Above: Tony Mattar
With nearly a decade under his belt in the real estate industry, Tony Mattar has learned from some of the best agents in Chicago. Their mentorship and guidance led him to not only scale his business, but do so by building an authentic, collaborative and successful team.
“I started a real estate team wanting to give back to the industry in terms of nurturing, mentoring and coaching the next generation of REALTORS® in Chicago,” says Mattar, founder of the Chicago Crib Team at Compass.
As he came up through the business, Mattar experienced working on multiple teams, working with mentors and building relationships within the industry. “I tried to pass that along to my team members and make sure they feel like they have a place in the Chicago real estate landscape, not without support, collaboration and comradery.”
Paige Brown: How would you describe your leadership style?
Tony Mattar: I really like to be authentic not only in my leadership style with my team, but also in all of my interactions with my clients. Authenticity is something that’s really important to me in terms of just being who I am on a daily basis. My job is really to be an amplifier of their ideas and work ethic, and creating more value. My team members need to be working hard and coming to me to help, seeking out amplification of the things that they already either want to work on or are working on. I’m there to make those things better, more fruitful, increase the ROI and impart my experiences into their ideas.
PB: Tell me a little bit about the culture within your team, and the goals and core values you rely on.
TM: Authenticity is really big for me, and I truly believe that being authentic in business is something that makes you an attractive proposition for new clients. I try to translate that into the culture of our team, as well, in terms of everyone being their true and authentic self. I think the things that make us different as business people are the things that set us apart from the masses, so leaning into those different types of personalities and interests, the more success that they’re going to see.
Another one of our core values is definitely collaboration, not only within the team, but within the industry. The better the relationships are with not only your team members, but your peers within the industry, the more success you’re going to see—especially in a tricky market like we’re in right now.
PB: How do you navigate the individual personalities and skill sets when working on a real estate team?
TM: I’m really lucky to have fantastic women on my team right now. Beyond the business, we act as a collective and all get along well. However, as I’ve been building my team over the years, there, of course, have been people who have come and gone. I’ve learned that personality fit is a really important piece of the puzzle to maintain that collaborative environment.
I try to maintain open lines of communication, especially on the skill set front, in terms of asking people not only what they feel like they’re doing a good job at, but what they like doing. If you can help someone sit in a seat that’s going to best suit their capabilities in terms of what they want to get out of work, you’re going to get more productive work from them.
PB: What are the current challenges in your market, and how has your team adapted to overcome and find success?
TM: Right now, the Chicago market is similar to many places across the country in terms of experiencing a shortage of inventory overall. Listings are selling very quickly, which is good for our seller clients. However, on the buyer’s side, it’s definitely a challenge. But the more plugged in that we as a team can be within our industry here in Chicago, the better our relationships can be outside of our team, either within our office, within our company, within our brokerage at Compass or within the greater Chicago real estate landscape.
In terms of our day-to-day activities, the messaging that I’ve been providing and coaching to the team is to focus on the basics. It’s really easy, when the market shifts in either direction, for agents to lose focus on what activities are proven to work and what activities they need to do every day in order to make it in the long run. Focusing on those things has given us a very clear picture of what we have to do when we wake up every day to maintain a full pipeline.
PB: Tell me about how you and your team are adapting to the new wave of AI and technology in the real estate landscape, and how these tools and resources help your team stay ahead of the competition.
TM: As someone who is a millennial, and with two Gen Z team members, we’ve all come up with technology as part of our daily life from a very young age. I believe this makes us very early adopters of new and different types of technology, and also very unafraid to try new tools. Coming over to Compass when we did, and being able to plug into the different technology and AI offerings that are built into the system, has been really a game changer for us in terms of working smarter instead of harder, and really being able to leverage our time more efficiently. The marketing suite within the Compass platform also has a lot of cool AI features.
Buying your time back or increasing efficiency is ultimately at the crux of how you grow and scale a business. The more time that we have to continue to do dollar-producing activities gives us the ability to scale the business up, help more people and even improve our own quality of life. I’m always apt to try new tools and technological advances to grow with the market because I don’t want to be left behind. I think those people who adopt new tools, technologies and/or capabilities are the people who are going to continue to grow and gain market share in an already really competitive sales environment.
PB: What advice do you have for real estate professionals looking to join a real estate team?
TM: For someone thinking about joining a team, make sure that you’re asking questions to any prospective team lead that you’re interviewing with about how they’re going to act as an amplifier or a megaphone for you. Ultimately, when you join someone’s team, they should be financially invested in your success. Successful team leaders are the ones that really care about the people on their team and want to see them succeed, not just bringing a warm body on just to say that they have a bigger team.
Joining a team is also a great way to speed up and accelerate the learning curve. As most brokers know, you take your class and take your test to get your license, but that doesn’t teach you how to be a salesperson or how to grow a business. The day-to-day practice of being a broker, growing a business and having a successful sales career is a totally different animal. Being able to learn not only through direct coaching, mentorship and guidance, but also through the osmosis of being attached to someone who has existing credibility within the industry can be really fruitful.
PB: What does it mean to you to be a team leader?
TM: I really believe in the concept that a rising tide raises all ships. You have to be in the trenches with your team, willing and wanting to give to them in a really meaningful way. I think that someone who’s thinking about starting a team should really take that into consideration, because there’s other ways to leverage your time and to pay for help outside of building a team in the traditional sense, if really all you’re looking to do is kind of take some pieces off of your plate.I get a tremendous amount of fulfillment leading a team and passing on the information that I’ve gleaned over the last 10 years to the next generation of Chicago REALTORS®, both newer and younger agents, and really helping them grow. Seeing them succeed at new levels that they didn’t think they were capable of is what fills me up and gets me out of bed every morning.
