Connect with Dionne Malush
Connect with Dionne Malush
Have you ever felt that rearranging your space could change your life? Well, today's episode might just prove you right. Stick around and let us know your thoughts. So welcome back to another episode of Shine on Success. I'm your host, dionne Malish, and today we're diving into the ancient art of feng shui and how it transforms the real estate landscape. Joining us is Steve Kodad, a national real estate trainer, author and feng shui master who has shaped countless spaces and lives with his expertise. From his roots in education to pioneering feng shui in real estate, steve's journey is as inspiring as it is educational. Let's unlock some ancient secrets to success with Steve today. So welcome Steve. How are you doing?
Speaker 2:I'm doing great, Dionne. How are you doing?
Speaker 1:I'm doing good. I just came in from an amazing weekend and I'm excited to talk to you today because it's so interesting to me being in real estate for 20 years and I understand the importance of what you do, and in this area we just don't have a lot of people that talk about it. So I'm anxious to talk to you a little bit and for you to tell me how you transition from your successful career in teaching and coaching to real estate and eventually, feng shui. So what sparked your interest in it?
Speaker 2:in feng shui. Well, uh, when I was in real estate Dionna I was I eventually became broker owner of the 34 Asian company that I worked for, and it was during that time that I had already become a certified home stager and I knew how important that was to get my listing sold and I really sort of thought of myself as a listing realtor. And so I had some information sent to me by email about something that I couldn't pronounce called feng shui, and I looked into it, sent away for the tapes and got really intrigued by it and was always looking for something that could conceivably help me get to a closing faster and get on to the next one just like anybody.
Speaker 2:So you know, I got the information. I listened to the tapes over a weekend, got a home that was presented to me that had a lot of difficulties in my neighborhood.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's interesting. So that's pretty cool because when you get in your neighborhood you're even I think sometimes you're even nervous about it because it is your neighbor, right? And then you're going to bring on this new thing to the neighborhood. So go ahead, finish telling me about it.
Speaker 2:Well, luckily they had actually moved out.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, they had two realtors and weren't getting anywhere, so they were moving to Winston-Salem, north Carolina. So I had a perfect opportunity to follow these tapes, these instructions that I could conceivably do it for a vacant home. So I spent that Saturday doing it and bringing some items from my house which was two blocks away, held an open house that Sunday and got an offer. And they were ecstatic and so that's how I got started, and so at that point I then started using it for other homes that I had and it not only did it work, but people were very intrigued by it and enthusiastic, and so they did an awful lot of the stuff themselves, and so I got really, really enthusiastic about it at that point and kept doing it and kept doing it.
Speaker 2:And then I had the opportunity to get myself fully certified with a couple out of California who flew all over the place doing their week-long sessions, but they were in Knoxville, tennessee, which was over the mountains and through the woods, you might say, from Charlotte. So I was able during that winter to travel over the mountains, through a snowstorm actually, and we ended up in Knoxville and spent over a week with them and it was just fantastic. You know you were talking about your exercise that you just came home from. This was the same way for me to really really turn me on, so I got fully certified. I've now picked up a couple of other certifications, but it really got me started. And so again I hung in with the real estate for a few more years. Again I hung in with the real estate for a few more years. I enjoyed it, but I really always felt I was a teacher at heart, because I had taught for 15 years in New Jersey.
Speaker 1:OK, what did?
Speaker 2:you teach? I want to try to correlate Mathematics.
Speaker 1:Totally opposite.
Speaker 2:Well, we love math and real estate, because we love adding up the numbers. Right, that's about it. Yeah, well, it helped me with my exam at least.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course.
Speaker 2:But yeah, mathematics, I taught mathematics for 15 years and some computer science classes, so it just really turned me on. And I just decided at that point, after a few years, that I went to my partner and I said David, I'm going to sell, I'm going to sell you my other part and I'm going to follow, follow this quest of mine and just work in feng shui. And of course everybody thought I was a real nut. But you know, but you know again, you can look at it this way.
Speaker 2:But you know, again, you can look at it this way. I've always been a teacher or trainer.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:I'd been in real estate for 18, 19 years, so I loved houses, and then I fell in love with this art or science called feng shui. So it all came together and that's my story.
Speaker 1:So you said something just now. Is it an art or is it a science?
Speaker 2:Well, that's a good question, because not everybody looks at it the same way. I actually always present it to my students in my school as an environmental science, an old environmental science, and I think a lot more people find that more. And I think a lot more people find that more intriguing, I guess, or understandable. You know to me in a lot of cases what feng shui is?
