June 26, 2025 • 28 mins
We explore the concept of trusting God for big dreams and how embracing our God-given desires can lead to fulfillment and purpose. Carol Van Ward shares her journey into real estate after delaying her dream for years, offering wisdom on overcoming self-doubt and taking practical steps toward your goals.
• God places dreams and visions in our hearts for a purpose
• Without a vision, people "cast off restraint" or wander aimlessly
• Carol's lifelong interest in real estate began in childhood
• Her hesitation to become a realtor stemmed from not wanting to be "pushy"
• The mindset shift from "selling" to "helping" opened the door to her career
• Taking practical steps and seeing small victories builds confidence
• Overcoming self-doubt requires "taking every thought captive"
• Recognizing negative thought patterns becomes easier with practice
• Starting a dream later in life still offers fulfillment and purpose
• Living without regrets means pursuing the desires God has placed in us
• Current real estate market presents buying opportunities despite higher interest rates
• Special programs and creative financing options are available for homebuyers
Connect with Carol for real estate questions or to learn more about Austin's housing market. Watch for our studio redesign and special content coming in July!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to another Sidewalk Conversation.
I'm so glad that you are heretoday.
I'm super excited about ourguest.
I know you will enjoy herthoroughly.
But before I introduce her toyou, I want to talk a little bit
about our theme for today.
We're going to be talking abouttrusting God for big dreams.
(00:21):
I think one of the things that Ilearned early on in my
Christian journey was that Godhas a quote-unquote plan for
your life, and it's better thanany plan you might have for
yourself.
And so I remember some of mymentors and people who discipled
me early in the journey.
They kept encouraging me todream big dreams for God.
In fact, I had the good fortuneto go to a Christian university
(00:44):
that kind of reinforced thatidea, and one of the things I
learned early on was that it'snot just about saying, hey, what
would I like to do.
It's like, lord, what would youhave me do?
So to dream big dreams forGod's purposes, not for my own
self-aggrandizement.
And so one of the things Ilearned early on was that the
(01:08):
book of Proverbs talks aboutthis that without a vision,
people perish or, in sometranslations, cast off or
straight.
So when we don't have a visionfor our life, we don't have a
sense of our purpose, we tend towander away, we tend to
squander the things that aregiven to us, and so one of the
beautiful things about life,when we connect it to God, is
that he does give us a purpose.
(01:29):
He does put in our heart dreamsthat we need to dream, and then
the second part, of course, isto fulfill them.
Now, it's not axiomatic thatonce you have a dream, you'll
automatically fulfill it.
In fact, there's a whole lotthat has to go into our
cooperating with God to see thefulfillment of a dream.
In fact, thomas Edison madethis quote very famous a dream
(01:53):
without execution is just ahallucination, and I think
that's so true.
And so what we are going to betalking about today is not only
having a dream for your life andcooperating with God in the
fulfillment of that dream, butsome of the practical steps are
involved with living it out, andit's not always easy.
In fact, god gives us anopportunity to stretch our faith
(02:17):
and our courage and ourstrength, and my guest today has
done just that, and so I'm sureshe will be an encouragement to
you, as maybe you are in thatsame place trying to figure out
Lord, what am I supposed to doand will I have the courage to
do it?
So, without any further ado,let me introduce you to our
guest today, my beloved wife MsCarol Van Ward van ward.
(02:53):
Now, before I get into theconversation with carol, I do
want to say a thank you to oursponsor today, the van ward
foundation.
In other words, there are anumber of people who regularly
and faithfully support thefoundation through the Patreon
page, and I just want to saythank you out loud.
Many of them do so anonymously,but because they believe in the
(03:13):
work that we do, not only withthis podcast, but with the
cancer families and theirpatients.
And then we also do a lot ofthings on video and teaching and
pastoral care, and all of thatis get funded through the
foundation.
I have a great team that helpsme make all this work.
So my good buddy Preston, who'sbehind the camera, then we have
(03:34):
Jen, who's our administrator,and there are others, martin,
who works on many of my videosas well.
So a lot of folks are supportedthrough the work of the
foundation, and I just want tosay a public thank you to all of
those who participate.
All right Now to the guest ofhonor today, ms Carol Van Ward.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Hello, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
I know this is not necessarily your favorite thing
to do, but you always do such agreat job.
Thank you for being here.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
It is easy to talk to my husband so glad to be here.
It is easy to talk to myhusband so glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Now we've talked about a lot of things over the
years.
In fact, we were talking aboutthis before we went on the air
that it's always between you andmy mom, like who are the
favorite podcast guests.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
I don't know if I can win this race.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Well, it's hard to beat a POW story, that's for
sure.
But we've talked about ministry, we've talked about parenting,
but today I want to really kindof do a deep dive on your
professional life, and that'ssomething that you've developed
later in life, although there'sa dream that kind of has been
(04:41):
percolating for many years inyour heart.
And in fact, that's probablywhere I want to start.
So you are now a realtor andyou've been doing this how many
years now?
Five and a half, five and ahalf years and so since we've
been in Austin, but you've had apassion for real estate, like
from very early on in life, yep.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So talk about that.
Yes, so we moved a couple oftimes.
When I was young and drivingaround in the car and looking at
houses with my family threekids and two parents in the car,
I have this distinct memory ofmy dad, who was all into this,
saying the phrase location,location, location.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Which, of course, are the three keys to great real
estate right.
