With an exceptional track record spanning over two decades, Abby Waltz stands as a seasoned expert in building businesses and driving purposeful and efficient growth. Her extensive expertise encompasses various domains, including leadership, management, public speaking, coaching, and training. Since 2007, Abby has immersed herself in the dynamic world of real estate, currently holding the esteemed position of National Director at Homes for Heroes—an organization she has played an instrumental role in propelling to its present stature.

Under Abby’s visionary guidance, Homes for Heroes has flourished into a nationwide force, boasting an impressive network of nearly 4,500 affiliates. This remarkable team has facilitated over $16.5 billion in hero real estate sales and dedicated an awe-inspiring $117 million in Hero Rewards to uplift 62,000 heroes and their families. As the National Director, Abby Waltz shoulders the responsibility of cultivating strong relationships with the company’s real estate and mortgage specialists across the country. Her mission is to equip them with the necessary tools, coaching, and resources to ensure their triumph and enable Homes for Heroes to express gratitude to every hero within their local communities.

Central to Abby’s focus lies the affiliate experience, success, and retention—an endeavor that necessitates collaboration with every department and team member within the organization. From overseeing the design and functionality of the affiliate portal to meticulously planning the annual national conference, aptly named Success Camp, Abby diligently acknowledges and celebrates the top producers. She actively shapes affiliate communications and training programs, delivering weekly coaching sessions to the dedicated cohort of 4,500 affiliates. Additionally, Abby holds the reins of the Affiliate Success Team, diligently orchestrating its operations.

While the responsibilities may appear overwhelming, Abby wholeheartedly believes that the endeavor is unequivocally worthwhile. By demonstrating how real estate and mortgage professionals can genuinely nurture purpose-driven business growth, she empowers them to infuse greater personal and professional significance into their pursuits. Her profound commitment lies in guiding her affiliates towards a path of intentional growth, enriching their lives with meaning and purpose.

Aligning Mission, People, and Processes

Abby firmly believes that knowing one’s purpose and establishing a clear mission and vision around that purpose is unquestionably the first step towards effectively and efficiently growing a business. She emphasizes that this purpose should not revolve around profits but should be centered on serving and assisting others in some way. Once the purpose is clearly defined, Abby insists on the constant sharing of it to ensure the entire team is aligned in their efforts to achieve it. Furthermore, Abby recognizes the utmost importance of having the right people on board. With the right purpose and the right individuals in place, the subsequent focus should be on implementing the remaining structure and processes necessary to set the team up for success. This involves establishing metrics, key performance indicators (KPIs), streamlined processes, and clear expectations, all aimed at supporting everyone’s success and driving the organization towards accomplishing its mission.

Nurturing Teams for Collective Success and Fulfillment

Abby recognizes a significant distinction between leadership and management, and personally, she has discovered that leading a team yields greater success for both the individuals and the business. To facilitate this, effective processes and systems have been implemented to empower the team members to manage themselves and uphold their own accountability. Abby’s approach focuses on clarifying the reasons and underlying logic behind every action, while also painting a compelling picture of the collective journey and the significance of each individual’s role in achieving the vision. She firmly believes that the organization’s purpose cannot be accomplished without the dedication and contribution of its people, which is why she places great emphasis on investing in them. This investment takes various forms, including dedicating time, offering encouragement, providing coaching and training, offering different perspectives, recognizing their efforts, and ensuring they have the necessary tools and systems to excel in their roles and contribute to the organization’s success.

At Homes for Heroes, cultivating a strong culture is of utmost importance. Abby and her team place a strong emphasis on ensuring that both employees and affiliates embody the organization’s five core values: caring, positive, do the right thing, driven by a cause, and together a team. Maintaining this culture is critical to their success. Additionally, they strive to set their team members up for success by ensuring a good fit between individuals and the organization, as well as aligning individuals with roles that leverage their strengths and allow them to make meaningful contributions, ultimately leading to their happiness and fulfillment.

Guiding Individuals to Intentional Growth

As a speaker, coach, and trainer, Abby places great emphasis on the concept of intentional growth and living with a purpose. She strongly advocates for individuals to develop a deeply rooted “why” or a personal mission statement. In the context of the real estate and mortgage industry, which has recently experienced intense challenges, Abby recognizes that people are feeling exhausted and burned out. It is during these times that having a clear sense of purpose and meaning becomes even more crucial as a source of fuel to propel oneself forward. Purpose also acts as a filter, helping individuals discern what commitments to undertake and what to decline.

Abby’s role is to guide others in recognizing the importance of having a purpose in their lives. She assists individuals in discovering what that purpose might look like for them personally and supports them in integrating it into their personal and professional spheres. She has repeatedly witnessed the transformative power of aligning one’s purpose with their profession. This alignment not only contributes to professional success but also leads to a deep sense of personal fulfillment. By making a positive impact in the lives of others and building a life legacy to be proud of, individuals find a profound sense of satisfaction and meaning in their work.