Speaker 2:It developed because a lot of people thousands of years ago were worried about other people and wanted to make sure that they were as safe as they possibly could be. So the security part of it was extremely important, extremely important that they could feel secure. So they started putting their houses with protection behind them, a mountain primarily, so they were looking for places where they could move their house a third or halfway up a mountain, protecting their backs, and at the same time, on the sides they were looking for protection too, maybe smaller hills, some trees, a forest or whatever. But the last thing is they would be able to see for miles, so they could see what was coming their way. They were feeling protected that way so they can react, whether they had to run, hide or get their weapons out, you might say. So that's the way, feng shui sort of started to create security, which created comfort, which created then productivity and success for those people.
Speaker 2:And you and I do the same thing when we go to a restaurant. I'm sure, if you had your choice, where are you going to pick? You're not going to pick the center of the restaurant, you're probably going to pick the sides in a booth and hopefully be able to see the door.
Speaker 1:Right, I was just talking about that just last night, about how my husband always faces the door to protect me, right In case somebody comes through. You just never know, right the way life is and it's important, so we don't even realize that we're doing something that's related to feng shui, correct?
Speaker 2:That's. That's correct, I mean it feels right, it's it's. It's in our DNA and that flight or our fight situation is always with us. Even though we're we're not running away from a saber-toothed tiger any longer, we still, when we enter a new environment, we're still a little concerned. We're not sure what we got, and I'm sure you've had listings yourself where people maybe left a little early because it didn't feel as good as they wanted it to feel.
Speaker 1:I've had a lot of that in my career, to be honest with you and you know I've been doing this, like you, 20 years.
Speaker 1:It's been for me and my 20th year and so you owned a brokerage, like I do, and it's interesting because you actually found a passion outside of the brokerage and you followed it. And when you said that people would think you're crazy, they really do. Like, people will think what are you doing? Like why would you give that up to to do feng shui, and so how did you, how did you overcome that?
Speaker 2:How did I overcome it?
Speaker 1:How did you overcome that? People think you know what people were thinking about you, because I'm at that point in my life where I don't care as much what people think. So I get to that point, because I'm at that point in my life where I don't care as much what people think.
Speaker 2:So I get to that point. Yeah, I probably felt the same way at this point. Again, this was something that turned me on. While I was still in the company the real estate company I was already going all over the Carolinas teaching, so it didn't really matter who asked me. I was doing a lot of freebies at that point because I really wanted to get the word out, and the Carolinas are a different place than from where you are or other places. So, you know, I had to learn basically how to present it in a way that was non-threatening and and came off as common sense, which it really is. There's an awful lot of common sense to this whole thing, so I really didn't worry too much about that. I guess I've always been sort of a free spirit somewhere I'm the same way.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about the fact. You've authored several influential books on feng shui for homeowners and real estate agents. Can you share with me how these books address the practical needs of your readers and any success stories that have emerged from you applying the techniques, so you could share that with me? I think that would be very interesting for listeners.
Speaker 2:You know the books are based on, of course, my experiences and what works and what doesn't work, and over the years I've had to put together a basic floor plan or guidance for folks. So you know a lot of it is actually around what I call the eight most depressional moments for selling a home with Feng Shui, most impressionable moments for selling a home with Feng Shui. That's how I got first started my first book, and those eight things, if they're taken care of correctly, really really sort of put you way ahead of the game. And I like to tell my students that. You know I give them lists, so that's the teacher part of me. So I tell them that if you make sure that they take care of what I call the four big D's and the eight impressionable moments, you're 95% ahead of the game of anybody else on the street. And so you set your priorities.
Speaker 2:You know there are times that we just sort of spin our wheels with things that are really not as important. So you know, certainly I want to make sure that the whole place is really clean. So deep cleaning is one of the big D's and then detailing is making sure everything works. You know, I'm sure you've had somebody walk in and try to turn on a switch and nothing works. You know right away what's going on here. So you try to take care of those four things. And the way I did my business before I got out of real estate is that if you're not going to take care of the four big D's for me, then I'm not going to waste my time, you might say, because you know you and I would put a lot of money into this advertising and marketing somebody and spending time. So the four big D's were non-negotiable. They had to take care of them, and so after that one of them's decluttering which of course you'd expect with each one- that's that one big D.
Speaker 1:It has to happen.
Speaker 2:Oh, it had to be, and I had to make up words to make sure they were all Ds.
