The exact steps I would take if I had to start again.

CRE Success Principle: Commercial real estate agents thrive faster when they have a tight market to own, not a vague patch to wander. When someone can go deep on a defined area, they learn faster, sound smarter, and become productive sooner.

When someone asks me what they should focus on when starting out in commercial real estate, I always go back to the fundamentals that helped me when I entered a completely new market.

I had to start from scratch when I moved from Australia to Korea in 2007, and I had to start again when I returned home. The lessons from those experiences have stayed with me.

Choose Your Market with Intention

You can only build momentum if you know where you are playing. I always recommend starting broad enough to learn the landscape, then narrowing your focus as you discover where the best opportunities exist. Reading market reports, walking the precincts, and understanding listings and transactions will give you the context you need.

Leverage Experience and Build Your Network

Experience matters, even when it belongs to someone else. Spending time with industry veterans, asking questions, and observing their approach can shorten your learning curve. At the same time, build a network with purpose. Aim for meaningful interactions and gather insights from the people you meet.

Prospect Early and Set Realistic Goals

Prospecting is the one skill that always matters. When you are new, you have more time than anyone else, so you can prepare thoroughly and differentiate through relevance. Set achievable goals that build confidence and give you momentum.

If you want a clear plan for starting your commercial real estate career, listen to this episode of Commercial Real Estate Leadership. It will help you take the right first steps.

Episode transcript:

This week I'm doing a podcast episode, which is for Grant, because Grant contacted me on LinkedIn and he said that he would like to see me do an episode which is all about what someone should do if they're just starting out in commercial real estate.

So typically, on the show we're covering topics which are more for experienced people and for leaders in the industry.

But I know there are people who listen to the show who are just starting out and are looking for some advice on what are the things that they should be focused on now so they can become more experienced and maybe even become a leader in the industry. So that's what we're going to cover on this week's show.

Welcome to episode 253 of Commercial Real Estate Leadership. My name's Darren Krakowiak. I'll be your host, and this is the second in our Momentum and Mindset series for a strong start to 2026.

In today's episode, I'm going to be breaking down exactly what I would do if I had to start all over again in commercial real estate. You're going to hear the actions, the habits, and the priorities that work in any market and why they're still relevant today.

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Well, right now I want to talk to you about what you should do if you are just getting started.

So, I've got for you, 6 tips that I believe you should be looking to master or at least adopt if you want to give yourself the best possible start in commercial real estate.

And I think I've got some experience in this area because I've moved from Australia to Korea back in 2007 and effectively had to start in a new market.

But also, at that time I moved from research and consulting into tenant representation first. So, I moved into a role from scratch in a new market.

So, I want to share with you some of the things that I did at the time, and also when I came back to Australia from Korea, I also had to start again. So, I'm going to share with you some of the things that I learned from those times in today's episode.

So, the first thing I want you to do, if you're just getting started, is to pick your market.

Now, I believe that the tighter the better, but you may need to go broad and shallow before you go deep and narrow.

The reason is because you want to sort of figure out where your ideal place is in the marketplace and where the best opportunities exist for you.

And some ways that you can do this in terms of picking a market, or at least getting to know the market where you're operating, is to read market reports—historical market reports so you have got some context, but also current market reports so you know what's going on right now.

One thing that I did when I got to Korea, and this was actually in an article that they wrote about me one time, they really sort of held onto this particular story, which was I just literally walked every single street in all the markets where I was operating, and that's how I got to know the market.

So, walk the precinct where you are operating, go into the buildings, look at the directory boards, get an understanding of what is going on. Seeing is believing.

And also have a look at the recent sales, the leasing transactions. Look at the data, look at the listings—the things that are currently for sale and for lease. Look at the contracts to get an understanding of what they say.

Specialization, I think, is the key with this first tip because, as they say in the US, “the riches are in the niches.”

My second tip is to learn from experienced people, and now there are a couple of ways that you can do this.

Number one is to just, I guess, shadow experienced people or shadow the market leader, if that's an opportunity for you, and let them know that you are there to learn but also that you are there to help.

So, you can say, “I'll do whatever you want me to do if you'll let me spend some time with you. I'm here to add value if that is something that you believe I can do.”

And in terms of what you should be looking to do in this situation, well, observe their actions, ask questions about what they're doing and why they're doing it so you can understand the rationale and what it is that's got them to where they are right now.

