touched on the kids and we might get back there again, but I'm looking at the time and I know we got a lot to cover here. I want to lean into specifically you and Arianna. You guys have been married 15 years. ⁓ She also is a ⁓ great leader. I don't know her personally yet, but just seeing what she's doing that she's constantly, you know, on podcasts and and leading different movements and you guys obviously started companies together in the past. So

This idea of protecting your home when your professional life is massive, right? So how do you and Ariana stay aligned together as a married couple in a season of building and influence that you're in? So what rhythms help you stay connected as a couple?

I mean the same ones that apply to the family, right? And I think, you know, folks, especially younger folks that probably ⁓ don't appreciate that marriage is an intentional activity that you have to be purposeful at, right? And so it's prioritizing each other, you know, it's making sure that you have you time, right? Like I'm really looking forward to Europe. We're going for 18 days without the kids.

And the cool thing is our my parents do live in the neighborhood, right? So like Grandma and Grandpa and their great aunt are staying in the house and by the way, the kids look forward to it. They call it summer camp, right? And by the way, they're ⁓ like they're going to a Spanish camp, which I think my aunt is actually happening to be volunteering at like as one of the teachers because it's a Spanish speaking camp and so ⁓ we've created a life by design, but I think just like people may feel

guilty of prioritizing their family. I think they're even more susceptible to feeling guilty about prioritizing their relationship. So making sure you have alone time and it's not just about the kids and you prioritize each other. one of the things that I'm hyper aware of is if we successfully raise the children that we are hoping to raise, they're going to leave and they're going to have their own lives. We failed that they're still home with us at 40.

You

But if we successfully ⁓ raise amazing humans that contribute to society, we're going to be alone again. I'm actually excited about it. One thing that I don't know that I did on purpose or not is just how I'm wired. I never think too much about something in the future. I'm hyper present. ⁓

You know, you have to enjoy every moment and so you have to find those moments to be close and ⁓ prioritize each other ⁓ and not have it be about other things, including the kids or what's going on. again, at the end of the age you and I are at, statistically speaking, this is the toughest part of life, right? Small kids, elderly parents, most pressure you'll ever have at work. The same study about happiness and joy that I told you about, a reference that the happiest people are is about 65 years old, right?

It's because they have awareness that the end is coming ⁓ and all the hard parts are done and you're most financially stable. there's some just statistical data of like when people experience certain thoughts and why. And so if I can learn from that future self and you know, another thought that I've made posts about that is jarring and dramatic, but it works, is to remember that

you have a 100 % chance of dying, right? Like, in a hundred years from now, everyone who have ever known you will no longer be here. And so whatever is robbing you of your joy and your peace in this moment, it's relevant. And even when you are on this plane, 99 % of the things that keep you up at night or robbed you of your joy don't matter in five years from now, right? Like I would invite you to go back to a memory, you know, as a teenager in college that like,

you lost sleep over for weeks at a time. I can tell you my first bad, bad real estate development deal, I lost 750 grand. And this person caused me agony, I felt emotions I hadn't felt before towards another human being before. But I can't even remember that today. And then also, when I have a bad day now, it's because the DOJ wants to talk to me.

Right.

Or somebody with a three-letter. It's all perspective. But I still have to come home and be present for my kids and my wife and my parents and my loved ones and everybody else.

self perspective, right?

Right. Right.

the there's a verse in the Bible that I love it, but it's the do not be anxious for anything but in all things and it goes on. But I love it because I heard it said once, did you ever realize it says don't be anxious for nothing because usually we're anxious for no reason at all. Like we let it work ourselves up so

you

And just remember, that was the part of the brain that kept us alive from saber-toothed right? We're the surviving ⁓ descendants of the ones who were anxious. The one who was chilling and got snatched up by the saber-toothed tiger did not reproduce. It was the anxiety ball human. So it's part of why we're alive.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Right.

So I got a few minutes left with you, Leo. ⁓ What I want to talk about is, well, question for you. So one thing I'm really passionate about is I do believe that, so one of the reasons OneLife even started is because my wife and I, we just were kind of raised our three kids and it's like, you know what, we need to, they're in this little bubble, right? They have their little friend group, they have their school, their hobby or two, but man, we got to give them a bigger life and a bigger story. And part of my journey, Leo, is I was compartmentalizing my life where,

I had my business, we had our philanthropy or contribution, we had our involvement with the church or city engagement, you know, partners that we work with. And then of course, we have our marriage and our kids. And it was like all these different spinning plates. And I really just went through this journey and I felt like it was my walk with the Lord, but he just said, hey, you got to blur the lines. Like you have one life. It's the family, it's the marriage, it's the kids, it's the purpose, it's the full, it's all that fleshed out through the business, through the community. It's all one life. That's the whole purpose of this.

this whole idea. My question for you would be, do you believe alignment, like true alignment between marriage and parenting and business and all that stuff is possible? And if so, what does that, what would you say to that? What's that look like for you? Maybe, maybe practically with the way that you run your, and the Prairie Hub Family Foundation, I think works into this conversation too, because that's all this idea of one life, right?