Speaker 2:I like that, the eight, most impressionable moments are things that are the primary things that have to be handled really really well, and I'll quickly give them to you if you'd like me to Sure. The first one is curb appeal, which is not a shocker for you. The curb appeal is pivotal, pivotal. And again, even in that case, right there, if they're not going to follow information, to make it more colorful outside, to draw attention not only to somebody pulling up but also somebody on the photos online, which is really a lot of our business happens, then again it's a waste of time. So that was the first one.
Speaker 2:The second one might surprise you. It's the walk from the car up to the front door. To me, that's. A lot of people don't even worry about that, but I want to keep their enthusiasm up. The next one's at the door, and if you've read any books about feng shui, you know the main door, the front door, is pivotal. It's got its own little name, called that mouth of qi. That's the primary place where qi, nourishing qi comes into the house, and if we don't have it set up correctly, it's going to not get the feeling we want. And secondly, if that front door does not really blow their socks off, we're not going to look good online either. Okay.
Speaker 2:Next one's just your first view. You cross the threshold and you took your first look around. Next one's the room of first impression, which often is to the right or to the left, and if it's straight ahead, then we've got a major feng shui problem. Straight ahead, then we've got a major feng shui problem. But then after that, the flow through the house, it has to be a situation where it moves in a particular way and nobody's going to stumble or fall or anything like that. And then the last two I'm going to group together because those are the two most important rooms in feng shui it's the kitchen and the master bedroom.
Speaker 2:They have to be given special, special attention.
Speaker 1:So when you met with a client to talk to them about it, how long does the process take, from you going in, talking to them, looking through the property and then do you do the work or do they do the work?
Speaker 2:Well, they do the work, or do they do the work? Well, they do the work really. And again, it's really saves them quite a bit of money that way. And you know, I can come up with some supplies and stuff like that, which I did at one time. I mean, I used to have paintings and pillows and all those kind of things, because that's really basically what I needed to create the different elements. But what I do is I come in and I, of course, sit down with them for a few minutes and tell them basically what's about to happen, and then I start off outside, I walk outside and I take my notes and have my little trusty camera and start taking pictures of things that need to be corrected, and that's part of the report that I would draw up Then.
Speaker 2:I come back inside and do my first walkthrough with, hopefully, them leading me and I use I don't know if you've heard of electrical magnetic fields or not, but that's a new part of feng shui. So I have a meter. My first time through is basically to get myself familiar with the thing, but also find out if there are any hot walls or stuff that would be a problem with their bed up next to it. You know, a good night's sleep is so, so important in feng shui. If that doesn't come across, then all of a sudden everything else sort of just stumbles and falls apart. So you make sure that their beds are in a very secure, safe environment.
Speaker 2:So that's my first visit through and I'm taking several visits through. And so to tell you how long it would take, it depends on the square footage, how big it is. If it's a, let's say, a 2000 square foot ranch, it would probably take me a couple of hours and then I would give them a quick summary because I know they want to have some information. At this point what I prefer to do is to go home and really do a little bit more thinking about it, put the report together in a nice manner and send it to them and then answer their questions.
Speaker 2:But of course, most people want to have something to work on right away, but that's the way I've always done my business. Now, if it's a bigger home, it could take three or three and a half four hours, it just depends.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So let's talk about the success stories. Tell me one or two examples of when you went in and the results.
Speaker 2:Okay, I remember one time I was speaking for free at this, this particular church believe it or not and to a couple came up and hired me right away Cause they really were intrigued by it. So I went out to their house. They were having difficulties getting it, getting it sold. I go out there and I meet the husband and I moved some things around. I told them about this and that, about paying, also even aroma and those kind of things, and also gave them some tips on the outside, and they had been on the market for a long time and, yes, they sold within the next four or five days and they were really, really pleased. Of course, too, they had then referred a lot of people to me.
Speaker 2:And so that's one story, but you know there's a lot like that. I remember doing a couple in Charlotte who were also having problems and I had actually sold their first home. This was their second home. I had helped them buy it and they were having difficulty with it and she got really into this with me because I was giving them I should say renting them a little water fountain in the front so you had the particular sound when you came in, and so when I do open houses which was a big thing for me that was one of the things that I loaned out was a water fountain, and so ever since we put that in, she got so intrigued and again the house sold fast. They moved to Cincinnati and she still still using the same techniques now.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:And enjoying it. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So that leads me to another question. So I had a question specific for you, but I keep coming up with other ones. So can can you do it virtually, or is it just you have to be in person?