For people who you don't have the opportunity to shadow, see if you can take some people to lunch or for a coffee. I did that even with people who worked at other agencies.

And if you come at it from a position of humility, and if you're humble, and if you ask questions of them— which, you know, I don't think you need to suck up to them, but if you certainly let them know that they have something which is valuable, some insights that can provide you with some perhaps shortcuts to success—then a lot of people will be happy to share those with you.

And maybe get an understanding of their highs and lows, and that will give you some future context around some of the highs and lows that you are likely to experience in your career.

So, my idea with this one is that experience matters. And even though you don't have experience yet, other people do, so you can acquire some of their experience.

The next tip for you is to leverage your network. And I think you want to let people know about what it is that you are doing now, but you don't necessarily have to ask them for business.

You can just let them know, “Hey, I now work in commercial real estate. This is what I'm focused on.”

You can ask them about their experiences in commercial real estate, get an understanding of what they like and what they don't like about dealing with agents, and just get an understanding of what it is that they're looking for.

And even if there's not an opportunity to do business with them, you might get an understanding of what people like them are looking for, and that can provide you with some great insights when you actually start to talk to other people who maybe are similar and are in need of the services that you provide.

So, you can leverage your existing network, but also, you’ve got to start to build a new and growing network.

And the goal that I would recommend that you set is to meet 20 new people in 20 days.

Meaningful contact—not just “hello” as you're going into the cafe, but actually to have some time with 20 people over 20 days.

If you can do that, then set a bigger goal—maybe to meet 100 people in 100 days. And if you can start with 20 people who may be relevant, but work towards 100 people who are definitely relevant, then you'll start to create this network which is going to help you get to where you want to go.

Now, I just want to remind you here that networking is different to prospecting. A lot of people in your network won't ever directly do business with you, but they can certainly help you, not only in terms of referring your business, but they can help you in other ways. And the big idea here is that your network is your net worth.

The next thing that I want you to do if you are new into the business is to always try and be a source of value.

So, look for ways that you can add value to people in your network, to people that you are surrounded by.

And it might not be something that you have the capacity to do right away in a commercial real estate context, but certainly there may be some other way that you can add value to people.

But if you are always looking for ways to add value, then you are likely to be more valuable.

And the idea here is that we are looking to activate the power or the rule of reciprocity. Because if you are looking for ways to give to people, then hopefully—well, the law says—that people will be starting to look for ways to add value to you.

My fifth idea—you knew this one was coming—is to start prospecting.

Now, you don't have the benefit of market experience, but you also don't have, earlier in your career, the burden of a heavy workload because you probably don't have any listings yet.

What this means is that you can spend more time generating leads so you can be more prepared and relevant to prospects when you speak to them.

So, when I say spending more time generating leads, I mean that you spend a lot of time actually on one lead before you actually make contact with them, because the one thing that you have that other people don't have is more time.

So, you can use that as something which is a differentiator for you to be more relevant when you actually do contact people.

And hopefully the work that you've done from getting to know the market and accumulating some information that will be of value to the people that you contact will offset the fact that you don't have so much experience in the marketplace.

Now, the reason why I want you to get started with prospecting as soon as possible, if you're new to the market, if you're new to the business, is because if you know how to generate your own leads and you know how to prospect, then you will always have value to contribute to any commercial real estate business.

Because a commercial real estate business can never have too many leads and can never have too many opportunities.

The final thing that I want to talk to you about today is number six: set realistic goals.

Now, if you set goals that you can meet in relation to learning the market, growing a network, you're going to have a more solid foundation to start setting more ambitious goals that will drive your production and results later.

So rather than saying that you're going to close 15 deals in the first three months, maybe focus on things that are more attainable at the front end so then you can work up towards more ambitious goals a little bit later on.

So, the real idea here is to be patient but also to be determined.

Now, given that prospecting is one of those skills that is always relevant at any stage of your commercial real estate career, I want to give you a little gift—a resource that can help you wherever you are at your stage of your career.

It is the A to Z of CRE (Commercial Real Estate) prospecting. It's available at cresuccess.co/abc. It's free, and there are 26 ways—26 ideas—for you to uplevel your current prospecting activity.

That is our episode for today. Thank you so much for listening and I will speak to you soon.