What I’m doing with the seven dollars

A letter for the woman wondering what else she could be doing in the next three years. — Letter №19

I told you in the last letter that I was going to tell you what I’m doing with this category of income — not the polished version, the actual one.

Here it is.

The way I now think about revenue share is simple.

I’m monetizing my real estate license in another way.

That’s it. That’s the entire frame.

The license I already have — the credential the Division of Real Estate in my state granted me, the credential I already maintain through continuing education year after year, the work I already do — has more income surfaces than the version of real estate I was first shown.

The transactional, time-for-money, you-only-earn-when-you’re-in-front-of-a-client version. That’s one surface. Revenue share is another.

I am still a Realtor. I still close transactions. I still take listings. I still drive to showings. None of that has stopped.

What’s changed is that I’m using more of my license, not less.

The decision to start was, in the end, a simple one.

I didn’t want to leave anything on the table.

I have one life. I have one license. I have a finite number of years where I’m going to be doing this work with the energy and clarity I currently have. And the idea that I would walk past an entire category of legitimate income — income that uses the license I already paid for and maintain — because the version of real estate I was first taught only knew about one way to monetize it...

That stopped making sense to me.

It’s not greed. It’s not ambition in the way the industry uses the word. It’s a quieter thing.

It’s the recognition that I built a license, a network, a relationship economy, and a body of professional knowledge — and the woman I want to be at 65 is the woman who used all of it. Not the woman who used the part she was handed and walked past the rest.

Before I made my first introduction, I gave myself some rules.

I want to share them with you, because I think the rules are more important than anything else I could tell you about how this works.

Rule one: I treat this the way I treat my real estate clients.

I don’t pressure my buyers. I don’t withhold listings because I’ve decided what they can afford. I don’t tell them which neighborhoods are for them. I give them the information they need to make their own decisions, and then I let them decide.

I treat revenue share the same way. I share what I know. I let the other woman decide what to do with it. The decision is hers, not mine.

Rule two: a no isn’t rejection.

It might just mean not now. Timing is everything.

It might mean she needs more information.

It might mean she needs more time to come to her own conclusion.

It might mean this isn’t her path, or this isn’t her brokerage, or this isn’t the right conversation for her right now.

None of those are a referendum on me, on the model, or on her.

A no is information. That’s all it is.

That rule frees me from any attachment to a specific woman’s decision — which means I can have the conversation honestly, because I’m not trying to manage her response.

Rule three: I’m not deciding for anyone.

I don’t know what another woman’s financial goals are. I don’t know what her family situation looks like. I don’t know what she’s saving for, walking away from, dreaming about, or grieving. I don’t know if she’s twelve months from a divorce or twelve months from retirement.

I don’t get to decide whether she’d want this option. I don’t get to decide whether an extra $300 a month or an extra $30,000 a month would matter to her. I don’t get to decide whether her life has room for another income stream.

My job is to share. Her job is to choose.

That’s the only ethical version of this work.

I want to say something specific about who I’m doing this with, because it matters.

So many women in this industry are starting over — in their forties, in their fifties, in their sixties.

Some after divorce. Some after a partner’s death. Some because the kids left and the house got too big, and the math suddenly looked different. Some because they stayed in a marriage too long, and they’re rebuilding their own financial life from a starting point they hadn’t expected to be at this age. Some because the version of real estate they’ve been running for twenty years isn’t going to carry them through the next twenty.

For those women, even an extra $300 a month is real. An extra $3,000 a month is rent. An extra $30,000 a month is a different life entirely.

It’s not vanity income. It’s not vacation money. It’s groceries without anxiety. It’s a car payment. It’s a daughter’s tuition or a granddaughter’s college fund. It’s the difference between staying in a job that’s killing her and walking away from it. It’s a season off after a hard year. It’s breathing room.

I am not selling anyone a dream. I am acknowledging that for a meaningful number of midlife women in real estate, real money on the table is real life changed.

When I think about who I want my future revenue share network to look like, it’s those women. Women who needed real money. Women who didn’t know there was another way to monetize the license they already had. Women who are tired and starting over and quietly looking for what comes next.

Now here is the question I want to leave you with.

I am not asking you to do anything with it. I’m not asking you to switch brokerages. I’m not asking you to introduce anyone to anything. I’m not asking you to make a decision in the next 30 days.

I’m just asking you to sit with the question.

What else are you going to do in the next 3 to 5 years to consistently increase your income?

That’s the question.

Not in a sales-pitchy way. In a quietly honest, in your own kitchen, on a Tuesday afternoon way.

If you keep doing exactly what you’re doing — same transaction count, same hours, same model — what would the next three years look like? What would the next five look like? Would your income grow? Would it hold steady? Would it slowly start to slip?

Be honest. Just to yourself. Just for a minute.

Because here’s the thing I’ve sat with for the last few years, and the thing I want to put on the table for you:

Three years are going to pass either way. Five years are going to pass either way.

The time will pass whether we do anything with it or not.

The only question is what we want to be true at the end of it.

If at the end of those years, you’d like to have an income that grew on a curve disconnected from your transaction count — even a small one, even one that took years to compound — then the time to start is right now, not because of urgency, but because of math. The compounding works on a clock that doesn’t speed up no matter how ready you eventually get.

If at the end of those years, you’d like for nothing to have changed — that’s also a valid choice. Some women look at their lives, look at their work, look at their finances, and say what I have is enough. That’s allowed.

But I think most of us, if we’re honest, would like the next 3 to 5 years to look different from the last 3 to 5. And we’re not entirely sure how to make that true.

Revenue share is one way. It’s not the only way. It might not be your way.

But it is a way that uses the license you already have.

And the women who, ten years from now, will be drawing real income from a network they helped create — they all started somewhere, with one introduction, with one decision, with one moment of I don’t want to leave anything on the table.

I’m in that moment right now. Still in it.

That’s what I’m doing with the seven dollars.

I’m using more of my license. I’m working differently. I’m having honest conversations with the women I cross paths with, sharing options without pressure, and letting them decide for themselves what’s true for their lives.

I’m walking the long curve on purpose.

I’m not the woman with the polished story.

I’m the woman in the middle of it.

I think that’s the version worth telling you about.

You are not behind.

You are not too late.

You are not done.

The time is going to pass either way.

What do you want to be true at the end of it?

I got you. ❤️

— Andrea