Speaker 2:you do it virtually, or is it just you have to be in person? You know, the virtual part of it, dion, has become sort of the way a lot of folks do it, especially since COVID, and so, yeah, I can definitely do it online and, and you know it's, it's fine. I mean, I'd always prefer to, of course, do it live, if I can. The same with I love, I love, I love training live. But even that has become somewhat in the past, you know.
Speaker 1:So I'm on, I'm on Zoom, probably as much as you are, but I'm on Zoom a lot and I do, and going to an event live this weekend, it just makes you realize how, how great it is to be in front of people and that relationship building. You know, we see each other online all the time, but we get to hug and talk and look at each other's eyes and it's just, it's really amazing. So I'm glad to know that you'd like. You know you, you do it, but you still like to teach. And that leads me to the next thing. So you developed the intrinsic school of feng shui and created the certified courses. So what can someone expect from taking these courses and how does their education enhance their professional life?
Speaker 2:Okay, the Intrinsic School of Feng Shui was created with myself and my partner, lisa Alban, and she was a veteran of 20 years with the Home Shopping Network and we ran into each other, you might say eight years ago, where she was having trouble selling a house in the St Petersburg area. So I go out there and again she had had some difficulties with her realtor and stuff like that. So I spent several hours with her. She took it very seriously, spent the whole weekend doing what I asked her to do and got an offer two or three days later. And the cool thing about that whole story is she then actually, after they sold it for cash, sent me a picture of a parakeet that had landed on her shoulder outside. Yeah, a parakeet, yeah. And so they decided to adopt the parakeet and they gave the parakeet the name Cash, and so I thought that was fun.
Speaker 2:But anyway, and then all of a sudden, five years ago, she got in touch with me. She was getting out of corporate and wanted to talk about a career in feng shui. So we sat down at a McDonald's she had just delivered a little boy he was with her too and we talked about forming a school and that started, like I said, five years ago, a school, and that started, like I said five years ago, and I had gone to I used to go to Asheville all the time to try to cool off a little bit from Florida, and so I'd go to Asheville and I'm working and working and working on my laptop at that point putting together this, and she's doing the same thing in St Petersburg. So that's how it got started and we actually created a school that actually certifies brand new professional consultants. It is now considered a gold standard school with our governing board, the International Feng Shui Guild, and so anyway, yeah, that's how we got started and there's a correlation here.
Speaker 1:So our company is Realty One Group Gold Standard. Yeah, so we've been. You know, we picked that name and it's just. It's fit so perfectly for what we're doing. Being in Pittsburgh, we're black and gold right, but being the gold standard is, it's definitely set us apart. So that's really cool in how we came together. Right, there's all these people in the world, but you and I came together and I think that there may be agents even in our own company that could have interest in this. I think this would be great to share with them. How long is the course?
Speaker 2:Wow, well, I have three courses.
Speaker 1:Three Teacher-teachers, yeah.
Speaker 2:One of them is a certification called Feng Shui Staging Professional. It's self-paced, it's 30 videos, you know, very colorful, all that kind of stuff with some materials that you get. And then I have another one that I actually coach and train people for 45 days in the same kind of material, but this time, you know, I'm sort of behind their shoulder. And then the intrinsic school is 42 hours of training. So it's very extensive and it goes deeply into feng shui, into some cases that you know you don't go into it in real estate, and real estate is more Practical use for for a home at this point, how to get it sold, how to help your buyers and how to help somebody build a house, and so that's what the first two classes are about.
Speaker 1:Okay, that makes sense. So the focus of Shine on Success is to talk about going through adversity and getting on the other side. So let's just share a moment in your life, whether personal or professional, that you had an adversity that you pushed through. I know starting a new business like this could be it, but it could be something else. Is there something you could share with our audience?
Speaker 2:a new business like this could be it, but it could be something else.
Speaker 1:Is there something you could share with our audience?
Speaker 2:Well, let me see. I'm not sure how difficult these are going to be for your audience, but when I was coaching basketball, I had had a lot of success at the freshman level. Okay and I really, really wanted to be a head coach.
Speaker 2:And the head coaching job was offered to me, but they really, really wanted me to move from the middle school up to the high school and I did not want to do that. So I would not give in to them for several months, even though I was their candidate. But I ended up giving in, went up to the high school and taught for three years, had success with the team, but I really did not enjoy it. Okay, so I left and went into the corporate world at AT&T for five years. I then went back into teaching, just because I missed it. But you know, that's one example I would give you.
Speaker 1:So you know, a lot of people, I think, have that kind of adversity in their life where they're not happy with what they're doing Right and it's OK to try something else and it's OK to go back to the other one that you had, because you get to have one chance at this whole life. If you're not happy, you're not successful. You have to be both.