Transforming Careers with Purpose-driven Growth

Abby has an abundance of inspiring stories that illustrate how agents and loan officers have utilized the Homes for Heroes program to propel their careers to new heights, guided by the concept of growing on purpose. One noteworthy example is a mortgage specialist based in South Carolina. During a challenging phase in her career, she found herself in a market undergoing significant changes, leaving her feeling exhausted and disillusioned. The focus had shifted solely to numbers and transactions, and she sensed that something crucial was missing. On the verge of leaving the industry she once loved, she discovered Homes for Heroes, which ignited her own sense of purpose and transformed everything. From that point forward, her primary focus became serving the heroes in her community, aligning her business with her newfound purpose. As a result, her business thrived, and she built a substantial team. Even in semi-retirement, she continues to be a remarkable rainmaker for her team, which continues to grow.

Another powerful story involves a real estate specialist in Indiana who was searching for meaning and yearned to give back to the first responders in his area due to a life-or-death experience involving his father. Upon discovering Homes for Heroes, he experienced a profound shift. Starting with a team of two, he evolved into a broker-owner, eventually establishing multiple offices. He now spearheads significant local events that honor and serve heroes, with his offices thriving and attracting business. This individual’s journey showcases how purpose-driven actions can lead to remarkable growth and success, both personally and professionally.

A Path to Continuous Improvement

According to Abby, in today’s world, professionals have endless opportunities to continuously improve and elevate themselves in areas such as professional growth, relationships, and customer experience. She emphasizes the importance of carefully choosing what information and influences to engage with, as what one fuels their brain with and focuses on tends to manifest in their reality. Abby encourages her team, as well as herself, to prioritize self-care so they can show up fully for others and contribute to their well-being. This can take various forms, such as practicing gratitude journaling, affirmations, going for walks, or meditating, depending on what resonates with each individual in their current life circumstances.

Abby is an advocate for lifelong learning and considers herself a perpetual student. She encourages others to cultivate curiosity and maintain a quest for knowledge. She personally enjoys reading business books and taking notes on growth-oriented podcasts, even during vacations, which has led to some good-natured teasing from others. However, she firmly believes that the world is accessible at our fingertips, offering both blessings and challenges. It is up to each individual to consciously choose which information and influences they want to focus on and allow into their lives.

By being intentional about what they consume and nurturing a growth-oriented mindset, professionals can make significant strides in their personal and professional development, leveraging the abundance of resources available to them.

Discovering Purpose

To Abby, purpose is a deeply personal aspect of one’s life that remains constant throughout adulthood, whether or not individuals are aware of its presence. It resides in the depths of their heart and core, driving a sense of pride in the life they lead and motivating them to greet each day with enthusiasm. Abby suggests reflecting on a pivotal moment from adolescence or early adulthood and then reconnecting with the inner two-year-old self to ask, “Why is this important to me? Why does it matter so much?” By delving into these questions, individuals often discover that their purpose is intertwined with their successes and failures, acting as a guiding force in their lives. Abby encourages individuals to embrace and strengthen their purpose, leveraging it to serve others. This can involve integrating purpose into their business or profession, such as the way Homes for Heroes gives back, or by engaging in volunteering and activities that align with their purpose. The key is to ensure that purpose remains consistently present and actively tapped into, as its transformative power can significantly impact one’s life.

Choosing the Challenging Path

Abby has observed two common challenges that people encounter regarding their purpose: superficiality and losing sight of it along the way. Discovering one’s why or purpose and effectively integrating it with their profession can be a daunting task in itself. It requires hard work, dedicated effort, and ongoing attention to nurture and expand it once it is uncovered. Abby recommends Simon Sinek’s book, “Start With Why,” as a valuable resource for exploring one’s purpose. Sinek’s accompanying workbook, “Find Your Why,” can also be a helpful tool. Starting with these resources provides a solid foundation.

Uncovering your purpose involves investing time in asking yourself challenging questions about your own life, experiences, successes, and failures. It requires courage to be honest with yourself in answering these questions. This process can be uncomfortable and even painful, similar to the discomfort experienced when working out and building muscles. However, the results are truly rewarding in the end.

Once you have identified your purpose, it is crucial not to squander it. Abby personally keeps her purpose visible by placing it on her wall, where she sees it every day. She uses it as motivation, fuel, and a guiding compass for determining the focus areas that will lead her and her team towards their desired destination.

Honoring Heroes

Homes for Heroes has achieved remarkable success, with an impressive track record of selling over $16.5 billion in hero real estate and giving back $117 million in Hero Rewards. According to Abby, the company’s unwavering commitment to their mission of thanking every hero has played a significant role in their accomplishments since its establishment in 2002. This steadfast dedication and focus have propelled them to where they are today.

The team at Homes for Heroes derives immense satisfaction from helping heroes, and each successful interaction and expression of gratitude further ignites their passion to reach even more heroes. Celebrating the victories of every hero they have the privilege to thank serves as a continuous source of motivation and inspiration. Abby emphasizes that the rewarding nature of their work fuels their drive to extend gratitude to an increasing number of heroes.

Creating Lasting Impact

Abby advises individuals who aspire to grow their business with purpose and make a positive impact to embrace the fact that it is not an easy path to choose. However, she emphasizes that if it were easy, everyone would be doing it, and there would be little room for uniqueness and personal growth. Abby encourages individuals to embrace their differences, to think and act differently from the crowd. She believes that investing in oneself and putting in the necessary work can serve as fuel to become the catalyst for the change they want to see in the world. She adds the reminder that building a life legacy to be proud of requires making deliberate choices and taking intentional actions.

Website: https://www.homesforheroes.com/