Yes, exactly so.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I learned that phrase when I was maybe seven years
old and it's just been part ofmy vocabulary when it comes to
assessing a property location,location, location and so I just
learned early to appreciatereal estate from my parents, and
the houses that we had werealways so interesting to me.
(05:51):
We moved at a key point in mylife when I was just entering
sixth grade, where I got to livein a beautiful community, with
the builder provided interiordecorators for everybody
building a house in thatcommunity, and so I got to
select my room, so I selectedneon, green walls and blue
(06:13):
carpet.
That was my bedroom.
It was a really good one.
All of us kids had our ownbedroom and so, yeah, I had a
lot of creative opportunity.
When I was young, I even builttree forts, not in the trees,
but like on the ground and gotto.
I built furniture for my treeforts, and so I love, isn't?
Speaker 1 (06:38):
that a really cool part of how God works, like he
begins to give us hints andlittle signs and signals along
the way that there's somethingin us that needs to find
expression.
In fact, I also remember youtelling me a story about this
book that you had.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Yes, tell us about that Somehow my mom had a book
published in 1850 or so.
It was very old, very big.
It had everything in this book,from dress designs to manners
what kind of manners you shouldhave and house plans.
And of course these house plansfrom the 1850s were of various
(07:14):
styles, but they didn't includemuch of a kitchen or closets or
bathrooms.
So I would take these designsand reconfigure the interior of
it to include those things.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Wow, how fun.
Now, even though you've had aninterest in real estate for so
long, you did kind of put thatoff.
Now, obviously some of it wasbecause you made the decision
early on in life.
Hey, I want to give full-timeattention to the kids and you
also were a very busy pastor'swife.
But there was also kind of ahesitation you had about jumping
(07:53):
into real estate.
What was that about?
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Yeah.
So I always had an interest.
When our youngest went off tokindergarten I thought, okay,
well, now's the time to get acareer and, you know, do
something more full-time orpart-time to contribute to the
family income.
And I thought immediately ofbecoming a realtor.
But my hangup was you have tosell houses.
(08:18):
And I didn't like salespeoplereally.
I felt like they were pushy.
I didn't want to be pushy, Ididn't want to be that to
somebody else.
So I just shoved it to thebackground and I thought you
know I have this interest butI'm pretty busy anyway, so I
didn't follow through on that.
(08:38):
And then, once we moved toAustin, somebody was wanting me
to come work with him to assisthim in his real estate business.
He wasn't quite ready for meand I thought, yeah, that would
be fun to dabble in real estate,just as an assistant.
Yeah, and learn about it.
Eventually, he said you reallyshould be a realtor.
(09:01):
And I thought no way.
And I explained my hurdle, thatI didn't want to sell people,
and he said he doesn't find thatit's selling, it's just helping
.
And it was a complete mindshifter for me.
I decided yes, this is aprofession where you're actually
helping people at a criticaltime in their lives when they're
(09:23):
making a huge financialdecision and and it's it's kind
of an emotional decision toinvest your the future into a
neighborhood or a house or youknow your financial position.
And so I was.
I felt like, hey, I can do this.
This is really something I cando and I'm going to love it.
(09:43):
And so I've been doing it and Ihaven't been regretful in any
way at all.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Yeah, I loved too.
I thought, when you shared thiswith me, you said I've had this
paradigm shift where I'm notabout selling, I'm about helping
, and I thought that is so alsocore to who you are.
That's kind of as a personalitytrait.
That's one of your strongesttraits is that you just love
helping, you love comingalongside people, and so the
(10:10):
fact that you had this interestin design and creative
expression through architectureand now you put this with the
helping gift and it's like ofcourse, yes, of course I love it
, and I'm just so grateful thatI get to do this with people.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
As soon as we're done here, I'm going to go show a
house, so that'll be fun.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Yeah, so even when people have a sense about what
they're supposed to do and theyhave confirmation that this is
the right thing to do, there'sstill like some hurdles about
getting over either internally,like emotional hurdles or
practical hurdles to get toactualizing the vision that they
(10:53):
have in their hearts.
And I'm just curious what washelpful to you in kind of moving
past some of those challenges?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Yeah, I think just the idea of taking one step at a
time and making a checklist andchecking off all the boxes and
being clear about what do youneed to do to what do I need to
do to move past the classes Ineed to take and so, or to learn
(11:24):
social media, how to do socialmedia well, so it's just really
a matter of creating a list ofthings that you want for me,
that I wanted to do, and beingvery specific about the steps to
get there and making sure thathappens.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Yeah, One of the things I noticed that you did
that I thought was oh, I don'tremember that.
Yeah, one of the things Inoticed that you did that I
thought was oh, I don't rememberthat is that every single
little step you took also becamea confirmation that this was
the right thing.
So when you took the classes,for example, and you did so well
on some of the testing and allthat, it was like I think I can
do this, I think I can get there, and then you take the test and
(12:02):
you did really well on the test, and then you partnered up with
somebody who was experienced inthe field and it just you made
a lot of strategic step-by-stepdecisions um practices and and
events and activities that Ithink helped confirm for you
that this was the right thing.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Right, yeah, um, just taking the classes, I knew that
I needed to, uh, sit in aclassroom rather than do classes
online, and that really helped.
I got to know some people.
We talked about real estate, wewould have lunch together and
then I would come home and studyand be ready for the tests.
All the tests.
