Every now and then, a conversation reminds you just how far mindset can take a person — and this week’s episode with Chelsea Steen of Your Castle Real Estate does just that.

Chelsea grew up in Marion, Ohio, a small-town kid with a loud laugh, a rebellious streak, and an untamable sense of independence. Her childhood was shaped by the kind of freedom that bred both curiosity and grit. She spent her days exploring the woods, breaking the rules, and falling in love with sports - basketball, soccer, even a stint in tackle football.

At just 11, Chelsea was hit by a car and told she might never walk again. Six months later, she was back on the field, a defining lesson in resilience that would follow her for the rest of her life.

That fire carried her through Catholic school uniforms she hated, top grades she earned anyway, and eventually to Case Western Reserve University. At 20, she stepped into entrepreneurship, running a college painting franchise that would make her the top-producing female in the company’s U.S. history by graduation.

She built her own real estate business from there, learned the hard lessons of leadership (including a few early “boss mistakes”), and achieved the kind of success that most would call enough. But after years of chasing goals, Chelsea and her wife made a life-changing decision: to sell almost everything and spend ten months traveling the world together. That was a reset that gave her space to breathe, reflect, and rediscover who she wanted to be outside of career and achievement.

Today at Your Castle, Chelsea continues to blend her competitive energy with compassion, helping clients make confident moves while staying anchored in what truly matters.

Her story is wild, wise, and full of lessons: that perfectionism softens with wisdom, that leadership starts with self-awareness, and that sometimes, slowing down is the power move that changes everything.

Chelsea, thank you for sharing your story, your honesty, and your mindset with me.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

As we launch the 4th season of Mindset Maters, I was thrilled to sit down with my friend Kendra Lanterman of West+Main Homes - a born-and-raised Arvada native who has been in the real estate industry since she was 16 years old. Kendra got her start answering phones at her Nana Jane's brokerage, and by 17, she knew there was no turning back. 24 years later, she's still doing what she loves - and she's doing it with a level of integrity that the industry desperately needs more of.

Having bought her first home in 2005 and facing the challenges of potential foreclosure in 2008 - all while pregnant with her first child – Kendra learned firsthand how a 2 year home can become a 10 year one, how to prepare for moments when things do not go as planned, and how she can use so many of the lessons she has learned along the years to help her show up for her clients.

As you’ll hear, it’s clear how serious Kendra takes her responsibilities to her family and her clients as we talked about balancing motherhood with a commission-only career, building her business around her family instead of the other way around, and why she's talked herself out of more deals than most agents would admit to - because it simply wasn't the right move for her clients.

If you've ever felt like the real estate or mortgage industry is more focused on the transaction than the person - this episode is for you. Kendra is the kind of professional who roots for you whether you're her client, her colleague, or a complete stranger. Tune in, share it with someone who needs to hear it, and as always… Mindset Matters.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

David Williams grew up in Bath, England, in a family where weekends were defined by rugby pitches, squash courts, and long days at school followed by even longer evenings of sport. That early love of team environments carried him across the Atlantic to Boston and Vermont, into graduate school, elite ski academies, the AHL, and eventually onto the pitch with the U.S. national rugby team, running out in front of 40,000+ fans in Hong Kong.

From there, his role evolved from player to strength and conditioning coach to national team staff — helping prepare the U.S. squad for a Rugby World Cup, building systems, and pushing athletes to their limits. And then, like so many of us, he hit a crossroads and walked away from the only world he’d ever really known.

Today, David has built a second career in commercial real estate across Colorado — office, industrial, land, investment — bringing the same team-first mindset into boardrooms, site tours, and negotiations. He’s honest about what he misses from sport, what he doesn’t romanticize, and why he’ll always choose values and long-term relationships over chasing the biggest check.

