“We only enjoy the stars because they lead us out of the darkness.” It’s a phrase that Joshua Hunt, founder and CEO of TRELORA and the 2018 9NEWS Leader of the Year has gravitated toward lately.
Hunt was in the dark not too long ago. From the outside, he had it all: a great family and a successful career, but he wasn’t being true to himself. At 32, he came out.
“I had to change everything, and it hit me one day that I can stay in real estate, be gay, be a great dad to my kids and be best friends with my ex-wife,” Hunt said. “That journey took me to start Joshua Tree Realty [now TRELORA] and I realized that we can make real estate better not just for our consumers but for our agents.”
Hunt shared his journey, business advice and more at the Chamber’s Your Conversation With program in May:
Use your strengths. For Hunt, “entrepreneurship and desire to be in business was deep seeded early on.” At age 13 he started his own lawn business, eventually owning five lawnmowers and employing a group of neighborhood boys.
Hunt excelled at creating businesses, but where he struggled was school. “I never really thrived in the academic and I was raised by somebody who was a high school dropout,” Hunt said. “I ended up dropping out the second week of my 10th grade year and went to go work on my own.” He turned to real estate and never looked back. Hunt was RE/MAX International’s Rookie of the Year – selling 67 homes in his first nine months.
Create curiosity. Hunt believes in leading a life in curiosity and not judgment. He’s used that same approach in their marketing strategy. TRELORA created a guerilla marketing campaign where they placed green pigs throughout Denver without branding. The message of the green pigs: we turn your piggy banks green. It led to local and national media coverage. Hunt found that if “you get in, confuse people and hit them with the message – it works.”
Know the pumpkin pie recipe. Hunt’s approach to his company culture – what he calls the pumpkin pie recipe – calls back to his own childhood: “When you grow up with the belief that you don’t matter, you want to make sure that everyone matters,” Hunt said. The myth around the real estate industry is that it’s a volume shop so they train around the pumpkin pie recipe: “Do you know who they are, and are you valuing them? Are you making sure that you know that they matter?” Hunt said. “It’s the foundation of who we are as a company.”
Ask for help. There are ups and down of starting your own business and if Hunt was to do it again he would have found partners. Don’t let your pride get in the way of finding those who can fill the gaps.
Don’t let fear stop you. Through it all, Hunt said he’s never regretted starting his own business: “You just got to close your eyes and jump,” Hunt said. “Love failure and just swim in it.”
Laura James is the marketing and communications coordinator for the Denver Metro Chamber.
