It Only Takes 5 Minutes To Breed Success – With Karen Briscoe

Stephen S. (00:02.382)
Welcome back to the show where we interview the nation’s leading real estate entrepreneurs. If you’re joining us for the first time or the second, third or hundredth time you’re in for a real treat today. I’ve got Karen Briscoe in the studio. She has a wealth of knowledge and has been involved in the real estate space, specifically residential for over two decades now. How to transition out of commercial.

real estate and the whole slew of things there into the residential side. She’s also the founder and creator of the Five Minute Success concept, has a podcast and is an absolute phenom with her real estate group under Keller Williams. She’s sold over 1,500 homes and over a billion dollars in real estate. Just remember at Investor Fuel, we help real estate investors, service providers and real estate entrepreneurs, 2 to 5X their businesses to allow them to build the businesses they’ve always wanted.

to allow them to live the lives they’ve always dreamed of. With that being said, Karen, welcome to the show.

Karen Briscoe (01:01.866)
I’m thrilled to be here and would love to add value to your community and so looking forward to the conversation.

Stephen S. (01:09.098)
Me too. We had such a lovely time sharing a little bit before we hit record. So before we kind of get into some of the meat and talk about your five minute success concept, how you created that, how it’s useful, what high level performers can can maybe use in working that into their routines. Tell us a little bit about what got you into the real estate space back in the day and where you’ve gotten to yourself now.

Karen Briscoe (01:37.504)
I started out in dirt in Texas, working for a land developer, Tremel Crow division, and we would buy land and put in streets and utilities and sell lots to home builders, mostly the production home builders. And really, I cut my teeth on that because I would say what I learned at Tremel Crow was really how to study the markets.

Stephen S. (01:50.382)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (02:04.022)
and to determine where demand was and supply. Back in the day, way before there was data analytics, we used to actually go count billing permits. But it was still the same concept and learned also negotiation and again, the market knowledge was so key. that career then, I my husband, two children and his career took us to the

Washington DC, which is now known as the DMV, but we are in the Northern Virginia side. And I was actually home with my children for about a dozen years because my husband’s career took travel and was gone a lot. We didn’t have any local family support. And so when I wanted to reenter the workforce, I was like, I’m going back into commercial.

And it’s, well, it’s different, but it’s also, if you think about land developers, they’re looking for land out in, you know, exurbs and outer suburbia, because you got to find, you know, usually farmland and convert it to subdivisions. So it wasn’t a very practical career choice. So I had an opportunity to go work for the Staubach company at the Nextel account and did sales engineering warehouse offices.

And I’m just going to say that once you’ve seen one sales engineering and warehouse office, then you’ve seen them all because it’s pretty cookie cutter every game just so.

routine and almost boring. So they asked me to get my real estate license and I did because as a developer, you don’t necessarily want your license because once you have license and you have to disclose. So I got my real estate license and then something interesting happened, the dot-com bust.

Karen Briscoe (03:58.972)
they and you work for a technology company and it busts then there’s a lot of layoffs and next tell Stalbach lost a camp and next tell still needed the services so they were going to hire me in house but I was like you know I was in Texas when they were you know going through a crash and savings alone crisis I’m like been there done that don’t really want to get into this whole disposition mode because I just knew that was not going to be fun and so somebody said well why don’t you try residential

Stephen S. (04:06.382)
Hmm.

Stephen S. (04:25.678)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (04:29.992)
And I mean try, like literally, like just give it a shot. And there is a perception at least that I found that there is like the people in the commercial side, they are the ones that have all the market knowledge, strategy, negotiations. They do the hard stuff, right? And the people on the residential side, they do all those soft skills, like talking to people and caring about what they think. And the thing is, is when I did my first deal, I was like, my gosh, I love this.

have both. Like I’m already a soft skills person. I have them both. And what I found about my time with commercial was it was just too hard. Like no soft skills, nothing opportunity to get to know people and serve them and provide value to their lives. And so I was like, wow, and I hit success rapidly and found my place in that.

