Facing Down the Fears That Hold Your Team Back

October 23, 2025

Monsters in the Market: Facing Down the Fears That Hold Your Team Back

This Halloween week, the scariest monsters aren’t in haunted houses – they’re in our minds. Great leaders don’t fight fear; they shine a light on it.

When we were kids, we believed there were monsters under the bed. Shadows that stretched just a little too long. Creaks in the floor that whispered our name. We’d pull the covers tighter, convinced that if we didn’t look, they couldn’t get us.

As adults – and especially as real estate professionals – the monsters haven’t disappeared, they’ve just changed shape.

Now, they look like interest rate hikes, commission lawsuits, inventory shortages, and media headlines predicting the collapse of the market. They hide behind uncertainty and whisper, “You’ll never reach your goals this year.” Or worse – “Maybe you’re not cut out for this.”

And just like those childhood fears, the longer we avoid shining a light on them, the bigger they grow.

Leadership is the Flashlight

Every brokerage has its share of under-the-bed monsters — the quiet anxieties agents carry but rarely say out loud. A good leader recognizes when those fears start to spread. A great leader knows how to flip the switch and flood the room with light. That light isn’t false positivity or empty pep talks; it’s truth. It’s perspective, education, and open communication.

When leaders speak honestly — about what’s really happening in the market, what’s

changing, and what’s staying the same — they give their teams permission to breathe. Fear thrives in silence, but it can’t survive in the light of clarity.

Face the Fear, Don’t Feed It

In challenging markets, fear often spreads faster than facts. One nervous conversation, one discouraging news clip, one deal that falls apart — and suddenly, morale dips.

If your team isn’t getting consistent, truthful communication from you, they’ll fill in the blanks themselves. And here’s the problem: when people don’t have information, they create stories — and those stories are almost always worse than reality.

Your role as a leader isn’t to say, “There’s nothing to fear.” It’s to say, “Here’s what’s real, here’s what’s not, and here’s what we’re going to do about it.”

Schedule regular team meetings that go beyond numbers and production reports.

Dedicate time to mindset — the part of the business that’s invisible but absolutely essential. Ask questions like:

“What’s worrying you most right now?”

“What conversations are you having with clients that feel tougher than usual?”

“What’s one thing you can control this week?”

When agents feel heard, their fear loses its grip. When they realize they’re not the only ones struggling, it stops feeling like failure — and starts feeling like teamwork. By naming the monster, you take away its mystery. And mystery, more than anything, is what keeps fear alive.

Teach Agents to Look Under the Bed.

As a leader, your goal isn’t to keep agents from ever feeling afraid — it’s to teach them how to deal with fear productively. That means helping them replace emotion with information.

When an agent says, “No one’s buying,” show them how to look under the bed, pull up the MLS data. Walk through local absorption rates, pending sales, and showing activity.

Chances are, there are buyers — but maybe not in the same price range or neighborhood as last year.

When they say, “No one’s calling me back,” help them analyze their follow-up strategy.

How long are they waiting before reconnecting? What’s the tone of their messages? Are they nurturing relationships or just chasing leads?

Most fears fall apart under the weight of truth. Once an agent replaces fear with facts, action becomes possible again.

You might even encourage agents to create a “Fear Journal.” Each time a worry pops up — “What if I don’t hit my goal?” — they write it down, investigate it, and challenge it with evidence. Over time, they’ll see how often their imagination was scarier than reality.

Be the leader who flips the switch.

Leadership isn’t about never feeling fear yourself — it’s about being willing to look under the bed first.

You don’t need to have every answer. You don’t need to predict the market. What your agents need most from you is calm confidence — the kind that says, “We’ve been through worse, and we’re still standing.”

When your agents see you facing uncertainty with composure, they’ll model that energy with their clients. When you focus meetings on solutions instead of panic, they’ll start looking for opportunities instead of obstacles. When you share real stories — agents who found success in slow markets, or how you overcame challenges earlier in your career — you remind them that resilience is part of their DNA.

Because when the market feels dark, leadership isn’t about chasing away the shadows. It’s about reminding your team that they already have the tools — and the strength — to handle whatever’s hiding in them.

Leadership Takeaway:

Here’s the thing about those childhood monsters: they were never real. The fear was. The unknown was. But once we looked – once we turned on the light – we realized it was just a shadow, or a coat draped over a chair. Today’s market monsters are the same. They seem big, looming, and impossible – until you shine the light of knowledge and leadership on them.

The best leaders don’t eliminate fear – they illuminate it. They don’t promise smooth seas; they teach their crew how to navigate storms. When you help your agents face their market monsters with truth, transparency, and compassion, you don’t just build confidence — you build culture. You build trust. You build a brokerage that can thrive in any market, because everyone knows one thing for sure: When fear shows up, there’s always someone ready to turn on the light.

For Your Agents…

We all have those “monsters under the bed” moments — when fear creeps in through headlines, slow weeks, or that one deal that just won’t close. But here’s the truth: fear grows in silence and shrinks in light.

As your leader, my job isn’t to tell you there’s nothing to be afraid of. It’s to shine a light on what’s real — the facts, the opportunities, and the steps we can control. So this week, let’s look under the bed together. What’s worrying you most? What feels uncertain? Let’s talk it through, replace fear with information, and turn confusion into clarity.

Because the best leaders don’t chase away shadows — they help their people see they were never as scary as they seemed.

Let’s keep flipping that light switch together. 💡

Darryl Davis is an award-winning international speaker, real estate and business coach, and best-selling author of three books, all published by McGraw Hill Publishers.

For more than 35 years, Darryl has spoken to and trained more than 600,000 sales professionals around the globe to more than double their production year after year. His book, How to Become a Power Agent in Real Estate, tops Amazon’s charts for one of the most sold books to real estate agents.

He was awarded the Certified Speaking Professional (CSP) designation by the National Speaker’s Association, which is given to less than 2% of all speakers worldwide.

Whether from a stage or Zooming into a virtual room, Darryl’s extraordinary humor, relatability, and natural gift for teaching real-world, results-producing skills and mindsets to audiences have made him a client favorite throughout his career.

Audiences will laugh, learn, and ultimately walk away better prepared for a changing world, with the tools, skills, and training they need to build their businesses with more ease and less stress and to design lives and careers worth smiling about.

Bring One of Darryl’s W.O.R.K. Topics to Your Organization! 

By providing your agents with the knowledge and insights they need to stay ahead of the game, you can ensure that they are equipped to handle any situation that comes their way!  Contact us here to learn more! 

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