(12:41):
There were lots of tests and,yeah, I was surprised when I did
take the final exam that I waswarned that people take these
tests two and three times.
I did not want to do that, so Istudied and I got it done the
first time.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Good for you, yeah, all right Now, along the way,
especially and I think this iscommon for many people, but
you've been pretty open aboutthis for yourself that even when
you start having some victories, you have some good things that
happen you also deal with acertain amount of self-doubt,
like the imposter syndrome Am Ireally good at this?
(13:19):
Do people really want to workwith me?
And so you have these internalvoices that create a lot of that
noise and I'm just curious whathave you found helpful to deal
with some of that pushbackinternally that many of us deal
with when it comes to things wedo.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yeah, well, I seem to have a high dose of self-doubt.
So you know, thankfully, I havelived some life and have had
self-doubt in all facets of life, honestly, all facets of life,
(14:01):
honestly.
I think I just grew up doubtingmyself, and I don't know what
that is, if it's nature ornurture.
Was I lacking something as akid?
Is it just part of my DNA?
I don't know.
But I've had that and I've hadto deal with it over the years.
So I have, yeah, a few tools inmy toolbox, and I would say
(14:24):
that the greatest hammer in mytoolbox to deal with self-doubt
is this idea out of I believeit's 1 Corinthians taking every
thought captive to the obedienceof Christ.
So it takes some practice tounderstand that this thought
(14:49):
that I just had is not a goodone.
It's an unhealthy, negativethought because you're so used
to how you think.
So, the first step is torecognize when I have a negative
thought, and sometimes itsurprises me that I can go for
quite a while and not evenrecognize that I'm having
(15:10):
negative thoughts that need tobe dealt with.
And so I am 64 years old now bythe way, happy birthday.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
just last week I had a birthday.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
And I still deal with it.
So I have a great deal ofcompassion for people who have
the same struggle as I do,because it can be besetting.
But yet when I take a thoughtcaptive that it is negative or
not true and I find the truthand I latch onto that, that just
(15:47):
changes my perspective and mymood and my productivity and I
can move past it a lot moreeasily.
I can move past it a lot moreeasily, but it's not like, at
least for me.
It's not something that I haveworked on in the past and it's
fixed now.
It just keeps cropping back upin various ways and I have to
(16:08):
learn again to take that thoughtcaptive and to speak the truth
to myself about what is actuallytrue.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Yeah, and one of the things I've noticed about how
you've processed that is that itused to be that you would have
kind of a cycle of things thatyou were thinking about that
weren't true or that were kindof negative or self-defeating,
and you would kind of sit inthat space for a while.
(16:38):
But now what I've noticed overthe years is that you've
shortened that timeframe, likeyou're much quicker about saying
wait, wait, wait, wait.
That's not true, that's not me.
God has something different tosay about me, and I think that
that's just like so helpful forother people to know that when,
whatever it is, whether it's acareer move you're making or
(17:00):
family, or even spiritually, youhave to just keep those
thoughts captive and say wait aminute, what's the truth?
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah, the truth is God.
In addition to that, god loveseach person deeply.
He loves me so deeply.
He sees me as his daughter.
He sees me as somebody with ahigh capacity to be able to
accomplish the things that I setmy heart and mind to.
Of course, I'm seeking his willin the middle of that, and he
(17:30):
provided a really great husbandfor me to also speak the truth
to me when I can't quite see itfor myself.
So it's been a blessing to bemarried to you.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Oh, I'm glad you see it that way I feel it very much
so to be married to you.
That is so okay.
Now I would like to kind of askyou to give advice to people
who may be where you have been.
So let's say somebody likelater in life is thinking about
(18:02):
a dream whether it's real estateor some other thing that maybe
they've been contemplating foryears but they just haven't
gotten a chance to get started,or have had self doubt.
What would be some of thethings you would say to your
former self or to that personwho's now where you were five,
six years ago?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah, I would say, man, there's a lot of life to
live.
You know, I feel young and myage doesn't say that, but I feel
young.
I have always wanted to do, andso should you.
Whoever is thinking aboutstarting something late in life.
(18:45):
I think that it will enrichyour life and it would challenge
you and create a new facet foryou to shine and for you to be
God's instrument in the world,in whatever way.
And so I think that God directsus with all kinds of little
(19:08):
opportunities, and when we takeadvantage of one of those
opportunities, it leads to thenext thing, and it's not that
you're not hitting barriersalong the way.
There's always barriers toovercome, but if you are walking
forward in the thing that youwant to do, then you're going to
(19:28):
land in a new place, and reallyenjoy it.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Yeah, as you're talking, it reminds me of
something my dad said to me thathas kind of stuck with me.
We were sitting on the porch athis new home when they moved to
Florida, when my mom and dadmoved to Florida, and they were
reflecting on their life and wewere in an especially kind of
(19:53):
one of those deep father-sontype talks and I just asked him
Dad, what's the best thing aboutyour life?
And one of the things he saidto me was I don't have any
regrets.
Which really took me aback,because who doesn't have regrets
?
But he clarified and said it'snot that I didn't make mistakes,
it's not that I didn't dothings wrong or wish I'd done
some things differently, but onthe big things I don't regret.
(20:14):
He went on to say that so manyolder people end up having so
many regrets that they didn't dothe thing that was on their
heart or they didn't spend thetime they wish they could have
with their kids, and he's likeit's a regret, regret, regret,
regret.