Stephen S. (05:12.174)
Hmm.

Stephen S. (05:25.228)
Wow. Now, so in that transition, how did you get to where you’re at now?

Karen Briscoe (05:29.91)
well, I wait, you we may get into the five minute success principles. I will say I realized very rapidly that it that nobody called me when I got my real estate license and asked me if they wanted me to help them buy or sell house. I had to actually go and get the business. And I would say that’s probably still not probably it is still true to this day. I am a very active

consistent, persistent lead generator. And I tell people, really…

don’t stop because when I did when I was writing my book I thought I’ll take a three month sabbatical and I’ll write my book and I I mean I’d already been in the business like 15 years I mean surely I can you know coast a little bit here and I felt like my business just right up like it was like the pipeline just it just stopped and so it was a real wake-up call for me and I went into double time for three months I’m like well not only do I have to fill the pipeline from the last few months I have to like double time and get to you know fill it extra

and then I had one of my best years ever. So I believe, it’s a little woo-woo, but I believe that the universe honors people who actively pursue opportunity to work with people. And it’s not always matchy-matchy. I don’t…

Stephen S. (06:51.767)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (06:56.448)
can’t necessarily correlate the people I contact today with where my future business is coming. But I’m putting out that energy that I’m here ready, willing and able to serve your real estate needs. And it just over time comes. But I would say if you wanted to know the one thing that has made the most impact, it’s that and that just persistence drive.

Stephen S. (07:03.918)
you

Stephen S. (07:21.678)
Absolutely. So tell me about where you were at in your career when you came up with the five minute success concept and how that was so pivotal for you when you developed it.

Karen Briscoe (07:36.342)
So I started on the residential side in the early 2000s and one of the top agents in the United States, she was number 10 at the time, asked me to join her and be her partner. so my group is called the HBC Group. So H stands for Sue Alcabee and B stands for Karen Briscoe and I’ll tell you about the C in a minute. so she and I joined together and in 2008,

and I remember it because it was September, you may remember what happened in September 2008. The financial markets crashed along with the real estate market and my business partner died. Now I knew she was ill, she really wasn’t that old, I was like I didn’t know she was gonna die, I when I took all this on. But then the idea of well then what do you do with this huge business, right? With this huge overhead of marketing and expenses and employees.

And so the good news is I had some muscle memory from the Texas Tamics Low Crisis. And I immediately got to work. First of all, figuring out how to get out of a lot of heavy expenses and then getting right on that. And then setting about to rebuild. And part of that rebuild was finding another partner. And Lizzie Conroy, who is the C in HBC, joined me in 2009.

I was actually thinking I might go find another arena. having Lizzie join me re-energized me. So I would say it took, you know, seven years to get back up to the levels we were producing, 100 million a year. And so what would happen was people in coaching and training and discussions like, well, how did you do it? Because a lot of people were able to, not everybody, but a lot of people did survive the market crash.

But not everyone also had their business partner pass away. And so I would tell stories, kind of like I’m doing now, but I would tell stories. And they became memorable. And I started a blog. then people, well, a couple of things came up. They were like, you should write a book. But I was like, well, OK, there’s a lot of real estate books out there. I mean, what makes my space unique? And when people would say to me in these situations,

Karen Briscoe (09:52.982)
Well, I just don’t have time for personal and business development. And I would say, well, do you have five minutes a day? And everybody says they do. It’s really pretty universal. And the idea is it breaks down the resistance, if you will, because the idea that to say you don’t have time, if you can commit to five minutes a day, then you can…

Stephen S. (10:09.102)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (10:18.23)
Well, first of all, it builds a habit and all these things we can talk about. But also, there is a phenomenon called Perkinson’s Law. When you limit or restrict activities, then you often can become more productive because the challenge with a lot of books and trainings and everything is they go on for long times and people are like, can’t commit to that, so I’m not going to do anything. But if you will commit to the five minutes a day. And so I wrote the book.

