Who’s In Charge?

Episode Description This week Stephanie and Zach trade the leadership talk for something their audience keeps asking about: the money. Being a "cash buyer" rarely means all your cash, it means other people's money, and knowing how to use it is what separates people who want to invest from people who actually do. The honest starting point is that leverage terrified them at first, and getting past t...

Episode Description The topic this week is energy, and it started with Zach getting called out. In a meeting last week, a teammate asked if he was okay, because his energy just felt different, and she was right. The lesson landed hard: your energy is contagious, so managing it isn't a nice-to-have. It's the job. Stephanie and Zach spend the episode on how to show up well even when you don't feel l...

Episode Description Everybody lists integrity as a core value, so is it even worth naming? Zach opens with that challenge, and his answer sets up the whole episode: plenty of people talk about integrity, but far fewer actually hold it when it costs them something. Honor, Stephanie and Zach argue, isn't the word on your values chart. It's what you do the moment keeping your word becomes painful. Th...

Episode Description Stephanie and Zach take on a question they openly admit they haven't solved: how do you raise kids who stay grateful and driven when they're growing up with advantages you never had? It's a parenting conversation, but they frame it as a leadership one, using the same muscles they rely on to build a team. They get honest (and personal) about talking to kids about money, building...

Episode Description With Zach out for the day, Stephanie takes the mic solo and brings on two people she's building something big with: Steve Trang and Jordan Samuel Fleming. The occasion is REI Tech Unlocked, the first-ever real estate investing tech event, landing September 19 to 21. But the conversation is really about a frustration all three share, and the AI lesson most operators are getting...

Episode Description Bobby Suarez ran his South Florida home-buying business as a one-man show until 2018. Today Sell to Bobby is a team of more than 25 with an executive bench, a second market in Tampa, and a few side ventures on top. In this episode, Bobby sits down with Stephanie and Zach to trace how he got there, and the throughline is a comfort with risk most operators talk themselves out of....

Episode Description You can repeat a goal until you're blue in the face, but if nothing happens when the date passes, it never meant anything. In this episode, part two to last week's conversation on meetings, Stephanie and Zach get into accountability: the least glamorous lever in leadership, and one of the most important. It starts, fittingly, with a story about their daughter missing an academi...

Episode Description Meetings get a bad rap, and there are whole books to prove it. But in this episode, Stephanie and Zach make the case that a meeting you dread is almost always a leadership problem in disguise: poorly set up, poorly run, or one that should never have been on the calendar. Stephanie comes in worn down by weeks of back-to-back calls and real decision fatigue, which turns out to be...

Episode Description Now that AI has made speed cheap, a website goes up in an afternoon and "We Buy Houses" is on every postcard, moving fast is no longer a differentiator. So what is? In this episode, Stephanie and Zach dig into the two things worth slowing down on to actually pull ahead: building a brand, and understanding the revenue math underneath your pipeline. They get tactical fast. Stepha...

Episode Description There is a new AI tool almost every day, and for anybody who struggles with focus, that is equal parts exciting and terrifying. In this episode, Stephanie and Zach cut through the buzzword noise and get practical about where AI actually earns its place in a real estate business, and where it just becomes an expensive distraction. They dig into the reframe most owners get wrong...

Episode Description Anybody can grow a company in a good market. Jesse Burrell built Batch from nothing to forty million dollars in top-line revenue in under three years, then watched the market cut it in half. What he did in between is the part most founders skip, and it's why he walked away with a clean exit instead of a fire sale. Jesse and his wife Erin sit down with Stephanie and Zachary Bett...

Episode Description What do a captain’s chair during the 2020 lockdown, a go-kart track with no mercy, a coffee maker with exactly one trained button-pusher, and a self-described “Shrek the Human Onion” have in common? They’re all part of this week’s conversation with Jason Medley and Jennifer Lombardi. Jason leads Collective Genius, the mastermind community for real estate investors, and he and J...

Episode Description What do a hospital hand-sanitizer dispenser, a calendar that runs like a game of Tetris, a canceled Florida vacation, and a recurring meeting block called “daddy doing deals” have in common? They’re all part of this week’s conversation on CEO rhythms. There’s no guest this time — just Stephanie and Zach across the table, the planner and the improviser, working through how succe...