Yeah, so like the day and moment Ariane and I both realized that we were each other's forever human was actually when Super early on when we first started dating when we were both in our 20s I met her when she was 21 and I was 24 so we've been together as we say our our whole lives, right? Cuz you know adulthood minus ⁓ The day we met we we were basically, you know kids when we met and and

we found out that we had both signed up for Big Brothers Big Sisters and both of us got rejected because of our driving records. ⁓ But what we realized in that moment is we both had the same philosophy of giving. And I came to that conclusion separately than her, of course. ⁓ So I had made a lot of money early on and a lot relative to what I had. ⁓ But I always knew that I wanted to give. ⁓

another story. That's another podcast.

In my head, I had this like, when I do X, I'll give Y. Then I lost all of it. It was just evaporated in a six-month period during the financial crisis. And it was one of the earliest moments where I had this aha of like, there's only the present. There's never a tomorrow. Tomorrow is a fictional ⁓ aspirational thing and yesterday is a memory. And so when you want to give, give. And giving to me and...

You said it earlier, you quoted me earlier, I value time above everything. So to me, giving the most powerful thing you can give is actually time. So in that moment, I started researching how you could give ⁓ in, I believe in concentrated giving versus ⁓ kind of scattered. So I think a lot of people, and I'm not passing judgment, I'm just sharing my thought here, think a lot of people check the box with charity.

give some of those lessons away because I had them. And so I volunteered with Big Brothers. And when we found out that we both got rejected, we actually went in together and said, hey, you rejected both of us. Actually both great human beings. We both just got the same speeding ticket. And we lobbied them to give us kids. And we both became mentors with Big Brothers, Big Sisters. And it was an awesome experience because we both impacted these two kids' lives dramatically. ⁓

In that moment, we learned it's like, you don't need what you think you need. I think we carried that thought process into being parents, because a lot of parents think they need to work hard to give kids stuff. As a father, you know that all they want is you. They just want you. I think a kid would take less of a lifestyle and more of your parent. ⁓ To me, that's how it's all integrated.

Right.

Right, so we formed a foundation and the powerful thing about what we do with the foundation is actually it's mostly time-based. Right, like we create, right now we create educational products with Miami-Dade College and I personally teach the class and so does Ariana virtually. Right, it's, we get two to three hundred students every time we do it. And so people, I think they're like, in order to be philanthropic, I need to be a billionaire. It's like, no, you don't.

Right? Like even if you were to spend, ⁓ and again, like, I'm not picking on soup kitchens just to be clear, like if you actually spend three hours at an elderly home with someone who doesn't have anybody and just listen to their stories, one, you're get an immense amount of wisdom out of that, but two, ⁓ you're gonna dramatically improve that person's experience for a couple hours. ⁓ And I think you're gonna learn more about yourself in that process too.

Is there any, I the kids are so young still, right? But in your, where do you see the kids involvement? Just kind of getting them in on this bigger story that you're building as a family. What do you think that'll look like? Is it already happening or obviously they're younger, but what's that look like?

Yeah,

and it's super interesting to raise kids in a very digital world. Both of our kids are becoming very self-aware of who mom and dad are. My wife's successful entrepreneur in her own right, but she has a TV show they're launching that direct to consumer children's gummy vitamin coming near you back to school. I'll send you the link when we drop it, but it'll be in Costco and Walmart and stuff.

We're in talks with another TV show. They know that we're different as parents. My kids came home one day with cheesing and I knew something was up. They said while they were waiting for pickup, one kid ⁓ said their parent was famous and they were Googling. They all took turns. Then my daughter put my name to Google and they're like, your daddy's the most famous as daddy because I'm the first six pages of Google.

And I clarified, I'm only real estate famous. I'm not real or famous. ⁓ And so, you know, there is very obvious signs that our world is different, right? Like we travel a lot, our life is different, right? We stay in very different properties when we travel and we have help. ⁓ But I think one is a balance to understand that that's what mommy and daddy did and not them. And there is zero chance that that's theirs, that's ours. And I'll point that out to them.

and we make them do chores and all that kind of stuff. But I'm also super clear that I don't want to breed them to be an experiment. I want them to be their own people.

you

Thanks for being

vulnerable and sharing a little bit. God knows this isn't your typical podcast, Leo talking about family and.

This is probably more fun than the normal ones I have to do. I'm tired about talking about, you know, all this.

Clear

cooperation, You probably do a week without that one. ⁓ Well, let's round third and bring this home, man. So, obviously the show is One Life. It's about, you know, just trying to blur the lines and living that, again, just that family that mirrors that purpose, that passion out through the business. Instead of trying to just separate all these things. What would you say to somebody who, you know, we have some high performing people in our brokerage in this industry and they're crushing it.

but maybe at the expense of what matters most to them in their life. What would you say to somebody who just doesn't know really where to start? Because some of these high achievers, you you said in that Facebook post that you're very clear on how to make those decisions, but some people are not. It's a real struggle. What would you just leave them with if you're going to give them one final thought?