That’s what I call a daily reader. So the idea is you read one page, you read one concept a day. And that really works with also the phenomenon of a lot of salespeople, people that are entrepreneurs, because they’re really kind of that shiny object squirrel phenomenon. Like I gotta have something new every day. I, you know, I’m a deal maker, I gotta make it exciting, or I’m just gonna get bored with it, and I’m not gonna finish the book or finish the training or finish whatever. So anyhow, it, that’s, it’s stuck.

Stephen S. (11:03.918)
Ha

Karen Briscoe (11:17.034)
Because they were like, well, I can do five minutes a day. And I’m like, OK, well, that makes my concept unique. so when I started working with a book developer, publisher, he’s like, OK, well, that’s all well and good. But there’s got to be some core principles here. Like, can’t be just like, every day is different. It has to have some sort of structure. So then that’s where I built out, well, what are the key elements?

to success, well really in real estate, because that’s the name of the book, real estate success in five minutes a day. But what I’ve learned on this journey is that they really do apply almost universally to other industries and other endeavors.

Stephen S. (11:54.126)
Mm.

Stephen S. (11:57.615)
Wow. You bubble with joy. Where does that come from?

Karen Briscoe (12:00.982)
Well, thank you. Well, it comes from, think, having a meaningful, purposeful life and doing a lot of coaching. I coach other people, but I also coach myself on thought work and how to, because really all of the things that happen to people’s lives and circumstances, it’s really how do you think about it, right?

Stephen S. (12:30.092)
Yeah

Karen Briscoe (12:30.28)
So if you change the way you look at things, the way you look at things changes. That’s a Jim Rohn quote.

Stephen S. (12:36.29)
You bet. Absolutely. Love some Jim Rohn. Now you also mentioned earlier that the universe rewards people who look for the opportunity to serve. Where did that mindset come from?

Karen Briscoe (12:49.694)
Well, because I’m, you know, like a mathematician, I’m really a high C in terms of my like numbers and correlations and everything, but I couldn’t make a correlation because it didn’t correlate. I couldn’t say I called these five people today and then all five of them at some point did business with me. I couldn’t correlate it. And so I was like, come on, there must be something else to this because I also found when I stopped

doing the work, then the work stop, then the opportunity stopped coming to me. And I’m like, there’s something to be said for the commitment and the actions. And so that’s where the energy happens.

And so it also, I found it to be very releasing because what I found a lot of people in sales is they get so caught up on that each individual deal and if it doesn’t work out and the person goes to someone else and then they start taking it personally and then that changes energy too. Like the energy then feels like your resistance, your negativity, your like bad mojo, whatever you want to call it. And so that means the other side is true as well.

Stephen S. (14:05.198)
Yeah, I completely agree with you on that for sure. I’ve seen that play out in my own life many times. Tell me a little bit about this. Like who’s the perfect person to actually implement the five minute success concept and in that five minutes, what are they actually doing?

Karen Briscoe (14:20.982)
you

Okay, well I would say anybody can implement it. Like I said, it works, it doesn’t real estate. So it’s predominantly a business philosophy, but if you think about it, you can apply it in lot of ways. the first one is commit to get leads. And I said that when you asked me, well, what’s the one thing you could do such by doing that, everything else would be easier unnecessary. Well, that’s it, commit, commit to get leads. So business development, prospecting, lead generation, everybody does it. I mean, dentists call it,

Stephen S. (14:46.115)
Right.

Karen Briscoe (14:52.15)
business development. Churches call it evangelism. is doing, you know, investors call it, you it could be, you could be committing to get leads for money, sources of money, funds, it could be committed to get leads for deals, but everybody’s doing something like that.