Speaker 2:Right, you're right.
Speaker 1:So and just spending that weekend, it just gave me so much perspective on. You know I, you know I've been in real estate for 20 years. I had a graphic design business before that and you know, for the next phase of my life I want to be happy and successful, not just successful.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:You continue to teach and speak across various platforms. How do you see the role of Feng Shui evolving in real estate and is there something you're excited about in the future of your your business?
Speaker 2:Well, right now, my partner and I are talking about a new aspect to really bring attention to what a feng shui professional does. So we're right now talking about the possibility of getting a house that's probably listed by somebody close to the water, to the ocean, and then actually inviting 20 or 30 folks to come basically to see what we call a day in the life of a feng shui master, and so we're going to be doing different little things.
Speaker 2:We're going to show them how to do an evaluation. We're going to show them how to actually use the energy template called the Bagua, which maybe you've heard of. So that's a physical, hands-on kind of thing. We're also going to show them how to do a space clearing. You know things like that. Space clearings I don't I'm probably they're not terribly prevalent in your area, but they basically think of it this way and I know you think this way. You want to make sure that the predecessor energy is not overriding the house. So we want to try to get rid of the predecessor energy as much as possible. So we want to try to get rid of the predecessor energy as much as possible. It's so personal with all their pictures and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So we get rid of predecessor energy as much as we can. Therefore, they can see themselves as living in that house, and that predecessor energy can be really, really deep. Sometimes, Dion, it can be there could have been a death in the house. Okay, there could have been a divorce. A lot of bad feelings, stuff like that. So the space clearing is not always for everybody.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you so now that you have this. You brought this up for my own self, so we bought this house. It was definitely one of my favorite houses I've ever shown, and it was for sell by owner. I'd had it listed and then I sold it and then the seller decided they didn't want to sell, so we took it off the market and his mom was living here and then a few years later she passed away and he decided to put it back in the market for sell by owner. So we bought it.
Speaker 1:I love this house. It's just, it's one of my favorite houses ever since I've been in the business. So don't you know? You know, we find a letter one day from husband and wife in the in the mall. It was not very nice, it was a very. It wasn't a very nice letter, it was sad, and I read through it and I thought, oh, that's not very positive, right.
Speaker 1:And then the last year and a half I have a dog, a little wiener dog named Hulk, and Hulk will not walk through one of the rooms in the house. He literally backs up, which dogs don't normally do this kind of backing up. He will back up before he walks through it and one of us has to go with him through the rooms. So I do back up before he walks through it and one of us has to go with him through the rooms. Wow, so I do feel there's some energy in this, in this house. I don't feel there's a ghost or anything like that, but I do feel that that the dog is is picking up on it and you know so that clearing I might have to do that for my own place, so we might have to talk again about that. But I think that idea if you had so.
Speaker 1:Years ago I took a staging class. It was actually in Ohio. We went out and we actually staged the house and actually doing it made the world of difference. I understood it a lot more Now. It was something that I wasn't as passionate about in real estate. I was more of the marketing girl. I love doing marketing, so the idea of the hands-on made so much sense. So I'm 100% voting for you to both to do this, because I think it'll be great for people to come into it. They'll get to see all the intricate parts of it and they'll understand it way better than they would just learning in a classroom. So is there anything else you would like to tell our audience? Because as much as I don't want to go, I know that I have to, but is there anything else that you want to share with us and especially, can you share how we can? You know the listeners can connect or learn more. How can they reach out to you?
Speaker 2:Sure, if I'm talking to real estate agents or home stagers, my website is wwwthefengshuicurecom. If you're interested in possibly going the full route and becoming a professional consultant, that website that I share with Lisa is wwwintrinsicschooloffengshuicom. So those are the best ways for you to start. Take a look at that, and we'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 1:So if they're a client that actually wants you to do a virtual with them, how do they get ahold of you?
Speaker 2:Well, in both excuse me, in both cases, there is a you know a way on there to get it. Yeah, so, and of course my email is all over the place.
Speaker 1:So that's good, Then we can. They can definitely reach out with you and reach out to you. So thank you for doing this. Thanks for being on here with me today. So let's wrap up today's episode of Shine On Success. Don't forget to connect with us on social media to continue the conversation and share your stories of transformation. Like, subscribe and share this episode with anyone you know facing adversity, and remember if we can help just one person, this podcast is a success. Thanks for tuning in and keep shining, Thank you.