Kristi on hard conversations
Scripts, sparring and listening for the price talk, the stuck buyer and the downsizer you have been avoiding.
13 short videos, grouped by the lesson each one makes. Newest first. Updated Sep 9, 2026.
Serve the downsizer in your database with empathy
2 reels
@kristijencks · ReelWatch what you say to a downsizer
This is the time to watch what you say. Downsizing is an emotionally rough season for some people. Their belongings, their home and their timeline all carry weight that a spreadsheet cannot see. Approaching all three with empathy, and letting them set the pace, could be your ticket to a lifelong client and your number one fan. Listening well matters more here than any script. Dawn Levy and I go through how to serve the downsizer in your database on this episode of Take It and Run.
@kristijencks · ReelThere is a downsizer in every database
Dawn Levy has learned that there is a downsizer in every database. Somebody in your past clients and sphere is sitting in a home that no longer fits their season of life, whether or not they have said it out loud yet. The question every agent needs to be able to answer is simple. When is the best time to downsize? If you cannot answer it in a way that serves them, you are not the one they will call when they decide. Dawn works through the whole conversation on this episode of Take It and Run.
Spar before the appointment, not during it
6 reels
@kristijencks · ReelSet your sparring partner to a six
Set it to a 6 tonight. Your sparring partner has a difficulty dial from 1 to 10, and almost every agent gets it wrong in one of two directions. They set it to a 2, cruise through a pleasant conversation, and feel great about a round that taught them nothing. Or they set it to a 10 on day one, get taken apart by someone who already interviewed two other agents, and never open it again. A 6 is a normal Tuesday. Distracted, mildly skeptical, keeps mentioning a friend in the business. That is the person you are actually going to talk to this week.
@kristijencks · ReelYour listing appointment should be the easiest conversation of the week
If your listing appointment is the hardest conversation you have all week, something is backwards. It should be the easiest one. It should be the tenth time you have heard that objection, not the first. That is the entire argument for practice, and it is why agents who spar sound calm when the room gets tense. Their heart rate does not move because the sentence is not new to them. Do one round before your next appointment. Not a program. One round, and notice how different the room feels.
@kristijencks · ReelRole-play is a supply problem, not a discipline problem
Every agent I coach knows they should be role-playing. Almost none of them do it. For ten years I assumed that was a discipline problem. It is a supply problem. Your practice partner is a spouse who does not want to, or a guy at the office who goes easy on you because he has to sit next to you Monday morning. Neither one will push you or tell you the truth about minute four. So you skip it, and the first time you hear why would I pay you 6% out loud, it comes from someone who can actually walk. You would not learn to drive in traffic.
@kristijencks · ReelPractice on a simulator, not on live clients
Role-playing standard real estate scripts can feel awkward, but practicing on live clients is far worse. That is why we created Corner Coach, a way to sharpen your skills in a zero-risk environment. You can simulate any buyer or seller scenario and get instant feedback on your performance. It also analyzes your actual consultation transcripts to highlight your strongest lines and show where you can improve. The awkward round happens in private, so the real one does not have to, and you walk into the appointment having already heard the hard part.
@kristijencks · ReelNobody walks into a title fight alone
Nobody walks into a title fight alone. There is a corner, somebody who watched the last three rounds, tells you what you are doing with your left hand, and sends you back out. Agents get none of that. You go into a listing appointment, something goes sideways in minute four, and the only person who saw it was the seller, who is not going to tell you. Then you drive home and try to reconstruct it from memory. That is not coaching. That is rumination. Send this to the agent on your team who has been white-knuckling appointments alone.
@kristijencks · ReelI scored an 84 on my role-play round
I scored an 84. Discovery, acknowledge, objection handling, hidden layer, close. The same five categories every round, graded 0 to 100 when the round ends. On its own that number means nothing. It matters because next week there is another one, and the week after that, and you can watch your discovery score climb while you are still sure you have not improved. You have been role-playing blind your whole career. Somebody says good job or that was rough and you have no idea which part. The close is where most rounds fall apart, by the way. Not the objection. The ask.
Sell the life, not the listing
1 reel
@kristijencks · ReelSell the life, not the listing
People make decisions emotionally and justify them with logic. Nobody buys square footage. They buy the backyard where their daughter's quinceanera happens. They buy the fenced yard for the dogs. They buy the school district. Find the motivation, and everything else is just logistics. Sell the life, not the listing. Before your next showing, ask yourself what your last buyer really bought, because it was not the house on paper. It was the life they could picture in it, and that is what your conversation needs to be about.
Get stuck buyers and sellers moving with data over drama
2 reels
@kristijencks · ReelData over drama, facts over fear
Data over drama. Facts over fear. When a buyer or seller hands you a feeling, do not argue with it. Answer it with numbers. Rates are too high becomes a blended-rate breakdown. My house is worth more becomes days on market and real comps. Feelings are loud, but data is louder. The agents who win lead with the math, not the mood, and they do it calmly, because the numbers do the arguing for them. This is from my episode with Tom Ferry on getting clients unstuck.
@kristijencks · ReelIt's not the market, it's the three layers of stuck
It is not the market. It is the three layers of stuck. Every stuck buyer and seller gets stuck the same three ways, and so do you. Layer one is surface. Rates are too high, we want to wait. It sounds rational but it is a symptom. Your move is enhanced discovery, ask before you tell, data over drama. Layer two is emotional, loss aversion. We feel a loss twice as strongly as an equal gain. Name it, reframe it, move them from what if to what is next. Layer three is identity. Go to the motivation, what it would mean for their family.
Say the hard thing early
2 reels
@kristijencks · ReelSteve LaCrosse's word-for-word price reduction script
This is Steve LaCrosse's word-for-word price reduction script, the one he uses with $1.2M listings. The price reduction talk is the conversation most agents fumble. Steve does not, and he lays out the exact language slide by slide. Save every slide, then use it the next time a listing has sat without offers. Having the words ready before the listing sits is what makes the conversation feel routine instead of confrontational, for you and for the seller. The full episode is episode 22 of Take It and Run.
@kristijencks · ReelThe conversation you keep avoiding is costing you clients
The conversation you keep avoiding is costing you clients. Not because the market is hard and not because the timing is wrong. Because you have not said what needs to be said. Pricing too high? Say it early. Offer losing steam? Say it now. Buyer losing focus? Anchor them back. The agents winning right now are not the ones with the easiest market. They are the ones with the best conversations. On episode 22 of Take It and Run, Steve LaCrosse breaks down a word-for-word framework for every tough conversation you have been putting off.
The longer version lives on this site.
Thirty seconds is the hook. These are the pages where Kristi works the same ideas all the way through.