And he kind of looked at me andhe said that that would be a
(20:36):
noble vision for your own life.
Like try to live a life withoutregrets, and I think that's kind
of what you're pointing to too.
You know you could have, youknow, maybe self-doubt, or you
maybe wonder well, could I?
But to not try would be maybeone of the biggest regrets of
your life.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Yeah, I know that if I had not done taken this career
path, I would be even nowsitting here with regret.
One of the things that I'vewanted to do is flip a house,
and we've talked about it somany times, and right now I am
hoping to get this house.
We should close on the 30th,but a lot of things still have
(21:18):
to happen between now and then,which is like five days, six
days, and it might not work, butif it does, I will get to say I
did that and I made this littlepatch of earth a little bit
better, and so I don't want tohave regrets.
I don't want to have thoselongings.
(21:39):
I want those longings to befulfilled.
And what is that scripture?
A longing fulfilled is a treeof life, but unmet longings are
like death.
You know, I don't rememberexactly the scripture, but yeah,
it is like a tree of life,providing beauty and shade.
(22:01):
And you know, a tree of life isa wonderful thing and I want to
do the things that God lays onmy heart.
He created me to have thesedesires, so I'm going to follow
through with it.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And I think that's just such a great principle for
people to have.
It's just like these desiresthat you have are not from
nowhere.
You have giftings, you haveinterests, you have passions and
all of that.
Some of it, you might say, well, that just comes from me,
that's what I'm interested in.
But even that interest isplaced there by God.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yes, yes, 100%.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
All right, I want to now actually talk a little bit
about real estate, because it'skind of an interesting market
right now.
Now actually talk a little bitabout real estate because it's
kind of an interesting marketright now and you know some
people are a little skittish,particularly as it relates to
things like interest rates andyou know house prices and so on.
And so you know, when you'retalking to somebody who is like
interested in saying, hey, we'reat a stage in life where we're
(22:58):
either wanting to move fromrenting to buying, or our family
is growing, we need a biggerplace, or somebody wants to sell
a house and they'd like movingthe job, what are some of the
things you're telling peopleabout real estate when they have
hesitation.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
A lot of people are hung up on the interest rates
right now, which are hoveringaround 7, 7.125 or so, and they
are remembering, you know, threeand four years ago, when the
interest rates were incrediblyamazing 3% and you know that was
(23:33):
just a very rare time.
I don't know if we'll ever seethat again in our lifetime.
I hope we do, because it'sreally great for realtors lots
of business, but as it is, weare under the 50-year average
right now.
So the 50-year average rate isabout 8% and we're under that.
There are also special programs.
(23:56):
You can find banks that will dolending under the market rate.
So I have a bank I'm workingwith right now that offers 1%
less than the market rate, sothat's exciting.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And they also have options like lower down payments
and yeah, things like that.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
Yeah like 100% financing.
You can find those out there.
Not that that's always thewisest choice, but it's an
option to get a person into ahouse.
The other thing about themarket right now is that it's a
buyer's market.
Sellers are having a littletrouble selling their house at
(24:38):
the value that they might findthrough comps, so buyers are
getting deals right now.
If buyers wait until rates godown, then it could flip and
become a seller's market wheresellers are asking for more
money and the house becomes moreexpensive.
(24:59):
So it's generally advised thatbuyers buy in a buyer's market.
With the rates like they areright now, it's just a good time
to buy.
And for sellers that are outthere that are skittish, we just
fight until we make it work,and so I have some sellers right
(25:20):
now and we're just doing thatand trying to work with creative
financing.
There's other creativefinancing options that benefit
sellers, and so we try to makeit all work together.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Well, we will put your information in the notes.
So if people are looking for arealtor that they can trust and
somebody who has a passion toserve, they'll have that
information.
Is there anything else thatthey should know about the
market or about real estate inthis time?
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Oh boy.
Well, I mean, there's so muchto learn and know and they can
just call me with theirquestions.
How about that?
Yeah, let's do that.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
All right, I always like to end the interview with
kind of a more generalizedquestion, which is like do you
have a particular philosophy oflife that serves as your true
north and it could be like itdirects everything like your
marriage, your family, yourbusiness, your personal life.
(26:23):
Is there a theme that you havefor your life or a statement
that would capture what it isyou want to be about in your
life?
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Wow.
Well, I would say that thetheme is God is love.
Just a simple theme.
People always talk about it,but it's my theme too, and I
think that knowing that God islove, he embodies love, he is
(26:53):
love, everything that drives himis love, then it should be my
driving force as well.
Then it should be my drivingforce as well.
So in the way that I relate tothe people I serve people I
interact with professionally,the way I relate to my family,
(27:18):
if God is love and he treats usin such a way, then I ought to
treat people and be motivated bylove as well.
So I would say that's mydriving force.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Well, it's interesting you mentioned that,
because we just had yourbirthday and one of the things
that we tend to do in thesecelebrations is we give family
members and friends a chance tokind of have a word for the
birthday honoree.
Kind of have a word for thebirthday honoree.
And if I think about it, mostof the things that were said
(27:47):
about you are one reflection oranother of this dynamic of love.
So I think you're doing well inmimicking the love of God to
the people around you.
Well thanks, yeah, thank you.
Thank you for doing this again.
I'm so grateful and, as always,you did a great job.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
Well, thank you for having me, and Preston, you're
awesome and I just appreciatethe chance to talk and share my
story.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
You're welcome, and I just want to say thank you for
joining us for anotherconversation.
