While mortgage rates are on the rise and the real estate industry is grappling with questions and challenges that may fundamentally change how agents and consumers transact, none of these issues seemed to impact the energy inside Utah’s Salt Palace Convention Center for eXp Realty’s 2026 eXp Con.
Over the span of four days, nearly 4,000 agents from 20 countries in eXp’s global footprint gathered in Salt Lake City to attend companywide general sessions and breakout sessions.
Although the morale, energy and enthusiasm for the business of real estate, eXp Realty and its leadership team inside the convention center was high, the onstage content, product launches and conversations were squarely focused on the less-than-stellar market conditions for housing.
During general sessions, eXp highlighted numerous agents who have overcome a variety of challenges to become top-performing agents.
They include Rafael “Rey” Reyes, who grew up in the projects before going on to be the first in his family to graduate university and become a top agent; Krista Mashore, who used real estate to restart her life after a divorce and become a top agent; and Daniel Fitness, the leader of the Fitness Realtors Group, who overcame near-death experiences four times and not only relearned how to walk after being paralyzed from the waist down but also became a triathlon national champion and Ironman Triathlon World Champion.
These agents sought to inspire attendees with stories of how they used their hardships to spur future success, tying their stories back to how agents can find opportunities and still succeed despite market headwinds.
More tools in the toolkit
Although resilience and grit are key to overcoming challenges, eXp made it clear to agents that it was not sending them out into a near-8% mortgage rate environment without resources. From the visibility of eXp leadership sitting front and center in the audience when they were not on stage, the brokerage worked to enforce its self-appointed title of “the most agent-centric brokerage on the planet.”
Among its resources to help agents better serve clients, MCP First, AI of Choice enables agents to connect the eXp Hub, along with other applications like Canva and various CRMs, to the large language model (LLM) engine of their choosing. ShowGo lets them coordinate open house and showing coverage. And eXp Ready provides sellers with access of up to $50,000 to use to prepare their home for sale with nothing due until closing.
“The better our agents are, the better we are as a company. Our company is just a group of agents,” Wendy Forsythe, eXp’s chief operating officer, told HousingWire.
“Our mission is to be the most agent-centric brokerage on the planet. So everything we do goes back to the questions of, ‘How do we strengthen the value proposition for the agent? How do we make their job easier? How do we make it better for them to compete in the market?’ Tools like this are tools that help them.”
In addition to these launches, eXp also announced Revenos Mortgage, a new mortgage joint venture with nonbank lender and servicer Newrez.
The joint venture is slated to launch in January 2027, although Newrez currently has a team dedicated to dealing with referrals from eXp agents, if their buyers are interested in giving Newrez a try before the official launch.
AI and social media
Beyond these tools and inspiration, eXp also sought to educate attendees on ways in which they could propel their businesses and obtain their “unfair share” of the market. At the center of this was a keynote presentation by Gary Vaynerchuk, a serial entrepreneur, chairman of VaynerX and CEO of VaynerMedia.
Vaynerchuk implored agents to utilize both artificial intelligence and the power of social media to drive their business forward and generate leads. On Wednesday alone, Vaynerchuck said he posted 931 pieces of content on social media from a variety of handles across 10 social media platforms from YouTube to TikTok to Substack.
Although he knows that posting thousands of pieces of content per week is out of reach for the vast majority of agents who do not have a full-time production and management team on their payroll, he encouraged agents to post as often as they could. Vaynerchuk said that it’s no longer a game of increasing follower count, as people frequently find content on their “for you” page, so never know who will stumble upon your content.
He also addressed various “excuses” agents may have for not posting or using AI — including ethical concerns, disdain for certain tech executives, environmental concerns about AI, fear of putting themselves out there or just a desire to do things the “old fashioned way.”
In his mind, if agents want to be successful, they have to move on from these concerns and “excuses,” because if they do not use these tools, they will be left behind.
As for agents who are afraid of appearing on video, but instead are great writers, he highlighted how they could use Substack to post content about their market and become a trusted voice in their service area. For the agents who would rather do things in person, Vaynerchuck highlighted ways that they could leverage social media to advertise in-person gatherings, expanding their sphere of influence.
But he was not the only one extolling the power of social media and AI, with additional main stage sessions with Gogo Bethke and Keegan Shivers, who have leveraged social media to create massive businesses.
This was compounded by a myriad of breakout sessions dedicated to things like “Winning in ChatGPT, Google and Social Media,” “The Attention Economy,” “AI to ROI,” “Social Content Bootcamp” and even an Instagram Live workshop.
Building a better agent
Other breakout sessions were focused on other ways agents could boost their business, with sessions on winning expired listings and for-sale-by-owner (FSBO) properties, how to better leverage their CRM, hosting in-person events that generate better connections, and how to do 150-plus deals a year via open houses.
These complemented main stage sessions by coach Matthew Ferry and a talk by Forsythe based on her book, “Leverage Your X-Factor.”
When not engaged in sessions, agents and attendees circulated through eXpo, where they had the opportunity to learn about products and services from 70 vendors and sponsors — including Constant Contact, Curbio, Newrez and PLACE.
So while the market may be far from ideal, eXp agents seem energized and confident that they have what it takes to thrive despite whatever hurdles 2027 throws their way.
