Driven by the goal of levelling the playing field in property purchases, Kylie Frearson created buyer’s agency Property Solutions 101 in 2011.
She is an extremely sharp negotiator with years of local real estate market knowledge all combined into an expert buyers agents package.
Being an independent buyer’s agent is incredibly rewarding to Kylie as purchasing property will most likely be the single biggest financial investment of someone’s lifetime. A strong element of trust and expertise is needed, plus creating great relationships with other local businesses is key to a successful outcome.
- What career path led you to where you are now?
In 2001 I joined Colliers International in Canberra as a junior. I worked my way up through the ranks – went to an executive and then they offered me an Associate Director role in Industrial Sales and Leasing. At that time I was also offered a role at CB Richard Ellis in Newcastle as an Associate Director in Sales and Leasing. I invested in property in Newcastle during my time at Colliers and I thought it was a really good opportunity to move to Newcastle as I have family and friends up here, and I really liked what potential Newcastle had so I made the decision to move up here with my husband and I joined Seabridge
In 2011 the GFC hit and CB Richard Ellis closed their office and I took that opportunity to start Property Solutions 101 as a buyer’s agent and property management service and we help the buyers invest in property and we continue their journey with property management and greater wealth.
- What motivates and drives you?
Well, I’m the mother of three daughters so they motivate me and drive me every day. I like to show them that anything is possible if you work hard and you set your goals that you can achieve anything. So that is a big motivator of mine.
I work in a service industry so my clients also motivate me. I like to see someone who has been in the property market for twelve months, who can’t commit to buying a property and they come to me and I give them all the information and the knowledge that they need to secure the property comfortably, and then I can give them independent advice and teams that they can surround themselves with to make sure they are comfortable in what they are doing. So success stories motivate me as well.
- As a younger business owner what advice do you have for others that may be considering branching out?
If you don’t give it a go you don’t know.
So I am a big believer in trying – if you fail and you tried, you tried.
Do your due diligence ‚Äì understand the market you are going into, set a budget, get a good team around you and give it a go. If you fail and you’ve tried, you’ve tried, if you try and you succeed, you’ve succeeded haven’t you. So do due diligence, know your point of difference and give it a go.
- Where would you like to be in ten years?
That’s a very confronting question. In ten years time I am going to have a seventeen-year-old daughter, so personally I’ll have three grown children!
On the professional side, when I set my business up I spent a lot of time on branding it initially ‚Äì I had a really good friend of mine who helped me with the branding. It wasn’t a business we wanted to change in five or seven years, we wanted to have a brand that we could carry around Australia, so obviously the plan is to franchise it. Newcastle is always going to be our home and we wanted to set up a really good foundation here and put our processes in place in Newcastle so in ten years time I hope to have three healthy daughters and expanding my business throughout Australia.
- Have you had any significant mentors during your career that inspired you?
I was really lucky when I started at Colliers International that I was mentored by Jim Shonk and Paul Powderly. They set a really strong foundation for business for me. They taught me how to be a team leader while working in the team, which was really important to my business. They also taught me ethics and every foundation I run my business on I was taught by Paul and Jim so I was really lucky to be mentored by them early on in my career.
I have also had really significant women in my career as well – Helen Davies has taught me a lot. More recently, a few years ago, I met Darren Glover from Evolution. I really have been drawn to Darren. I think he is a very good businessman and intelligent man and I can learn a lot from him. So I try to spend as much time as I can with Darren.
I think personally though, as important as mentors are to me, are the people I surround myself with every day – the women in business, the mothers in business, the families in business. So I try to keep a really tight network around me of like-minded people, so as well as mentors they are just as important to me.
