Our Agents Achievements
With us finally seeing a bit of sunshine in Manchester over the past couple of weeks, April has felt like a good opportunity to pause and reflect on what our agents have already achieved this year and, more importantly, how differently success can look from one person to the next.
Over the past 12 months, one thing has become increasingly clear to us at Agent MXM: there is no single version of a successful self-employed estate agent. Progress shows up in different ways, at different times, depending on the individual, their experience, their market, and the kind of business they are trying to build.
Over the past few months in particular, we’ve seen some brilliant progress across our agents, all for very different reasons.
Katie joined us without any previous experience as an estate agent and has already listed and sold her first property. It’s a huge milestone and one that says a lot about the attitude she’s brought into these early stages of her journey. She’s approached everything with openness, consistency and a genuine willingness to learn, which has allowed her to build confidence quickly.
Josh, who launched with us in February, has listed five properties in his first couple of months, with two already agreed. He has approached self-employment with a clear focus on consistency and relationship-building within his area, and it’s been great to see that early momentum begin to take shape.
Ian continues to develop his presence at the upper end of the market and is currently marketing four high-value properties. That part of the market requires a different style of communication, a longer-term approach to relationship-building and a strong understanding of client expectations, all of which he continues to establish steadily.
Lauren currently has four properties on the market, with one due to complete in the coming weeks. She has taken a very considered approach to growing her business locally, focusing on building something personal, sustainable and aligned with the way she wants to work long term.
And Ellie, despite navigating some incredibly difficult personal circumstances recently, continues to demonstrate what consistency and resilience can achieve over time. With 11 properties listed and 8 already under offer, she’s a brilliant example of what happens when strong service, trust and persistence begin to compound.
What’s important about all of this isn’t simply the numbers themselves. It’s the way these businesses are being built; thoughtfully, individually and at a pace that suits the person behind them. That’s something we’ve become far more aware of over the past year, particularly when it comes to the early stages of self-employment.
The First 90 Days
There is often a perception that becoming self-employed immediately leads to visible momentum and quick results. From the outside, it can appear as though new instructions, sales and opportunities happen almost instantly once someone makes the move. In reality, the first 90 days are usually much quieter, much more reflective and far more focused on laying foundations than people expect.
The Beginning
The first few weeks are often centred around clarity. Agents are beginning to properly define how they want to position themselves, the area they want to focus on and the type of clients they genuinely want to work with. At the same time, there is a huge amount happening behind the scenes. Conversations are being restarted, old relationships are being revisited and networks are being reactivated. Agents are reaching out to previous clients, reconnecting with contacts and beginning discussions that may not lead anywhere immediately, but often become important later on.
Emotionally, it can also be a difficult stage to navigate. Alongside the excitement of doing something different and building something for yourself, there can also be moments of doubt, particularly when progress feels slower than expected. We see this with every agent, even those who go on to build very strong and consistent businesses. The difference is rarely whether those doubts exist; it’s how people respond to them.
Month One
By month one, the groundwork is starting to build, even if it still doesn’t feel particularly visible. There may not yet be a long list of instructions or obvious momentum, but the important work is happening underneath the surface. This is where consistency starts to matter. Agents who do well at this stage are the ones who continue having conversations, following up, staying visible within their area and maintaining momentum even when results aren’t immediate.
This is also often the point where people begin questioning whether enough is happening. The reality, though, is that month one is far less about visible outcomes and far more about creating the conditions for those outcomes to happen later. Most progress during this stage simply isn’t obvious yet.
Month Two
By month two, things often begin to shift. Conversations start coming back around, opportunities begin appearing more naturally and people who were previously “not quite ready” become more open to moving forward. This is usually the first point where agents begin to feel that their efforts are starting to compound.
Confidence also begins to change during this stage. It becomes less about excitement and more about evidence. Agents start understanding their own rhythm, recognising where their strengths naturally sit and seeing how their pipeline is likely to build moving forward. The business starts to feel more tangible and more sustainable.
Month Three
By month three, most agents begin to feel significantly more settled. Not because things suddenly become easy, but because they become more familiar. There is a clearer understanding of where opportunities are coming from, a stronger sense of direction and more confidence in how the business is taking shape.
Pipelines begin forming more naturally, with instructions, conversations and sales starting to overlap rather than sitting in isolation. At this point, the shift in mindset becomes noticeable too. It stops feeling like something new you are trying to make work and starts feeling like your business. Although uncertainty never completely disappears in self-employment, it often begins to feel more manageable, more intentional and far more aligned with how that individual wants to work.
What we’ve realised
Looking across all of our agents, both those in the very early stages and those further along, there are some very clear patterns. The people who build strong, sustainable businesses are rarely the loudest or the fastest out of the gate. More often, they are the ones who stay focused on the fundamentals, continue showing up consistently and keep having conversations even when things feel quiet.
What’s also interesting is how differently momentum builds from one person to another. For some agents, progress comes relatively quickly through existing relationships and local reputation. For others, it builds more gradually through visibility, consistency and new connections within their area. There isn’t one right way for it to happen.
What makes the difference
What matters is consistency over time.
There is a huge amount of focus within the industry on quick wins, fast starts and immediate results, but what we’ve seen over the past year is that long-term success rarely comes from any of those things. Instead, it tends to come from how those first few months are handled. The agents who build sustainable businesses are usually the ones who resist the temptation to rush the process, compare themselves to others or expect everything to happen immediately.
Most of the work that drives results early on is invisible. It’s conversations, follow-ups, relationship-building and small actions repeated consistently over time. Those things may not feel particularly significant in the moment, but they are often the foundations that everything else is built on.
And when that work is done consistently, the results do come; not always quickly, but in a way that is far more stable, predictable and sustainable in the long term.