We are actually getting readyto take a break.
I've talked about this a littlebit.
In July we're going to be doinga total studio redo, so we have
a short greeting that we'll bedoing next week for July 4th,
and then we have a specialconversation that we're going to
(28:36):
be having with Shana for themonth of July while we reset the
studio that we've pre-recorded,and so then in the beginning of
August we'll be back again inthe new studio.
Can't wait for you to be a partof that too.
Welcome to another Sidewalk Conversation.
I'm so glad that you are heretoday.
I'm super excited about ourguest.
I know you will enjoy herthoroughly.
But before I introduce her toyou, I want to talk a little bit
about our theme for today.
We're going to be talking abouttrusting God for big dreams.
(00:21):
I think one of the things that Ilearned early on in my
Christian journey was that Godhas a quote-unquote plan for
your life, and it's better thanany plan you might have for
yourself.
And so I remember some of mymentors and people who discipled
me early in the journey.
They kept encouraging me todream big dreams for God.
In fact, I had the good fortuneto go to a Christian university
(00:44):
that kind of reinforced thatidea, and one of the things I
learned early on was that it'snot just about saying, hey, what
would I like to do.
It's like, lord, what would youhave me do?
So to dream big dreams forGod's purposes, not for my own
self-aggrandizement.
And so one of the things Ilearned early on was that the
(01:08):
book of Proverbs talks aboutthis that without a vision,
people perish or, in sometranslations, cast off or
straight.
So when we don't have a visionfor our life, we don't have a
sense of our purpose, we tend towander away, we tend to
squander the things that aregiven to us, and so one of the
beautiful things about life,when we connect it to God, is
that he does give us a purpose.
(01:29):
He does put in our heart dreamsthat we need to dream, and then
the second part, of course, isto fulfill them.
Now, it's not axiomatic thatonce you have a dream, you'll
automatically fulfill it.
In fact, there's a whole lotthat has to go into our
cooperating with God to see thefulfillment of a dream.
In fact, thomas Edison madethis quote very famous a dream
(01:53):
without execution is just ahallucination, and I think
that's so true.
And so what we are going to betalking about today is not only
having a dream for your life andcooperating with God in the
fulfillment of that dream, butsome of the practical steps are
involved with living it out, andit's not always easy.
In fact, god gives us anopportunity to stretch our faith
(02:17):
and our courage and ourstrength, and my guest today has
done just that, and so I'm sureshe will be an encouragement to
you, as maybe you are in thatsame place trying to figure out
Lord, what am I supposed to doand will I have the courage to
do it?
So, without any further ado,let me introduce you to our
guest today, my beloved wife MsCarol Van Ward van ward.
(02:53):
Now, before I get into theconversation with carol, I do
want to say a thank you to oursponsor today, the van ward
foundation.
In other words, there are anumber of people who regularly
and faithfully support thefoundation through the Patreon
page, and I just want to saythank you out loud.
Many of them do so anonymously,but because they believe in the
(03:13):
work that we do, not only withthis podcast, but with the
cancer families and theirpatients.
And then we also do a lot ofthings on video and teaching and
pastoral care, and all of thatis get funded through the
foundation.
I have a great team that helpsme make all this work.
So my good buddy Preston, who'sbehind the camera, then we have
(03:34):
Jen, who's our administrator,and there are others, martin,
who works on many of my videosas well.
So a lot of folks are supportedthrough the work of the
foundation, and I just want tosay a public thank you to all of
those who participate.
All right Now to the guest ofhonor today, ms Carol Van Ward.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Hello, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
I know this is not necessarily your favorite thing
to do, but you always do such agreat job.
Thank you for being here.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
It is easy to talk to my husband so glad to be here.
It is easy to talk to myhusband so glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Now we've talked about a lot of things over the
years.
In fact, we were talking aboutthis before we went on the air
that it's always between you andmy mom, like who are the
favorite podcast guests.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
I don't know if I can win this race.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
Well, it's hard to beat a POW story, that's for
sure.
But we've talked about ministry, we've talked about parenting,
but today I want to really kindof do a deep dive on your
professional life, and that'ssomething that you've developed
later in life, although there'sa dream that kind of has been
(04:41):
percolating for many years inyour heart.
And in fact, that's probablywhere I want to start.
So you are now a realtor andyou've been doing this how many
years now?
Five and a half, five and ahalf years and so since we've
been in Austin, but you've had apassion for real estate, like
from very early on in life, yep.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So talk about that.
Yes, so we moved a couple oftimes.
When I was young and drivingaround in the car and looking at
houses with my family threekids and two parents in the car,
I have this distinct memory ofmy dad, who was all into this,
saying the phrase location,location, location.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Which, of course, are the three keys to great real
estate right.
Yes, exactly so.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I learned that phrase when I was maybe seven years
old and it's just been part ofmy vocabulary when it comes to
assessing a property location,location, location and so I just
learned early to appreciatereal estate from my parents, and
the houses that we had werealways so interesting to me.
(05:51):
We moved at a key point in mylife when I was just entering
sixth grade, where I got to livein a beautiful community, with
the builder provided interiordecorators for everybody
building a house in thatcommunity, and so I got to
select my room, so I selectedneon, green walls and blue
(06:13):
carpet.
That was my bedroom.
It was a really good one.