Stephen S. (14:55.615)
Hahaha

Karen Briscoe (15:12.674)
And then the consulta-cell is what some people call conversion. I call it consulting because I’ve found you can’t make anybody do anything, right? So there has to be, you know, it’s still a free world, right? So free will exists. So, but if you consult them to help them achieve what they want to achieve, then they’re going to do it, right? So, but it’s a process. So you take people through really

Stephen S. (15:34.606)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (15:39.926)
Again, everybody does it. Dentists clean teeth, do x-rays. They do something to get out on the other end. Churches, they have ministry and programming. Non-profits do these too. They still have to have money. So everybody’s doing something to get a result on the other end. Well, then what I found is that if you only do that, if you only get leads and convert them, you’re going to be on this roller coaster, hamster wheel, whatever you want to call it, like AmeriCorin.

you’re not going to go anywhere because you’re only going be as good as your next deal. And that is a, it’ll be exhausting at some point, maybe when you’re young you can pull it off or early in the business, but some point really successful, sustainable, long-term operations businesses, they connect to build and grow. They figure out those key principles of scale, leverage, system, and they build it and it becomes a model and it’s reproducible, right? Other people can do it.

So that’s what I found in my business. I can do it. I’m a very driven person. I’m going to make it happen. But can I help other people do it? And that’s where the connective building grows. A lot of it’s a who. It can be systems, but it almost always includes a who because at some point you can’t do everything, only one person. And then what I found is to achieve at a high level long term the success

Stephen S. (17:00.344)
Right.

Karen Briscoe (17:07.824)
mindset and I call that success thinking activities and vision because people have a vision and a lot of times people think success thoughts. Like I said, you got to take that action in the middle. You got to do the activities because to sustain success long term, that is going to be a key aspect to that. so that’s where the like I said, what my my publishers said, but there’s got to be a structure. So I drew this

Venn diagram like on a napkin. It was classic, you know, drawing it on a napkin. This is the plan. And it’s true, I’ve been doing this now for, well the book came out in 2016, so it’s about ready to have its ninth birthday. So those concepts, I’ve had 435 plus episodes on my podcast and I’ve interviewed that many people in a lot of different arenas and they’ve all said yes, I do all these things in some way.

Stephen S. (18:06.51)
Wow you you mentioned like commit to get leads and and I even wrote down here on my notes commit to get relationships You know, it’s it’s interesting because I actually watched a clip of Cardone Speaking yesterday who I don’t necessarily I don’t necessarily follow for any Reason I just it just kind of came across my feed and he was talking about he’s like, you know, I’m a transactional person

Karen Briscoe (18:15.527)
Ooooo

Stephen S. (18:36.146)
And was talking about how he, he goes, you know, if we have a transaction and then a relationship comes from it, then okay, so be it. Like, great. But he’s like, I’m not looking to be relationship with no transaction because then there’s no value that I’m getting out of it. And I thought about that really kind of deeply. I’ve been pondering that ever since I saw it yesterday evening. And

You know, ultimately, you you do have transactional people and relationship people. And I think sometimes relationship people can get misunderstood for having ulterior motives, whereas transactional, at least you know what they want right from the get go. Right. But what’s your what is your what is your process for when you’re committing to get leads? Are you building a relationship with those people or what’s your style?

Karen Briscoe (19:18.826)
Well, for me, yes, because I would say the majority of my business is past clients referrals, connections. I do have occasional people that’ll believe it or not find me on podcasts and Google me and find my books. And I have had that happen. It’s still mostly relationships. And that is fascinating that you took that commit to get because it is true there are.

Stephen S. (19:30.958)
Mm-hmm.

Karen Briscoe (19:42.908)
other arenas where you commit to get, you know, for example, relationships. And that will be key when you’re connecting to building and growing. Because like I said, it’s more oftentimes a who not how in growing to the next level. could, you know, I know you all run masterminds, you know, the who in those relationships, because many people reach ceilings in their business and life and they to go to the next level to break that ceiling, they really need somebody that’s at the next level or can see things. That’s what coaching is so valuable for.

that you they can help you see things that you can’t see. So yes if you take the commit to get relationships to grow to the next level, commit to get relationships also would be a great lead generation strategy too I think because people there’s been a lot of research they call it the strength of weak ties. People are more likely to refer you’ve heard the seven degrees of separation.

Stephen S. (20:38.051)
Yes.

