We moved here from Fairfax, Virginia, when I six so I’ve been in the area pretty much my entire life. My mother, Michelle Sneidman, has been in real estate for 24 years now. I have one younger sister. She lives in West Palm and is an ER nurse. I’m married and have two children under two years old, so home life is a bit of a circus right now.

I went to the University of Pittsburgh and graduated with a degree in Kinesiology. After college, I was a speed and agility trainer for professional teams, including the Dodgers and the Penguins. When I moved back to Central Pennsylvania, I did some work training high school kids but pretty much dove into real estate full-time.

Everyone in the sports industry talked about how they never saw their family, their kids. They didn't have a work-life balance. Working 80 to 100 hours a week, I'd get to the facility before the sun came up, and I'd get home at ten at night. That was seven days a week. I realized if I was going to have a family and a personal life someday, I would need to change paths. In 2018, I returned home to Pennsylvania and started real estate classes two months later. I've been working in real estate with my mom for five years now.

I went from working in the strength and conditioning field in college and professional athletics –definitely not a corporate world –to working with my mom, who has a highly respected reputation in the real estate industry. It was significantly different. But I will say both environments are extremely routine-based.

Nine to 11 every day is lead generation unless I have a settlement or other scheduled meeting. After that, I usually work on my coexisting or my existing files and follow up with all my deals to make sure everybody's good to go. Then I follow up on emails and dive into searches for all my buyers, shoot out my daily texts to see where people are, and check in with the lender. Then I go to my afternoon appointments, and twice a week, I'll do an evening lead generation as well. I learned the importance of routine from my mother.

I started going to open houses when I was nine years old. Dad was traveling, so Mom had open houses on the weekends. I would go with my little sister, and we’d sit at open houses from one to four every Sunday.

It’s a mix. I would say the majority of my business is first-time home buyers. I also work with a lot of young professionals who are transitioning from first home to secondary home. Also, people I grew up with are selling their parents’ home.

2023 was a good year, but It was a tough year. I didn't start real estate until 2019. 2020 through 2022 were just not regular markets, but last year was a good year.

I read Shift by Gary Keller, and that helped me a lot. I grew in 2022, not only in units, but volume. I grew in 2023 as well, but needed to do a lot more lead generation. What helped me was learning scripts, role-playing, and how to educate people on getting off of the fence and not letting them get sucked in by the media. Our area is so different than the major metropolitan areas that the media focuses on.

Routine and consistency is number one. Communication is definitely number two. The importance of communicating in this field, not only with your clients, but your co-brokers, your lenders, your title, everything. Number three is just constantly educating yourself on the markets and details of home ownership. It helps you in your dialogue and your conversations with your clients if you truly are confident in the education that you have.

We have a team of seven now. Michelle is obviously the team leader, and my father, Todd, covers Delaware. Michelle, John Henry and I all do 50 plus transactions a year individually. We have two buyer's agents, Svenn and Zach Williamson. Shawn Lutz is our processor, a licensed agent, and marketer

I think 2024 is going be very reminiscent of what we saw in 2020, 2021. We saw the rates go up a little bit in, but I had a ton of buyers who didn't have to go over list price.  In 2024, when we see these interest rates drop back down to the low fives, I think we're going to see things go back to where we saw them in 2020 and 2021.

Looking further ahead, at the end of the day, a big part of sales and a big part of why people use realtors is to benefit from our customer service, our networking, and our relations. I'm sure AI and new technology have its place, but the people who continue to network and communicate and educate and build relationships with depth will continue to see success.

New agents ask how I was able to become consistent with my growth.  I tell them you have to surround yourself with the right tools and the right people. I'm not going to tell you that I think joining a team is the right fit for everybody because it's not. But joining a team when you're a new agent provides you with hands-on training. Find a mentor or find systems that help you create leverage.

And invest in your business and your community, that's the most important thing. I am involved in different community groups that I go to for networking and lead generation. Those connections help you and your business grow.