All of us kids had our ownbedroom and so, yeah, I had a
lot of creative opportunity.
When I was young, I even builttree forts, not in the trees,
but like on the ground and gotto.
I built furniture for my treeforts, and so I love, isn't?
Speaker 1 (06:38):
that a really cool part of how God works, like he
begins to give us hints andlittle signs and signals along
the way that there's somethingin us that needs to find
expression.
In fact, I also remember youtelling me a story about this
book that you had.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
Yes, tell us about that Somehow my mom had a book
published in 1850 or so.
It was very old, very big.
It had everything in this book,from dress designs to manners
what kind of manners you shouldhave and house plans.
And of course these house plansfrom the 1850s were of various
(07:14):
styles, but they didn't includemuch of a kitchen or closets or
bathrooms.
So I would take these designsand reconfigure the interior of
it to include those things.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Wow, how fun.
Now, even though you've had aninterest in real estate for so
long, you did kind of put thatoff.
Now, obviously some of it wasbecause you made the decision
early on in life.
Hey, I want to give full-timeattention to the kids and you
also were a very busy pastor'swife.
But there was also kind of ahesitation you had about jumping
(07:53):
into real estate.
What was that about?
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Yeah.
So I always had an interest.
When our youngest went off tokindergarten I thought, okay,
well, now's the time to get acareer and, you know, do
something more full-time orpart-time to contribute to the
family income.
And I thought immediately ofbecoming a realtor.
But my hangup was you have tosell houses.
(08:18):
And I didn't like salespeoplereally.
I felt like they were pushy.
I didn't want to be pushy, Ididn't want to be that to
somebody else.
So I just shoved it to thebackground and I thought you
know I have this interest butI'm pretty busy anyway, so I
didn't follow through on that.
(08:38):
And then, once we moved toAustin, somebody was wanting me
to come work with him to assisthim in his real estate business.
He wasn't quite ready for meand I thought, yeah, that would
be fun to dabble in real estate,just as an assistant.
Yeah, and learn about it.
Eventually, he said you reallyshould be a realtor.
(09:01):
And I thought no way.
And I explained my hurdle, thatI didn't want to sell people,
and he said he doesn't find thatit's selling, it's just helping
.
And it was a complete mindshifter for me.
I decided yes, this is aprofession where you're actually
helping people at a criticaltime in their lives when they're
(09:23):
making a huge financialdecision and and it's it's kind
of an emotional decision toinvest your the future into a
neighborhood or a house or youknow your financial position.
And so I was.
I felt like, hey, I can do this.
This is really something I cando and I'm going to love it.
(09:43):
And so I've been doing it and Ihaven't been regretful in any
way at all.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Yeah, I loved too.
I thought, when you shared thiswith me, you said I've had this
paradigm shift where I'm notabout selling, I'm about helping
, and I thought that is so alsocore to who you are.
That's kind of as a personalitytrait.
That's one of your strongesttraits is that you just love
helping, you love comingalongside people, and so the
(10:10):
fact that you had this interestin design and creative
expression through architectureand now you put this with the
helping gift and it's like ofcourse, yes, of course I love it
, and I'm just so grateful thatI get to do this with people.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
As soon as we're done here, I'm going to go show a
house, so that'll be fun.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Yeah, so even when people have a sense about what
they're supposed to do and theyhave confirmation that this is
the right thing to do, there'sstill like some hurdles about
getting over either internally,like emotional hurdles or
practical hurdles to get toactualizing the vision that they
(10:53):
have in their hearts.
And I'm just curious what washelpful to you in kind of moving
past some of those challenges?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
Yeah, I think just the idea of taking one step at a
time and making a checklist andchecking off all the boxes and
being clear about what do youneed to do to what do I need to
do to move past the classes Ineed to take and so, or to learn
(11:24):
social media, how to do socialmedia well, so it's just really
a matter of creating a list ofthings that you want for me,
that I wanted to do, and beingvery specific about the steps to
get there and making sure thathappens.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Yeah, One of the things I noticed that you did
that I thought was oh, I don'tremember that.
Yeah, one of the things Inoticed that you did that I
thought was oh, I don't rememberthat is that every single
little step you took also becamea confirmation that this was
the right thing.
So when you took the classes,for example, and you did so well
on some of the testing and allthat, it was like I think I can
do this, I think I can get there, and then you take the test and
(12:02):
you did really well on the test, and then you partnered up with
somebody who was experienced inthe field and it just you made
a lot of strategic step-by-stepdecisions um practices and and
events and activities that Ithink helped confirm for you
that this was the right thing.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Right, yeah, um, just taking the classes, I knew that
I needed to, uh, sit in aclassroom rather than do classes
online, and that really helped.
I got to know some people.
We talked about real estate, wewould have lunch together and
then I would come home and studyand be ready for the tests.
All the tests.
(12:41):
There were lots of tests and,yeah, I was surprised when I did
take the final exam that I waswarned that people take these
tests two and three times.
I did not want to do that, so Istudied and I got it done the
first time.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
Good for you, yeah, all right Now, along the way,
especially and I think this iscommon for many people, but
you've been pretty open aboutthis for yourself that even when
you start having some victories, you have some good things that
happen you also deal with acertain amount of self-doubt,
like the imposter syndrome Am Ireally good at this?
(13:19):
Do people really want to workwith me?
