Inside Krista Mashore’s Unlikely Rise From Runaway Teen to $74M Entrepreneur
An affair changed the course of her career. Now, the top producer turned $74M digital entrepreneur is spilling what she’s learned about getting known, standing out, and why most agents are doing it wrong.
There are plenty of numbers attached to Krista Mashore’s name: more than 2,300 homes sold, 133 transactions a year for 17 years, eight best-selling books, and more than $74 million generated through the coaching company she built online.
Here’s one that probably isn’t in the version of her story you know: 13.
“I haven’t lived at home since I was 13,” Krista tells eXp Life.
After running away as a young teenager, Krista set out for a better life. But what came next was a grueling series of hardships: time in juvenile hall and a stay at a group home for troubled girls. From there, she spent her remaining teen years in foster care.
The years that followed took her somewhere few people could have predicted. She earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction, became a third-grade teacher, and planned to work her way up to becoming a principal.
Real estate, however, entered the picture sort of unexpectedly.
“When I first got into real estate, it was just to take care of my daughter, who was ill at the time,” she recalls. “My goal was just to play real estate, so I left my full-time teaching job to be a stay-at-home mom.”
But that all changed when her marriage imploded.
“Right around that same time, my husband at the time had an affair. He left me and my two daughters with a brand-new mortgage and no money in the bank. Because of that, I had to 100% make real estate work for me.”
Krista sold 69 homes that year, but that was only the beginning. Krista spent 19 years as a top 1% performer – selling an average of 133 houses per year.
Knowing she had an approach to real estate that needed to be shared, she left production to become a coach.
“The saying that says ‘those that can't do, teach,’ doesn't apply to me,” she says candidly. “I left real estate at the height of my career. My daughter is a newer agent, and she’s already averaging two to three home sales a month. I test every strategy in her business first, and once we know it works, I teach it to my students.”
She has since shared stages with Tony Robbins, Dean Graziosi, Russell Brunson, Grant Cardone, and Elena Cardone.
Now she's headed to the General Session stage at eXpcon, where she's planning to challenge something she thinks agents have fundamentally wrong about how clients choose them.
Local Domination on Buses, Screens, and Feeds
During the 2008 housing crash, Krista built a substantial business. As a top producer for 13 asset management companies, Krista handled bank-owned properties that practically sold themselves. Because inventory moved so quickly, the banks skipped marketing, and since this meant quick sales for Krista too, she didn’t market herself either.
For years, the production kept coming, but when the market rebounded, her primary source of business was wiped out overnight. This came with a harsh reality: she had a massive production record, but zero local name recognition.
“I realized, ‘Oh my gosh, nobody knows me.’”
Krista decided right then to build something no bank, asset manager, or shifting market could steal. So, she set out to make herself almost impossible to miss.
Before “personal brand” became standard vocabulary in real estate, Krista put her face everywhere local eyes might land.
She created television commercials, appeared on movie theater screens and put herself on the sides of city buses. Her marketing showed up in mailboxes and on signs around town, and as digital advertising grew, she began targeting the same local consumers on their news feeds and television screens.
She calls the approach “digital location domination.”
Krista has since taken that same focus on digital visibility far beyond her local real estate market. Through her coaching company, she has generated more than $74 million in online sales, primarily through digital marketing, with 26 separate months topping $1 million in sales.
Her results through sales funnels are just as impressive. Krista has earned 11 ClickFunnels Two Comma Club Awards for generating more than $1 million, along with two $10 million and two $25 million funnel awards.
With tens of millions of dollars in digital sales behind her, Krista has a pretty good idea of what turns online attention into business. She also has some strong opinions about where real estate agents are getting it wrong.
Why 95% of Agent Instagrams Fail
Hand Krista 100 real estate Instagram accounts, and she estimates very few generate actual client leads.
"Maybe five," she says. "Ninety-five out of a hundred are posting listings, sold signs, and 'call me for all your real estate needs.' That's a brochure, not marketing."
Her biggest critiques split into three common traps:
Chasing Vanity Metrics: "Views are vanity," Krista says. "I would rather have 200 people in my actual town who trust me than 200,000 strangers who will never buy or sell a home with me."