First, find alignment with your people. Like, actually sit down with them and say, what's important? What does success look like from your point of view, whether it's your spouse or your kids? And again, and also appreciate their seasons to it. Like I said this recently, and Ariana and I were having dinner the other night, we wholeheartedly agreed on this. Like if our kids were out of college and I was in this exact season, we would actually be nomadic. Like we would not have a primary residence, right?

I probably go from one city to the next every two to four weeks and throw events and speak and we have a virtual platform. So I would just travel with our gear and we can jump into any physical, a virtual office, Regis, all that stuff. ⁓ Because it'd be fun, right? And then just understand it's like, okay, there's probably a five or 10 year season where this is what my life will look like. ⁓ Because it's aligned with who's important and what is important.

⁓ So I think that's a thought that I'm starting to gravitate to more as I've gotten older, where it's like, just like, again.

I think sometimes when I speak, think of like, he's all about life balance, right? Because I'm very structured with my time now. But I think that's the reward to the effort I did in a different season, right? Like I actually tell 20 year olds, right? Every time I do a keynote, I'm like, raise your hand if you're under 25. I'm like, work 12 hours a day, 14 hours a day until you collapse because it's a superpower. It's an advantage on us old people because I just can't physically do it, right?

But when I could, and it's kind of the fun part about the journey, Like one hour of my time now gives me 10x the yield that it did when I was 20, right? Because I know more stuff, I'm more impactful, I'm surgical with my words, I can impact more things with the skills I've acquired over the period of time, but I only acquired them because I did that work, right? Like, you know, I get compliments about my ability to speak to a group.

There was times where I was speaking to 10 people, right? And there was times where those 10 people were playing on their phone when I was up front, right? And part of it was like having someone in your corner where this is your partner, your friends who were like, hey, by the way, those are really boring. Like you sound too robotic, tell more stories, cuss a little bit, it's more on brand for you. Like be more authentic and I would, I just.

gave some coaching to an executive in our company who's taking on a big role. my advice was to be the most authentic version of yourself, which sounds obvious, but I think it's counterintuitive to most people. He's like, what if so-and-so doesn't like it? And I was like, then that's their problem, not yours. And if they don't like it, then you're not at the right place. ⁓

as intense as my life is, because professionally speaking, it's like back to back. This is my third podcast of the day, and then I'm going to lead a couple other conversations and big agent meeting. It's a crazy pace. If I was acting or I was being a character, my energy would go like this. I can't show up as a... Whenever we're not being authentically ourselves, that's draining. I encourage...

and I strive to be in authenticity at all times.

I love it. You know that one of the biggest things you'll hear all the time in our industry is imposter syndrome, right? Well, a lot of us say we have that well, if you're being your true authentic self, you'll never feel like an imposter, right? It's when we're trying to not be our authentic self.

So

I will push back on that one because I think it's human nature to feel the imposter syndrome because I have a theory that I think we all kind of get locked in at whatever age that is and I think for most of us like 14, 16 when we kind of develop our identity. And other than that, like I still sometimes feel like a 16 year old and I'm like, I pinch myself. I'm like, this is my life. Like, is that my wife? Is that these are my kids? Like I live here. This is my car. This is like this is my life.

And I think that's part of the imposter syndrome. I had somebody in the company, we were going somewhere and he kind of looked at me he goes, do you ever just kind of go, this is really cool? And I'm like, yeah, the 16 year old me is always like, yeah, this is awesome. This is different than I pictured at 16.

last thing I'll say before I wrap this up Leo is one of my mentor for years used to say the day a leader stops growing he forfeits the right to lead and I just want to honor you bro because that's what is very evident in this conversation is some people might Google Leo and see the first six pages Google say okay this dudes arrived like cruise control but man you're not like you're you're talking about data you're reading and all the studying you're doing and you're just constantly leading from the front bro so I honor you for that and thank you for that it's a it's a

joy to be a part of your organization and to have you, you know, be one of my leaders in my life. So thanks for.

Well,

I will only edit that sentence and say our organization.

There you go. Our tribe. I like it. Well, man, thanks for being here, Leo. Dude, I think I got through half the questions I had for you and I knew that was going to happen because there's so much I would love to talk to you about. But man, I'm grateful for your time ⁓ very much. So share anything that you came with me Leo, like even Ariana's new adventure that she's getting ready to launch because ⁓ listener, we're going to put the show notes out there so you'll have information on the Praha Family Foundation, how to get in touch with Leo, of course, the organization that he leads and.

And whatever else we can provide to get people connected to you, Leo, that we want to do that. So visit the one life podcast dot com. Don't forget the the one life podcast dot com for show notes and listeners. We're grateful for you. This episode resonated with you. Please share it with somebody that might encourage them. Reach out to us. We want to get the word out. Spread this community and help more agents and entrepreneurs find that harmony between work and life. So, Leo, thanks again, bro. Appreciate you being here.

Thank you for having me.