Today we’d like to introduce you to Josh Miller.
Hi Josh, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story and your business?
When we started Epique Realty, it was a company built out of frustration for an industry that has historically been a “sink or swim” environment. That’s a great environment if you’re a Shark, as many TV shows portray real estate agents. The reality is that most real estate agents aren’t sharks. They’re regular people, neighbors, friends, family, etc. When an agent joins a Traditional real estate brokerage, they’re often given some up-front classroom style training for as little as a week, and basically told to reach out with any questions for the rest of their career. Ongoing support, ongoing training, technology to enhance their business, or just benefits have been missing since the inception of the Brokerage model…which is designed to benefit Brokers more than Agents. Until Epique, brokerages have historically kept a Top – Down model with Brokers at the top and Agents at the bottom. Epique is the first Agent-Owned, Agent-Founded, and Agent-Operated brokerage. The agents are at the center of the company, and are owners in the company. The Broker and other executives (myself included) are employees who work for our agents. This is a brand-new concept that has not been done yet. Because we are agent-owned we offer more benefits than anyone in the industry has ever offered. We have 50+ perks that no other brokerage is even offering (Free Agent Billboards, Free Listing Photos, Free Signage, Free Social Media Management, Free AI-Tech Software to build business, Free Buyer & Seller Leads, and so much more). No other brokerage in the country even comes close.
Despite my field of study at Harvard being Economics, the majority of my work experience has been in Marketing and Real Estate. I was Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for a few local and national corporations for over a decade. These are positions I created out of thin air as I am a 100% self-taught mobile App Developer, Graphic Designer, and Website Designer. My graphic design history has won me many awards and accolades and I’ve won a few national competitions for brands, including one for Planet Fitness and most recently for Epique Realty which placed in the Top 6 for @ExhibitAwards brokerage design contest. I was one man, at a small brokerage, competing against giant national and international companies who each have dozens of full time design team members, whereas we just have me! We came so close out of hundreds of competitors with our branding and design, where I was the sole person designing for our company. Just to get as far as I did against these huge brokerages was such an honor! I’ve used my design skills, and ability to build technology, to put Epique Realty at the forefront of technology offerings for our agents and for their clients. We’ve built something that’s about 4-5 years ahead of even the most advanced brokerages in the country. We are growing strong. We’ve onboarded about 150 agents since January of this year and have expanded to every corner of Texas, covering Houston, Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, all the way up to Amarillo, out to El Paso, and a lot of places in between. Our goal is to be in all 50 states in the next 5 years and our predictions show that we may be there even faster.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Our first struggle in Co-Founding Epique Realty was logistical. We had ideas that no other brokerage had done…so we were stuck making something brand new. It’s a fun process to have ideas and to think about what you want your wish list to be for Agent Benefits, but then figuring out how to implement these ideas is quite another challenge! How do we create this brand new thing from scratch? We wanted to offer a lot of perks to our agents, but not charge a lot. Negotiating deals with vendors, hoping they see the potential and benefits ultimately worked in our favor and they’re starting to see a return on their trust in us that we’d grow and help them grow along with us.
We’ve been impressed with Epique Realty, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
Epique Realty isn’t like any other real estate brokerage out there. No matter how interesting or cool a real estate brokerage claims they are, the reality is that once you join, you’ll be doing 100% of the work by yourself with no help. Agents have accepted that as normal. We haven’t. We do work FOR our agents. We’re writing contracts for them, posting to their social media, sending them leads, doing daily training, paying for Continuing Education for them, taking their listing photos, installing their signs at the listings, and so much that no other brokerage has even considered. Many traditional brokerages are happy to take half of an agent’s commission while doing very little for that agent. That’s not what we’re about at all. If we can do something FOR our agent and let them focus on their client more, we will.
Is there a quality that you most attribute to your success?
Realizing that there’s no limit on creativity or success. As Maya Angelou said, “the more creativity you use, the more you have.” The same applies to success. Success feeds success and Creativity feeds creativity. We try to encourage out-of-the-box thinking when it comes to finding solutions for our agents and clients. We want to make this the most amazing and rewarding brokerage that has ever existed and are constantly looking for ways to build on that idea. We end every board meeting with the question, “What else can we do or offer?” and have detailed discussions about new ideas, new benefits, and new approaches to help our agents be more successful.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://joinepique.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/epiquerealty
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/epiquerealty
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/epiquerealty
- Other: http://info.epiquerealty.com
Image Credits
Epique Realty