Obsessing Over Feed Aesthetics: "I've watched agents spend a week perfecting a grid and zero minutes thinking about what problem they solve for the person watching," she says. "Clients don't hire your feed. They hire the person who made them feel understood."
Copying Trending Dances: "Everyone saw one person do a trend, so now 10,000 agents are doing the exact same dance to the exact same sound," Krista says. "Marketing is supposed to make you the obvious choice. You can't be the obvious choice while blending into a sea of people doing the identical thing."
Consistency alone will not save a bad approach either. Posting daily without a clear message just delivers noise faster.
"They're not for anybody, so they're compelling to nobody," she says. "No authority, no teaching, no stance, just listings and smiling headshots. If I can't tell in 10 seconds what you stand for and who you help, neither can your next client."
Stop Being a Commodity: Krista Thinks Most Agents Are Making Themselves Interchangeable
Ask a group of agents what makes them different and you’ll probably hear some familiar answers: great service, years of experience, market knowledge, and dedication to their clients.
There’s nothing wrong with any of those things. The problem is that everyone else can say them, too.
“Every agent says they have great service and experience, so it all cancels out,” Krista says. “You don’t win by being a better commodity. You win by not being a commodity at all.”
Real estate only feels crowded because agents mimic each other's approaches. When everyone uses the same script, standing out requires remarkably little effort.
That’s why Krista has a surprisingly different take on just how competitive real estate really is.
“Everybody thinks real estate is brutally competitive. It’s not,” she says. “It only looks that way because everyone is doing the exact same thing, saying the exact same thing, and marketing the exact same way.”
For an industry with more than a million agents competing for attention, her conclusion sounds almost counterintuitive.
“When everyone blends together, the bar to stand out is shockingly low.”
Your Next Client Is Already Watching
Krista's eXpcon General Session, "Your Next Client Is Already Watching Someone. Make Sure It's You," addresses the hidden audience watching agents online right now.
"They think the client decides when they call," Krista says. "The client decided long before that."
Potential clients often consume video content for months without leaving a like, comment, or direct message. Krista believes that by the time some finally reach out, they may have already made their choice.
"It's usually the 'small' stuff," she says. "The comment they never replied to. The video they thought nobody watched that a client rewatched five times. Agents think content disappears. It doesn't. People are silently consuming you for months before they ever raise their hand. Your audience is way bigger than your engagement."
Homeowners look for a knowledgeable neighbor, not a pushy pitch.
“They can tell the difference between an agent who posts a listing and an agent who understands the neighborhood, the schools, the trends, the story of the area,” Krista says. “Consumers are looking for a local authority, not a salesperson.”
And while agents may picture trust being built across a conference table, Krista says the relationship can start somewhere much less formal.
"Trust is built in the scroll, not the sales call," Krista says. "People decide who they like while they're lying in bed at night watching videos. By the time they meet you, the relationship is already real to them."
By the time that person finally raises their hand, Krista believes the agent may not be walking into a competition at all.
“The consultation isn’t where you win the deal,” she says. “It’s where they confirm the decision they already made.”
What to Expect at eXpcon
So, how exactly does an agent become the person a future client spends those months watching?
That’s where Krista starts keeping a few cards close to her chest.
“I’m not handing out the trending audio of the week,” she says. “I’m changing how they think about being chosen. Tactics expire. Authority compounds.”
Her General Session will go deeper into what happens before someone becomes a lead, when potential buyers and sellers are still scrolling, learning and forming opinions about the agents they see online.
It also means the session isn’t really about becoming an influencer, chasing virality or finding another trick to feed the algorithm. Krista’s focus is on becoming recognizable and trusted by the people who could actually become clients.
Krista has experienced both sides of the equation: selling at the top of her market while realizing hardly anyone knew her name, and building a business around making sure that never happened again.
She already knows what she wants agents thinking when they leave her General Session.
“I’ve been doing this backwards.”
And if Krista is right, there are buyers and sellers making decisions about agents right now without ever clicking “like,” filling out a form or making a phone call.
Your next client may already be watching someone. At eXpcon Salt Lake City, Krista plans to show agents how to make sure it’s them. Sign up here.
