We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Kailey Warfield a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Kailey, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

When speaking to most of my peers about the plans for our lives it seemed like owning your own property or even basic financial stability felt completely out of reach. When I began my career in real estate I wanted to be the person that could help make what seemed impossible a realistic goal. That is when I decided to form my business the Modern Real Estate Collective.
Modern Real Estate Collective is dedicated to advancing the financial wellness of our communities through education. We provide free education for first-time homebuyers, assistance for homeowners leveraging their properties as assets to advance their lives, support for those pursuing a career in real estate, and tailored support for real estate investors at all levels. Our mission involves the intentional distribution of our professional resources through customized workbooks, consultations, classes, workshops, community engagement, and social media outreach. Our goal is to empower individuals to take informed actions for the betterment of their financial well-being by meeting them where they are and advising them based on their situation.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I have been exposed to real estate in different capacities throughout my life. My grandmother was a property manager for a time and my mother was a mortgage broker turned Realtor after the crash in 2008. I never saw Real Estate as a career path for myself because of the lack of balance I saw with my mother between work and her personal life. It’s funny how time can change things.

Fast forward I am a college graduate in the working world and I have dipped my toes into sales, then marketing, and had landed a job that with potential to turn into a true career. I was excited, I felt like after so much hard work I was achieving what I had put so much time and energy into preparing for and was just… not happy.

I was surrounded by people who didn’t understand me and co-workers that made coming into work harder and harder each day. About a year into that job that, not so long ago I was so sure was going to be my career, I hit my breaking point. Mentally and emotionally and had to be real with myself… this was not the path for me.

At that time I had begun my real estate courses and made the decision to dive head first into a new journey. This was in 2022 which if you don’t pay too much attention to the real estate market was the year that the affordable housing crisis we are already in was further exacerbated by the post covid market conditions.

Around this time I heard a lot of other real estate professionals give their opinions on the state of mind most of my generation (Gen Z) had about home ownership. In that is was not a possibility or really even a desire to own where one lives. I heard a myriad of opinions none of which I felt truly acknowledged where they… we … were coming from. It was in that moment that I found my lane in this field. I wanted to put my knowledge and skills to work to meet people where they are and find modern solutions for the next generations of homebuyers.

I set out to have conversations with people. I started with regular folks, went to every networking and community event I could find to get a feel for what people needed, what were their greatest obstacles to overcome. After that I set my sights on resources I attended workshops, classes, information sessions held by government programs, title companies, banks, credit unions… if there was an educational event about a resource that helped lower the barrier to ownership.. I was there.

In this process I learned about so many amazing programs some that helped with down payment assistance, some grants to help with home renovations for people who have been affected by redlining, and other community organizations with the same mission as I had. It came to a point where I could sit down with someone and knew that if owning a home or investing in real estate was a desire they would have access to the resource to turn any “if” into a “when”.

There is so much that is changing in the way we view housing today. With cost of living so high people are choosing to live with their roommates for longer, families are living with multiple generations in a household, times are tough and I have seen people simply want to be surrounded by their loved ones where they live.

It was seeing all of this over the course of the last couple of years that lead me to call my business Modern Real Estate Collective. Yes I am a real estate agent that can help you with the real estate transaction process, and I have built up a network and resource pool to help my community have access to home ownership if that is something they want for themselves. And looking towards the future with that I am quite happy.

Any thoughts, advice, or strategies you can share for fostering brand loyalty?

I keep in contact with my clients at least 4 times a year by way of client appreciation events. Rather than the traditional email marketing and quarterly phone calls that many agent use (which is quite effective) I take a bit more of a personal approach with my clients. They get a fun Bitmoji text on their birthdays and we run an annual night at the drive in, a fall fest a local winery, and a shopping spree giveaway at the end of each year just before the holidays.

I create things that they can look forward to and when it is timely send them a personal message or my personal favorite send them a Tik Tok that they would find absolutely hilarious when they open it. Most of all I get to know them and they know I care and that goes very far.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

The best advice I can give is lead with a listening ear. As the leader you are expected to have the answer for everything and be the backbone of your team but sometimes you just don’t know what is best and you’ve got to be willing to truly listen and learn from someone that does know better in that situation. It is an opportunity to grow yourself and lead by example by showing your team that less mistakes are made when you are willing to admit that you don’t have the answers.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://mrec.kw.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/realestateinvestingkw/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100087329199485
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaileywarfield/
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@realestateinvestingkw

Image Credits

Hello, no image credits to apply here. I will say I do not have many action shot photos but I have captured a photo of me at an open house (with a balloon and signage fail), two closing day photos with 2 first time home buyers, and one photo from a client event our annual 5k giveaway where with give a $5,000 shopping spree to one lucky winner!