How a Late-Bloomer Built a Global Real Estate Legacy

I want to make these years really impactful, and I want to realize dreams that I've always

had and I'm going to just go for it. And I feel like I'm in the best part of my life, and I'm 58 years old. Diane Mills is a real estate leader, mentor and partner at Global Agent Collective. She helps real estate professionals grow thriving businesses by equipping them with the mindset, strategies, and support to succeed while encouraging others to embrace new opportunities

at every stage of life. I think people connect to people and stories, more than they connect to numbers and data. You get a great platform and you can utilize it and maximize it.

“But it's more about the connections you make with the people, and that's what brings them”

over to EXP. You feel like you've compartmentalized your knowledge and go, all right, I'm going to monetize that and here's how I'm going to do it. What I can tell you is the experience that I bring to the table, the experience that any person brings to the table, is really our value prop, our personal value prop, and I feel

that the living your legacy podcast for those who live to leave a legacy.

Welcome back to another amazing episode of The Living Your Legacy podcast for Insights

Success. I am Regus here. Joining me today is yet another powerful woman with another powerful story, Diane Mills joining us all the way from San Diego. Welcome to these coasts.

Thank you. How are you doing? I am doing well. Thank you. Diane, you're literally fresh off the productions of Pipeline.

How do you feel filming your episode? I feel great. I feel like it was really a natural process and it flowed well, I feel really well good about it. Cool.

“What are we going to learn about you in your episode?”

I think you're going to learn about my journey, kind of where I began and where I've now arrived and where I'm going. Really talking about my professional journey, my personal journey, how it's all kind of intertwined and how it's led me to the opportunity I'm now pursuing and sharing. So it's I hope it's inspiring.

Right on. Well, do you begin before we figure out your why or North Star? Where does your journey begin? My journey begins and I was born in Los Angeles. My parents were, you know, wonderful, good people.

They moved us to Laguna, Nagel to Orange County when I was six years old and I was raised primarily there in Laguna, Nagel area, went to high school and data point, public schooled, went on to go to UCLA, got married very young, 23, still married and had my beautiful

“family and that's where I began my days.”

I got to ask when you say, you know, born in LA, like there's a sense of pride there. What does that really mean when you're born in LA? Well, you know, it's where my parents began. They're both born in Los Angeles and, you know, they were both raised in East Los Angeles kind of in the hood, really, came from modest beginnings and they were inspired to want

to create a better life for me and my brothers, I have three brothers and my dad worked multiple jobs to move us to Laguna to Galls so that we could have a more kind of community upbringing in a less crazy environment than what they knew and that's kind of what inspired that. So I'm very proud of the fact that my parents took us to a different location, I love my roots from LA, I ended up going back there to go to college and I love Los Angeles

and it's a dynamic city. I love it. But I didn't want to raise my family there, I kind of wanted a quieter place to raise my kids and so we did so in San Diego County but which is very much like where I grew up. Talk about your entrepreneurial journey, what was that first moment where you sold your first

piece of gum or something that triggered, yeah, I can do this for a living and makes me feel happy?

Yeah, you know, I always had entrepreneurial dreams, my husband was an entrepreneur and I

supported him many, many years in his entrepreneurial pursuits and I saw the windfalls, I saw the sacrifices, I saw the the setbacks, all the different things that happened in his career path and he was in fast cattle restaurants, franchising, helps. So challenges there that we got through together, but I also saw that it was really a way to create your own future and I really, I really wanted to do that but I was raising small

401k and all the things you get in court of America and I was doing that in the advertising

“side so that's why I stayed in it for a long time.”