Episode Description Pat Martin didn't start with a grand vision or a business plan. He started with a house in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, a father-in-law who said "you should fix that up," and a wife who was the breadwinner while he figured things out. By 2010 he was in Knoxville, turning live-in flips every two years, stacking equity, and slowly building what would become Pro Source Home Bu...

Episode Description What does it really take to build a real estate empire alongside the person you married your freshman year of college? Marck and Sara Beth De Lautour have been doing exactly that for 25 years, starting with a $5,000 credit card charge for a real estate course, a cat-filled duplex they eventually moved into, and a nursing salary holding the whole thing together. Marck, originall...

Episode Description What do Ironman triathlons, venture capital, pro track and field coaching, and falling asleep on the stairs have in common? They're all part of one of the most energizing double date conversations the Who's In Charge? podcast has ever had. This week, Stephanie and Zach sit down with KathrynKathryn O'Day, partner at Atlanta Ventures and former employee number nine at Pardot, and...

Episode Description What if the thing you've been avoiding — conflict — is actually the thing standing between you and the business you're trying to build? In this raw and refreshingly personal solo episode, Stephanie and Zach get into it on the topic of conflict: where it comes from, why most leaders handle it wrong, and what it actually looks like to turn tension into a team superpower. Stephani...

What does it look like when someone goes from fixing and flipping houses in post-crash Las Vegas to co-founding a $165 million venture-backed real estate technology company — twice? This week, Stephanie and Zach sit down with Josh Stech, co-founder of Sundae, for one of the most framework-rich, intellectually honest conversations the podcast has ever produced. Josh brings the kind of clarity that...

What does it actually look like when a company turns the corner — not from a highlight reel moment, but from the slow, unglamorous work of facing what you've been avoiding? In this solo episode, Stephanie and Zach pull back the curtain on what's working right now in both Better Path Homes and Left Main REI. No guests, no polish — just a raw, honest conversation about burnout disguised as boredom,...

What happens when two people who started as business partners — and not even friends — end up building one of the most solid entrepreneurial marriages in real estate? This week, Stephanie and Zach welcome Matt Theriault of Epic Real Estate and his partner Mercedes Torres for a double date conversation that gets refreshingly honest about ego, adaptability, and what it actually means to be a team. M...

Eric Brewer is a name that real estate investors recognize — but this episode isn't about the deals. It's about what happens behind the billboard. This week, Stephanie and Zach sit down with Eric and his wife Sonia for a rare, unfiltered look at the relationship that has quietly anchored one of the most recognized names in REI. It starts with a bar, a rejected tip, and a woman who had zero interes...

Most entrepreneurs hit a wall and assume something is broken. The revenue stops growing, the team feels chaotic, and no matter how hard they push, nothing moves. What Zach and Stephanie Betters know — after 12 years of building real estate investment and SaaS businesses — is that hitting a ceiling isn't a sign you're failing. It's a sign you've graduated. In Episode 10 of Who's In Charge? , Stepha...

Are you stuck in an "industry echo chamber"? In this episode, Stephanie and Zachary Betters challenge leaders to break out of their vertical and look to the outside world for innovation. From the high-stakes world of 1950s open-heart surgery to the efficiency of a Chick-fil-A drive-thru, they discuss how asking specific questions can lead to $15 solutions for million-dollar problems. The duo explo...

Episode Description In this episode, Stephanie and Zachary Betters explore the concept of "living a hundred lives" and how a diverse background—from medicine to high-stakes entrepreneurship—is actually a massive competitive advantage. They debunk the myth that you need decades of industry-specific experience to be successful, arguing instead that the lessons learned in "previous lives" are exactly...

Episode Summary: In this episode, Stephanie and Zachary Betters sit down with Hunter and Andrea Jarvis of Legacy Homebuyers. Hunter and Andrea share their 10-year journey from Hunter’s early days as a "problem child" in the corporate banking world to building one of the most respected real estate investment firms in Dallas, TX. They dive deep into the "messy middle" of leaving a W2, the importance...