sheCENTER(FOLD) you felt like giving up, and if so, what inspired you to conquer such adversity? M. KELLY: Yes, you know, I had a very difficult time in my life where within 23 months, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, had a mastectomy, and not long after that, my father passed away. I ended up with cancer again and had to have a complete hysterectomy. Only eight weeks after the hysterectomy, I had to have emergency back surgery for a herniated disk that caused me to lose control of a leg. All of this in 23 months, and it was a very difficult time. And yes, I actually sat back and said, "God, what is it? Am I not supposed to be working? Should I slow down?" I even had one holistic professional state that because I work in a man's world, my body is trying to throw off my woman parts. I obviously didn't go back to that person, but it's amazing the kind of things people will say and do. I had to sit back and think through "What do I want in my life?” I have a great marriage, two sons, and I really enjoy my career. I decided that if I don't go back, cancer wins. The reality
“People have forgotten that buying a home should be a place where you live firstly and an investment secondly. We got into trouble when people started buying and selling homes like stock, as opposed to actual residences.” is that I love what I do, and I really enjoy the people I work with. They are like family, so I went back. A few things happened after I returned to work. First, the Susan G. Komen Foundation came to us and asked if we wanted to be a national sponsor of the Race For The Cure. It worked out great. For 10 years, I was a survivor, a sponsor and a speaker about women's health, breast cancer, and the things we need to do to take care of ourselves. What a great thing to be involved in. Also, it wasn't too long after I came back to work that I found
28
| N MAGAZINE
an anonymous suicide note in our office mail. To make a long story short, I figured out who it was. They tried to commit suicide a couple of times. They reached out because they knew of the hardship that I had been through and thought I would understand why they were giving up. That was almost 13 years ago, and that person is still working with us, they are happy and doing phenomenally well. I look back and say, "Wow, what would have happened if I didn't come back?" It was a tough yet easy decision to come back. Since then, I've been able to see the impact it's had on other people's lives. We are all connected, and if you only see the negative, you miss the positive. Personally, my faith has helped me get through it. I also had family, friends, and co-workers. Somehow all those things come together to help you through and eventually, pay it forward. NAWRB: Circling back to our earlier discussion about housing industry professionals having to navigate the changing landscape of the market, what can you say about the volume of properties being sold? Wouldn't that affect one's ability to make a living in the housing industry? M. KELLY: A lot of investors and analysts ask, "What do you see in terms of the market?" The low inventory…sure, it's an issue and we need to look at it, but we're still talking about 4.9 -5 million sales. With that many properties available for sale, agents should be asking themselves, "What's really going on in the market?” as opposed to reading the press and saying, "Oh my God, I should just give up!" They should look at the market, analyze, and say, "How can I capture a piece of this inventory?" NAWRB: Speaking of how to get a piece of the smaller inventory, we now see tightened loan restrictions, making it harder for first time buyers, as well as an influx of foreign investors with programs like EB5. How do those factors come into play, and what does it mean for Main St. as opposed to Wall St. in terms of being able to participate in the market? M. KELLY: Those factors do play a big part, but look at the overall market right now. The Federal Reserve is continuing their taper, but then GDP comes out at one tenth of one percent which is literally stalled. Then days later, unemployment comes down to 6.3%, and we've just added 288,000 jobs. So, all of these things are contrary to each other. When you factor in the CPFB, all the federal regulations and Dodd-Frank, it's as though we have so much stimulus going on in our industry that it's impossible to make a prediction where we will be in the next one month or even six months. To me, that's the tough part right now. The Fed taper is fine, but it's time to get all artificial stimulus out of the market and let it level out to where it ought to be. Now they're adding the consumer protection that was based upon Dodd-Frank which changes the application for mortgages, down payments, etc. This makes it harder to predict