Karen Briscoe (20:38.262)
people are more likely to refer like the second to third grade plus. Your immediate friends and relationships, family, are less likely to refer you. that sometimes get, you know, people wrap that around their head and they go, why? And I’m like, well, they may be just a little too close, right? But the next couple of levels will refer you. And so I have this philosophy, I never know where the next deal is coming from because I really

Stephen S. (20:58.296)
Yeah.

Stephen S. (21:02.891)
Mm-hmm.

Karen Briscoe (21:08.216)
don’t know at what point that relationship is going to have a need and then that will happen that that like I said the the the strength of the weak ties.

So yes, can commit to get healthy. You can commit to, but the key word in that is the commit because so many people say they’re gonna try something and you know what Beata says about that, there is no try. There’s only do. When you commit to something though, you’re gonna figure it out. You’re gonna make it work.

Stephen S. (21:22.7)
Right.

Stephen S. (21:31.086)
Mm.

Karen Briscoe (21:46.614)
When you try something, you’re like, eh, didn’t work, moving on. That’s why when I said at the beginning, when I was like, I’m going to try residential real estate, I can’t say I went into it with the right attitude. I was fortunate that it was an immediate, like, you know, knowing. But a lot of people try residential real estate. And I find the ones that commit to it are more successful.

Stephen S. (22:06.51)
Yeah.

Stephen S. (22:10.432)
Right. You know, I even that’s something I teach my kids, you know, my kids would be like, well, I’ll try to do this and I’ll try to do that. And my wife, she hates it when I do this. But but we’ll all try. And I’m just looking, I’m like, if you’re going to try, then just don’t. And and they’re like, what? And I’m like, because and I’m like, hey, when you think about it, anything you ever tried, you didn’t do. So just do it or don’t like there is no try.

Karen Briscoe (22:17.704)
Yeah.

Karen Briscoe (22:23.67)
Yeah, because you’re already creating your own scapegoat.

Karen Briscoe (22:33.46)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, you know, it really is, it’s up. And you know, the other thing when I share it with us to people, I’m like, you’re creating your own escape route, you are already rejecting you.

before you even tried, right? By saying tried. So commit to do it. You’ll learn, grow, or become better than before. You will learn something, right? You may not, quote unquote, do that one thing, but you will learn something that will, you know, it’s kind of the whole Einstein thing, you know, like how many times did he try to invent a light bulb? I mean, he didn’t stop when the first, I don’t know, 900 didn’t work. He was committed to it. Figured it out.

Stephen S. (23:16.344)
you about. So let me ask you this, Karen. If you had to go back to the beginning and you were starting back way back when and you were able to take all of the challenges, the lessons, the wins, the failures, everything that you’ve been able to accumulate over the last several decades and you were you were starting with your journey, what would you do different and what would you do the same with all that knowledge?

Karen Briscoe (23:45.526)
Well, all the things that happened, know, the circumstances have informed my current self. So I’m not gonna really take any of those away. I think what I would, I’ve done a lot of coaching and thought work in the last, I don’t know, nine or 10 years. And I would like to have go back and apply that to the early years. I did a lot, I spent a lot of time worrying and that was, which is really…

I found for me very wasted energy. And so the idea that whatever, mean, now I’ve, you know, I’ve been through financial markets crash, savings long markets crash, pandemics, stock market fluctuations, interest rates at 22%, you know, down to 2 % to, you know, all the things. One time my business partner who passed, her husband was a congressman.

Stephen S. (24:17.314)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (24:43.176)
And in the 1970s when she was in real estate, she went to him and she said, when are you going to do something about about interest rates? And he said, well, when are you going to learn how to sell houses no matter what the interest rate is? And I’m like, I still remember that today. So whenever someone says, well, I’ll do that when this happens, I’m like, well, when are you going to learn how to do it with that?

Stephen S. (25:03.021)
Wow.

Karen Briscoe (25:09.758)
Because that’s what is the opportunity. Because, well, first of all, if interest rates change to whatever direction you wanted them to change to, then anybody could do it. Right? I mean, that would be…

Stephen S. (25:14.946)
Hmm.