And so you have these internalvoices that create a lot of that
noise and I'm just curious whathave you found helpful to deal
with some of that pushbackinternally that many of us deal
with when it comes to things wedo.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yeah, well, I seem to have a high dose of self-doubt.
So you know, thankfully, I havelived some life and have had
self-doubt in all facets of life, honestly, all facets of life,
(14:01):
honestly.
I think I just grew up doubtingmyself, and I don't know what
that is, if it's nature ornurture.
Was I lacking something as akid?
Is it just part of my DNA?
I don't know.
But I've had that and I've hadto deal with it over the years.
So I have, yeah, a few tools inmy toolbox, and I would say
(14:24):
that the greatest hammer in mytoolbox to deal with self-doubt
is this idea out of I believeit's 1 Corinthians taking every
thought captive to the obedienceof Christ.
So it takes some practice tounderstand that this thought
(14:49):
that I just had is not a goodone.
It's an unhealthy, negativethought because you're so used
to how you think.
So, the first step is torecognize when I have a negative
thought, and sometimes itsurprises me that I can go for
quite a while and not evenrecognize that I'm having
(15:10):
negative thoughts that need tobe dealt with.
And so I am 64 years old now bythe way, happy birthday.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
just last week I had a birthday.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
And I still deal with it.
So I have a great deal ofcompassion for people who have
the same struggle as I do,because it can be besetting.
But yet when I take a thoughtcaptive that it is negative or
not true and I find the truthand I latch onto that, that just
(15:47):
changes my perspective and mymood and my productivity and I
can move past it a lot moreeasily.
I can move past it a lot moreeasily, but it's not like, at
least for me.
It's not something that I haveworked on in the past and it's
fixed now.
It just keeps cropping back upin various ways and I have to
(16:08):
learn again to take that thoughtcaptive and to speak the truth
to myself about what is actuallytrue.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
Yeah, and one of the things I've noticed about how
you've processed that is that itused to be that you would have
kind of a cycle of things thatyou were thinking about that
weren't true or that were kindof negative or self-defeating,
and you would kind of sit inthat space for a while.
(16:38):
But now what I've noticed overthe years is that you've
shortened that timeframe, likeyou're much quicker about saying
wait, wait, wait, wait.
That's not true, that's not me.
God has something different tosay about me, and I think that
that's just like so helpful forother people to know that when,
whatever it is, whether it's acareer move you're making or
(17:00):
family, or even spiritually, youhave to just keep those
thoughts captive and say wait aminute, what's the truth?
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah, the truth is God.
In addition to that, god loveseach person deeply.
He loves me so deeply.
He sees me as his daughter.
He sees me as somebody with ahigh capacity to be able to
accomplish the things that I setmy heart and mind to.
Of course, I'm seeking his willin the middle of that, and he
(17:30):
provided a really great husbandfor me to also speak the truth
to me when I can't quite see itfor myself.
So it's been a blessing to bemarried to you.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Oh, I'm glad you see it that way I feel it very much
so to be married to you.
That is so okay.
Now I would like to kind of askyou to give advice to people
who may be where you have been.
So let's say somebody likelater in life is thinking about
(18:02):
a dream whether it's real estateor some other thing that maybe
they've been contemplating foryears but they just haven't
gotten a chance to get started,or have had self doubt.
What would be some of thethings you would say to your
former self or to that personwho's now where you were five,
six years ago?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah, I would say, man, there's a lot of life to
live.
You know, I feel young and myage doesn't say that, but I feel
young.
I have always wanted to do, andso should you.
Whoever is thinking aboutstarting something late in life.
(18:45):
I think that it will enrichyour life and it would challenge
you and create a new facet foryou to shine and for you to be
God's instrument in the world,in whatever way.
And so I think that God directsus with all kinds of little
(19:08):
opportunities, and when we takeadvantage of one of those
opportunities, it leads to thenext thing, and it's not that
you're not hitting barriersalong the way.
There's always barriers toovercome, but if you are walking
forward in the thing that youwant to do, then you're going to
(19:28):
land in a new place, and reallyenjoy it.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Yeah, as you're talking, it reminds me of
something my dad said to me thathas kind of stuck with me.
We were sitting on the porch athis new home when they moved to
Florida, when my mom and dadmoved to Florida, and they were
reflecting on their life and wewere in an especially kind of
(19:53):
one of those deep father-sontype talks and I just asked him
Dad, what's the best thing aboutyour life?
And one of the things he saidto me was I don't have any
regrets.
Which really took me aback,because who doesn't have regrets
?
But he clarified and said it'snot that I didn't make mistakes,
it's not that I didn't dothings wrong or wish I'd done
some things differently, but onthe big things I don't regret.
(20:14):
He went on to say that so manyolder people end up having so
many regrets that they didn't dothe thing that was on their
heart or they didn't spend thetime they wish they could have
with their kids, and he's likeit's a regret, regret, regret,
regret.
And he kind of looked at me andhe said that that would be a
(20:36):
noble vision for your own life.
Like try to live a life withoutregrets, and I think that's kind
of what you're pointing to too.
You know you could have, youknow, maybe self-doubt, or you
maybe wonder well, could I?
But to not try would be maybeone of the biggest regrets of
your life.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Yeah, I know that if I had not done taken this career
path, I would be even nowsitting here with regret.
One of the things that I'vewanted to do is flip a house,
and we've talked about it somany times, and right now I am
hoping to get this house.