At the heart of this conversation is something simple and rare: the power of having real friends, real conversations, and a real support system while you reinvent yourself — and why being a “good bloke” and maybe even a G.C. still matters more than any title.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

Christina Ray’s story is one of grit, faith, and fearless reinvention. Raised on an Air Force base in North Dakota, she grew up surrounded by discipline, loyalty, and community—watching her dad build a military career and her mom dedicate 25 years to Lockheed Martin. Those early lessons carried her from small-town life to Colorado, where she found herself navigating college, chasing purpose, and eventually stumbling into a career in property management.

What started as a leasing job turned into a decade-long climb through every level of the business, all the way to regional director. She met her husband there, learned how to lead people, and discovered just how much she loved helping others find “home.” But everything changed the day she got a call from daycare saying her daughter was sick—and her boss asked, “What’s your plan B?” That moment pushed her to create one of her own.

Eight months pregnant with her second child, Christina decided it was time to bet on herself. She got licensed, joined Live Laugh Denver, and never looked back. Over nine years, she’s built a thriving real estate career while raising two daughters, setting boundaries that protect both her business and her family. Her mindset—rooted in faith, gratitude, and abundance—has carried her through markets that tested even the best agents.

In this episode, Christina shares what it really takes to balance ambition and motherhood, how she’s teaching her daughters the power of hard work, and why she believes success means never having to tell your kids “we can’t afford that dream.” It’s an honest, heartfelt look at a woman who’s built her life around service, family, and the kind of perseverance that can’t be faked.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

This week on Mindset Matters I sat down with my friend and fellow Green Mountain grad, Mikelle Adkins Smith of Keller Williams Advantage.

Mikelle grew up an only child who loved books and writing, with a very straightforward plan: become an attorney, make the grades, do the work, check the boxes. She got into DU, worked 40 hours a week while carrying a full class load, and stayed locked in on that path… until real estate and the title world showed her two things at once:

1. She could make more money, faster, without going hundreds of thousands into debt.
2. She could actually build a life she wanted, not just a résumé that looked good.

From there, her story takes a lot of turns - leaving the law-school dream behind and jumping into title, burning out during the refi boom, meeting her now-husband Brian and, within six months, watching him buy a struggling franchise while she quit her stable job and they got married, and eventually her decision to enter real estate and build a life and business simultaneously.

We get into motherhood, too. Having kids during the 2007–08 mess, choosing to be home as much as she could while still selling, and how having three boys (now 18, 16, and 13) completely reframed how she talks to clients about homeownership.

And then there’s hockey.

A random flyer in a kindergarten Friday folder led to roller hockey at Skate City… then ice hockey… and now all three boys are all-in. They shoot pucks every day without being asked, they study film, they battle each other in the driveway, and they make choices most grown adults won’t make to protect their opportunities. Mikelle and Brian don’t try to be their coaches - they just ask good questions, keep them grounded, and let the work ethic be theirs.

What stuck with me most, though, was this:

Mikelle will tell you she’s guarded, that she keeps a small circle because of some of what she lived through growing up. But if you listen to how she talks about her boys, her clients, and even the kids they play with, you can hear the truth - she’s got a massive heart, and her sons have inherited it. They care, they stick up for people, and they don’t let past hurts decide how they show up.

If you’re in real estate, a parent, or just someone trying to figure out how to chase big goals without losing your mind or your family in the process, this episode is worth your time.

And Mikelle's story... starts now!

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

This week on Mindset Matters I got to sit down with my friend and straight shooter, Sasha Smothers of Keller Williams Advantage in Lakewood. If you’ve ever felt like you were “the quiet kid” who didn’t quite know where you fit, or if you’ve been staring at this housing market wondering what’s real and what’s just noise, this episode is going to land.

Sasha grew up outside of Boston as an introverted, sometimes overlooked gymnast - the kid who didn’t always feel worthy of speaking up. She was raised by entrepreneurial parents in mortgages and real estate, watched them build businesses and still show up for every important moment, and somewhere along the way picked up an early belief that her voice might not matter as much as everyone else’s.