Stephen S. (25:23.79)
Sure.

Karen Briscoe (25:26.406)
That would not be the point. The point is can you, can I do it? And what I found is on more skills I have, I’m just like, well, I can do it. I can figure it out. So I would worry less. I would just say, you know what?

Stephen S. (25:31.182)
Hmm.

Karen Briscoe (25:40.116)
past me, it all works out. I, it also, I could have known how successful I was gonna be, the years I stayed home with my kids, I probably wouldn’t have wished them to grow up faster. And you have little ones, so I’m just gonna share that. I know everybody says it because the days are long and the years are short or whatever it is, whatever, whichever way it goes. It’s so true, but it’s like when you’re in middle of it, you’re like, yeah, right, I just wanna get good night’s sleep. So, but that’s what I would say to myself.

Stephen S. (25:52.142)
Hmm.

Stephen S. (26:08.728)
Love that. Yeah. On that point too, you know, what you mentioned there, kind of the reframe that I’ve been dealing with in the last few days is because we are, we are going through that. Like in my family right now, we are going through,

somewhat sleepless nights, you know, I have to maintain a very high level of energy to do what I do. And so I, you know, my wife takes the brunt of it and, was up for four and a half, five hours in the middle of the night the other day with between our newborn and our toddler before finally throwing the toddler in bed with me, which we try not to do.

But you know, I whenever I have to get out of bed and go go deal with her and rock her back to sleep or whatever those things are. I think it’s very easy for people to get frustrated about the challenges and the things that they’re going through. And I’ve really worked on reframing in the past month with a newborn of like, you know what? This is not fun, but I’m grateful that I have a little girl who I’m able to rock.

who isn’t sick, who doesn’t have cancer, who is living happy and healthy. And I’m glad she has an active mind to where, you know, she’s able to, you know, you know, she’s having some of these, you know, challenges. And I think that’s just part of life. It’s finding the challenges and turning those things into positive notes, because it could be so much worse. And I have I have a special needs child who has Tourette’s autism.

Karen Briscoe (27:23.606)
and

Stephen S. (27:40.526)
Tourette’s autism, cerebral palsy, I mean, he’s 18 months in a 13 year old body still in diapers. And so coming from that perspective, it’s like that could be one of these other kids too, but it’s not. And so even though it’s challenging, I have so much to be grateful for that there’s no reason for me to be frustrated at the challenges.

Karen Briscoe (28:00.202)
Yeah, because you know, know, I’ve kind of gone the future self past self, you know, just your present self like be be here now be where you are and, you know, learn and grow and become better than before and where you are now because that’s all you really have anyhow.

Stephen S. (28:16.396)
Yeah. Yes, ma’am. So I’m really so appreciative of our conversation today, Karen, and thanks for joining us. If anyone wants to learn more about you or what you’re working on, where should they go for that?

Karen Briscoe (28:30.58)
So for the real estate space, well, pretty much you could Google Kara Briscoe, you’re gonna find me, I got the whole first page. But real estate space, like I said, I’m in Northern Virginia, outside of Washington, DC. And we are the HBC group at Keller Williams, and can help with your real estate needs. And then the, what I call my creative endeavors, the five minute success. So it’s the number five minute success website. The book is real estate success in five minutes a day, the podcast is five

Stephen S. (28:36.727)
Yeah.

Karen Briscoe (29:00.504)
and success. Obviously you can find on Amazon and Audible and plus the other books. There’s three other ones. And if somebody’s interested in visiting with me about whether it would be a good fit for you, for life coaching, for mega agents or those who want to be, I do have a few slots so you can go to the website and find a way to schedule a time for us to have a conversation.

Stephen S. (29:23.315)
Awesome what you heard it here first folks go connect with Karen and and learn more about what she’s working on and what she’s got going Everyone, I hope you enjoyed today’s show if you got as much value out of it as I did I know you’re you’re off to the races So we’ll see you in the next episode. Thanks again Karen