You know, for, for, for any women that are listening since you, you know, you are a powerful woman in power, woman in power, well, when you had your children, did you feel like, oh, this is it, I'm going to be a mom forever, did you know I would be right back and hit this entrepreneurial journey? Yeah, well, I didn't know that I would necessarily pursue my entrepreneurial dreams because

I was always a support to my husband, but I did know that I would go back to work at some

point because I always loved working and when I first had my first, when I had my son,

my first child, I went back part-time in media and then I took a hate as to really just be mom for a while, which I'm grateful I did because those were vitally years for my kids and I was super involved in their schools and all that good stuff and then I knew by the time they got a little older, I was ready to get back in the game so it all worked out on the right timeline for me.

What's your day-to-day like, what's getting you out of bed, what's the communication

“like with your husband, what's your battle plan every day when you wake up?”

Well, I'm much more structured these days in terms of, I've done a lot of deep work in the last several years since my dad passed away, just gratitude work and really preparing

myself mentally for my days, I get up early, I exercise probably four to five days a

week, but this has been a part of my life for many years, but it really helps me mentally and physically obviously, but it's just as important in the mental part of it to the the actual physical gifts that you get from, you know, moving, but what I can tell you is that I'm very structured in that, I really try to practice gratitude and map out my week, what I want to accomplish, I get, I'm very excited about what I'm doing now, so

I get up very energized and excited for every day and I feel like I'm in the best part of my life and I'm 58 years old. Right on, yeah, I, I would agree with you, I woke, I snapped out about a 3/30 this morning full of energy and what is going on. Like, I've got three more hours to sleep, but I'm like, no, it's just like pumped up,

I'm like, I've got to do something with this pent up energy, like, you know, it's not energy, it's more like a divine download and it's interesting to kind of hear that frequency and turn it into something that's actually in this reality. Talk about lives that you've changed, you know, you're, that's here about what you're doing, did it, I know.

Okay. Well, I, I moved into real estate and I focused on growth, I come from a very robust marketing background, so I was helping Matt, the guy who brought me into EXP, my friend and dear, you know, comrade, he brought me in and the thing with him is that, you know, he's an expert in the space, so I've been really grace to be able to have him mentor me, but it has

allowed me the opportunity to share opportunity with other agents and help them grow. And the biggest reward has been in the recruitment space was like bringing on raw stat who's now a partner who I just cold called in the desert, did my due diligence, thought

he was awesome and I'm like, I want this guy in our organization and I basically, I hunted

the man, I mean, he will, he will definitely support that, but in a good way and I helped him see a vision in an opportunity with the EXP platform and he made the move and it's been life changing for him and his family, they've since moved to Carl's Bad, he grew from two agents to a hundred agents, to eighty agents out of the gate and as much as a hundred agents and he's just really thriving and excited and now we're building together and it's

been really dynamic and I'm so grateful that he's part of the equation now and he's become a dear friend and a confident and I, you know, it's been really gratifying to see his growth and his excitement about what we're doing. Let's talk about your philosophies when it comes to recruitment and building your tribe and your team, I'm born and raised in Miami and it thinks they're done very differently

here and when I move to the bay and when I be moved to the area and it's going to be a good decade of my life there, seeing how it's really, how it really works, I saw a gentleman from start up to start up how recruiting, what recruitment really worked there, how was more about energy, feeling good vibes, it's less about what's on paper, talk about your philosophy there because I remember you mentioning that in your interview.

“Yeah it's always about connection and storytelling and relatability and I think people connect”

to people and stories for them they connect to numbers and data. That is a gift that comes with the territory and that's the byproduct of those connections and then you get a great platform and you can utilize it and maximize it but it's more

my entire journey has been based on relationships I've built and I continue to build relationships

“and connect with people and that's what brings them over to EXP is that energy, that excitement”

that passion that I have and I have true to life stories to share with them testimonials from people that have made the change including myself and that does all the selling for you. Right on, talking about the EXP name, such a great name. Yeah you know it was really Glenn Sanford who's a genius who created the EXP and came from a genius.

Yeah, that's true. It was especially exciting. A lot of a time with Glenn and he's a very humble guy and you know now a billionaire and he built the company was inspired by Keller Williams he had it back around in real estate. He did his due diligence in knowing that there was some deficits with that model.