We should close on the 30th,but a lot of things still have
(21:18):
to happen between now and then,which is like five days, six
days, and it might not work, butif it does, I will get to say I
did that and I made this littlepatch of earth a little bit
better, and so I don't want tohave regrets.
I don't want to have thoselongings.
(21:39):
I want those longings to befulfilled.
And what is that scripture?
A longing fulfilled is a treeof life, but unmet longings are
like death.
You know, I don't rememberexactly the scripture, but yeah,
it is like a tree of life,providing beauty and shade.
(22:01):
And you know, a tree of life isa wonderful thing and I want to
do the things that God lays onmy heart.
He created me to have thesedesires, so I'm going to follow
through with it.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And I think that's just such a great principle for
people to have.
It's just like these desiresthat you have are not from
nowhere.
You have giftings, you haveinterests, you have passions and
all of that.
Some of it, you might say, well, that just comes from me,
that's what I'm interested in.
But even that interest isplaced there by God.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Yes, yes, 100%.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
All right, I want to now actually talk a little bit
about real estate, because it'skind of an interesting market
right now.
Now actually talk a little bitabout real estate because it's
kind of an interesting marketright now and you know some
people are a little skittish,particularly as it relates to
things like interest rates andyou know house prices and so on.
And so you know, when you'retalking to somebody who is like
interested in saying, hey, we'reat a stage in life where we're
(22:58):
either wanting to move fromrenting to buying, or our family
is growing, we need a biggerplace, or somebody wants to sell
a house and they'd like movingthe job, what are some of the
things you're telling peopleabout real estate when they have
hesitation.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
A lot of people are hung up on the interest rates
right now, which are hoveringaround 7, 7.125 or so, and they
are remembering, you know, threeand four years ago, when the
interest rates were incrediblyamazing 3% and you know that was
(23:33):
just a very rare time.
I don't know if we'll ever seethat again in our lifetime.
I hope we do, because it'sreally great for realtors lots
of business, but as it is, weare under the 50-year average
right now.
So the 50-year average rate isabout 8% and we're under that.
There are also special programs.
(23:56):
You can find banks that will dolending under the market rate.
So I have a bank I'm workingwith right now that offers 1%
less than the market rate, sothat's exciting.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
And they also have options like lower down payments
and yeah, things like that.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
Yeah like 100% financing.
You can find those out there.
Not that that's always thewisest choice, but it's an
option to get a person into ahouse.
The other thing about themarket right now is that it's a
buyer's market.
Sellers are having a littletrouble selling their house at
(24:38):
the value that they might findthrough comps, so buyers are
getting deals right now.
If buyers wait until rates godown, then it could flip and
become a seller's market wheresellers are asking for more
money and the house becomes moreexpensive.
(24:59):
So it's generally advised thatbuyers buy in a buyer's market.
With the rates like they areright now, it's just a good time
to buy.
And for sellers that are outthere that are skittish, we just
fight until we make it work,and so I have some sellers right
(25:20):
now and we're just doing thatand trying to work with creative
financing.
There's other creativefinancing options that benefit
sellers, and so we try to makeit all work together.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Well, we will put your information in the notes.
So if people are looking for arealtor that they can trust and
somebody who has a passion toserve, they'll have that
information.
Is there anything else thatthey should know about the
market or about real estate inthis time?
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Oh boy.
Well, I mean, there's so muchto learn and know and they can
just call me with theirquestions.
How about that?
Yeah, let's do that.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
All right, I always like to end the interview with
kind of a more generalizedquestion, which is like do you
have a particular philosophy oflife that serves as your true
north and it could be like itdirects everything like your
marriage, your family, yourbusiness, your personal life.
(26:23):
Is there a theme that you havefor your life or a statement
that would capture what it isyou want to be about in your
life?
Speaker 2 (26:31):
Wow.
Well, I would say that thetheme is God is love.
Just a simple theme.
People always talk about it,but it's my theme too, and I
think that knowing that God islove, he embodies love, he is
(26:53):
love, everything that drives himis love, then it should be my
driving force as well.
Then it should be my drivingforce as well.
So in the way that I relate tothe people I serve people I
interact with professionally,the way I relate to my family,
(27:18):
if God is love and he treats usin such a way, then I ought to
treat people and be motivated bylove as well.
So I would say that's mydriving force.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Well, it's interesting you mentioned that,
because we just had yourbirthday and one of the things
that we tend to do in thesecelebrations is we give family
members and friends a chance tokind of have a word for the
birthday honoree.
Kind of have a word for thebirthday honoree.
And if I think about it, mostof the things that were said
(27:47):
about you are one reflection oranother of this dynamic of love.
So I think you're doing well inmimicking the love of God to
the people around you.
Well thanks, yeah, thank you.
Thank you for doing this again.
I'm so grateful and, as always,you did a great job.
Speaker 2 (28:05):
Well, thank you for having me, and Preston, you're
awesome and I just appreciatethe chance to talk and share my
story.
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
You're welcome, and I just want to say thank you for
joining us for anotherconversation.
We are actually getting readyto take a break.
I've talked about this a littlebit.
In July we're going to be doinga total studio redo, so we have
a short greeting that we'll bedoing next week for July 4th,
and then we have a specialconversation that we're going to
(28:36):
be having with Shana for themonth of July while we reset the
studio that we've pre-recorded,and so then in the beginning of
August we'll be back again inthe new studio.
Can't wait for you to be a partof that too.
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