Fast forward - she moves to Denver on a 24-hour decision, survives a pandemic in a brand new city, hires a coach, does the hard inner work, and slowly starts to rebuild her identity. While this massive change is taking place, she meets her now-husband and stepdaughter at the apartment pool, falls in love with both of them, and over time steps fully into what she was built for - helping people navigate one of the most complicated housing and financial environments we’ve ever lived through.

What I admire about Sasha is simple - she tells the truth, even when it isn’t trendy and she’s not afraid to talk about the uncomfortable parts of our financial system that most “professionals” ignore because it doesn’t fit on a postcard.

During our conversation we talked about her journey from introverted gymnast to confident, outspoken agent, the mindset work that helped her finally see her own worth, how she and her husband think about money, control systems, and what might really be coming next, and why she believes community, curiosity, and questioning the mainstream narrative might be the only way we get through this together.

Her story... starts now!

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

Stephen Berg’s journey reads like a crash course in perseverance. Growing up in Evergreen, CO, with a pilot father, his childhood was shaped by curiosity, travel, and an early fascination with aviation. After 9/11, that dream dissolved — both because of his opposition to the war and witnessing his father lose his pension when United Airlines filed bankruptcy. The experience planted two lifelong seeds: distrust in corporate systems and an obsession with independence.

He tried it all - flipping houses, running a wine department, even becoming a certified sommelier and assistant winemaker in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. But when the financial fallout from a mold-ridden home and a costly lawsuit left him nearly bankrupt, Berg rebuilt again. This time, back home in Denver, as a real estate agent.

With a newborn, another on the way, $80K in debt, and his family living in one bedroom at his in-laws’, Stephen started from zero and within two years was the Denver Metro Association of Realtors (DMAR) Rookie of the Year, discovering that the only real limits were the ones he’d been placing on himself.

Our conversation covered a lot of ground - from the danger of comparing your chapter one to someone else’s chapter twenty, to how punk rock, science, and critical thinking can shape a career and a worldview. We also dove into why structure and patience are underrated superpowers in an unpredictable industry and how fatherhood reframed his idea of success — not just as freedom of income, but freedom of time.

By the end, Stephen’s story becomes less about selling homes and more about how to build a life — one defined by adaptability, curiosity, and conviction.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280

On this week’s episode of Mindset Matters I had the honor of sitting down with my friend and absolute pro, Jessica Lentz of eXp, Colorado native who turned hard seasons into repeatable excellence. Jessica grew up in Littleton (Columbine class of 2000), walked through more loss and challenges by nineteen than many see in a lifetime, and somehow found a way to raise a family, build a life and grow one of the more impressive real estate businesses in all of Denver.

At one point in her life a teenage mother both working and studying full time, Jessica earned a biology and nuclear medicine degree, moved to Seattle for a rare program, and still somehow found the energy to read her son biology textbooks at bedtime.

And when life pivoted, she pivoted. A severance check and six weeks later, she took a shot at real estate with zero expectations and a very un-Instagram start: FSBO, HUD, messy buy-sell—trial by fire from day one. What followed is the part I want every agent and entrepreneur to hear: Jessica built a durable business on three FOCUSED hours a day. No frantic “always on,” no “I meditate about my ice bath” monologue - just clear boundaries, fast communication, and a bias for service over spectacle.

Not to say she didn’t work outside those hours, but those three hours have become the foundation on which everything in her business has been built.

Jessica has a clear understanding of what she wants and what her expectations are. From playing offense with clients (set expectations so emotions don’t run the show), to refusing to tie your identity to a paycheck, to why doing one deal a month is a legitimate business that doesn’t require you to sell your soul.

We also get into the good stuff: raising great kids (shoutout to Collin taking his real estate exam the day before Thanksgiving to match mom’s milestone, and Hayden patrolling center field), leaving railroad life for a healthier family rhythm, travel, concerts, sunshine, and yes - logging miles on a treadmill to the Eras Tour.

Jessica’s story is proof that consistency beats chaos, boundaries beat burnout, and a servant’s heart beats slick tactics - every time.

www.everettslending.com
720-979-8742
jimmy@everettslending.com
IG: @jimmythesaint5280