And he also was a tech guy and he knew that the world was going in the direction of in the cloud. You know that's where everything's going right. I mean look at Amazon and brick and mortar look at yellow cabin Uber look at you know the traditional models that have gone away now with the you know the technological era right and it continues to be a moving target continues to evolve and optimizing get better and better and he had

that he was a visionary he knew that was where the future was going he knew that the franchise traditional franchise model was not sustainable was not profitable and needed to change.

“So that's how EXP was born and EXP was inspired by any word that begins with EXP, exponential”

experience, expedite. I mean many different things that begin with that EXP represent the model and the things that I can do for people absolutely um what it's are you coaching coaching folks or are you anyone you speak to and kind of helping them define themselves that's like you have experience and that experience is valuable especially now with AI and horizon that that human data that

human experience that human frequency is going to be far more valuable now are you like with yourself do you feel like you've compartmentalized your knowledge and go all right I'm going to monetize this and here's how I'm going to do it. What I can tell you is the experience that I bring to the table the experience that any person brings to the table is really our value prop our personal value prop and I feel that what I bring to the table most is a robust marketing sales background

but more so the ability to connect with people identify their needs and then help them fill the needs I mean that's the legacy of any great sales person right whatever sector you're in and that's really what your mission is so what I do is I just talk to people I learn about them I listen those are the key things and then you can really understand how you can best serve them and sometimes it's not a match and that's okay I mean I wish people well I know that

everybody has to make decisions that are best for their family if there's an agent here and there that leaves for whatever reason and goes to a different brokerage or leaves the business

I I send them with love and light and wish in the best I never hold grudges I'm not a person

“that is upset if someone makes a decision that doesn't align with what I think is best for them”

I think people are all on their own journey and I support everybody's individual unique journey how do you how do you support folks that don't understand that they're on a journey that they're yet to be awakened or become sounds kind of kind of vein like you and I but I mean like they just understand that things operate differently in a different frequency how do you convert that knowledge into you know it's real estate and building a portfolio doing your data

day hustle knowing that there is quite a magic it's you the wonder of what we do call the life sure I I think that again is such a unique individual journey for each person but I do think that leading by examples the key for life and if I can show people just by how I operate in my life and how I celebrate other people and how I lift them and connect with them if I can inspire them in any way then that's a bonus you know and hopefully I can do it by example I don't believe

force feeding anything is ever the right way to approach it yeah exactly right how do you what do you tell folks male or female or non-binary whatever they choose to be it's our lives that are listening to your watching where you right now are like I want to be her what would be the very low hanging fruit easy win for them to feel that first kick of dopamine confidence

what would you say to them I think it's always like digging in a little and um you know for me a

catalyst was when my dad passed away and I realized this I had this cathartic moment of oh my gosh

I want to make these years really impactful and I want to realize dreams that I've always had

and I'm going to just go for it and it was a real turning point for me and I just encourage people to dig in and to really examine what they want what their what motivates them what do they want

“their legacy to be and then figure out how to get there and I think if you put good thoughts and”

actions out into the world there's an abundant world out there there's so many opportunities

and when you look at it that way and you have your eyes open things will present themselves

“and you got us sometimes take a leap of faith and go for it. Diane thank you so much for your time”

and energy so so grateful to be sitting here with you how can folks find you how can folks learn more about you well um you they can find me at a couple different places but let's go with

“body oughta dot com and I have a profile on there homes dot com they'll show all the homes I've sold”

I've been linkedin and linkedin of course yeah I'm huge on linkedin I've got a Facebook profile of course that I'd love to you can come see me at Diane Romo Mills there I've also got

an Instagram Mills 4 Diane so yeah come see me tap in I'd love to connect with you and always

feel free to reach out. Ryan Diane thank you so much for your time and energy you got it. I hope you had a fantastic time and a great session today. I did thank you so much. I'm God bless you for Insight's Success. This is Ray Gutierrez (upbeat music)