Peter Brewer: What's Broken in QLD Real Estate and How to Fix It

If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. 

In episode 21 of Raising the Bar, George Sourris from Empire Legal sits down with industry titan and ex REIQ Chairman Peter Brewer to unpack what it really means to lift standards in Queensland real estate.

From building a career that spans over four decades to leading major reform through the REIQ, Peter shares a no nonsense perspective on what’s working, what’s broken and what needs to change.

We cover:

- The career: how Peter built a brand that stands the test of time, what “raising the bar” actually means from his perspective and the key mentors and moments that shaped his journey from practitioner to industry educator and advocate.

- Industry advocacy and the hard conversations: where Peter’s direct approach comes from, the biggest gaps he still sees in agent training and support and why real change comes down to leadership, accountability and calling out poor behaviour.

- What’s next: where Queensland real estate is heading over the next 3-5 years, the biggest mistakes agents are still making today and what he would do differently if he was starting his career in today’s market.

If you’re in real estate or business and want a real look at how standards are actually lifted, this episode is a reminder that change happens when people decide to do something about it.

Contact Peter: https://thatpeterbrewer.com
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More podcast episodes: https://empirelegal.com.au/podcast/
Check out our blogs: https://empirelegal.com.au/blog/
Website: https://empirelegal.com.au/

Transcript

**George:** All right. This is an episode I'm excited for. Peter Brewer, welcome to the Raising the Bar podcast.

**Peter:** George, thank you. I'm excited. I can't wait to hear what I've got to say.

**George:** As you know, we're storytelling excellence in Queensland property. And my friend, you are excellent. You have made great changes for our great industry.

**Peter:** Thank you. We're on a mission to clean it up as best we can. Let's do it.

**George:** Mate, you're a role model to me. What you've achieved for REIQ and the property space is spectacular. I'm early in my career, and I'm hoping we can spark some good change through good conversation.

**Peter:** You're very generous, and it's lovely to have people like you coming through - people we can pass the ball to and say, keep going, do better. From what I'm seeing, you're doing some amazing things in your space.

**George:** I'm here to learn. We've got to learn from your generation. That's how the great circle of life works.

Fun fact - Pete, you've just written a book.

**Peter:** I have. Published in July 2025. About ten months in now, and I've loved every bit of it.

George, I was a dropout from Wynnum High School. I had no scholastic skills - I negotiated with the teachers to leave before the end of Grade 10. And I happily sent a copy of the book to my Grade 7 English teacher just last week. He gave me the thumbs up. For me, that's a great achievement.

I can't tell you what an adverb, a noun, a pronoun, or an adjective is - I have no idea. But I know a bit about life. Life has been wonderful to me, and I wanted to share those stories with my family, friends, and anyone who wants to know what a silly old 66-year-old man thinks about the world.

**George:** As I said to you before we started recording - the fact that you narrated the audiobook yourself, I highly recommend it. Anyone interested in hearing about Pete's life and what he got up to - it was emotional, informative, all sorts of good stuff. Kudos to you, mate.

**Peter:** Thank you, George. When we launched the book, we gave people a packet of tissues along with it. We said: you're going to laugh and you're going to cry, but enjoy the ride.

**George:** I actually teared up a couple of times listening, which I wasn't expecting. You're an excellent storyteller.

**Peter:** Thank you, buddy. I think people have got to share their emotions more. Certainly when you get to my vintage, there's a tendency to hide behind stuff - this tough bravado. That's okay, but I reckon you've got to lighten up a bit and share your story. That's what I tried to do.

**George:** I learned a lot about you. I had no idea you were a Bayside local. I went to Iona, just around the corner, and spent a bit of time at the Manly Hotel. It was nice to hear that's where you were living and breathing for a long time.

**Peter:** It was very kind of me, yes.

**George:** Now, I've got a cheat sheet here. I'm going to read off it because I can't memorise everything.

So - "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." That's the philosophy that drove Peter Brewer to spend a decade leading the Real Estate Institute of Queensland, and it's exactly why we want you in this seat today.

We've got three points to touch on. I reckon we just jump straight into the first one.

**Peter:** Let's do it.

**George:** Diversity in the REIQ Constitution. You embedded diversity into the REIQ constitution - creating reserved board positions for regional voices, a female director seat, and a spot for leaders under 35.

**Peter:** When I think about "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem" - I sat back and reflected on how kind the real estate profession had been to me. I joined it around 1980, and what I saw was an organisation and an industry very much run by - I'm just going to say it - fat old white men, like me. That's how it was run, by the franchise groups and the institutes.

I watched trainers on stage telling people: get up at 4am, go to the gym, stay out until 8:30pm. Mate, 52% of our profession are women, many of them raising families. When you say that to a woman, she'll look at you and want to smack you around the head. That's not real. So many decisions were being made to suit fat old white men.

I looked at where the future is - and that's our young people. So, with encouragement from people like Rob Honeycombe, Linda Bland, and Antonia, our wonderful CEO at the REIQ at the time, we set about changing the constitution.

I wanted to make sure that whether you were a commercial salesperson in Cairns, a property manager on the Gold Coast, a rural salesperson in Biloela, or a guy putting up signs in Carina - you felt like it was your REIQ. Not just for the boys at the Brisbane Club or at Tatts. That might sound pointed, and it might annoy a few people, but the real estate profession should be for everyone.

We went right across Queensland presenting to the membership: the voices of everyone in this profession need to be represented. We needed a vote of better than 75% to get it across the line, and I think we got 75.6%. So we got it home.

And can I tell you - the quality of conversations in the boardroom after those changes has gone through the roof. The decisions are better. The conversations are challenging, and that's exactly what you want.

**George:** I've only known the REIQ with Antonia steering the ship. Was it you before that?

**Peter:** No, no. We had a previous CEO. Antonia was the first female CEO of the REIQ - sub-40 at the time. That was a challenge for some people. "Oh my God, a female CEO - what's going to happen?" I joined Antonia just after she'd taken over, and I'm happy to say - I think she'd agree - we were a wonderful team. We had a great time, made some amazing changes, and really lifted the value and perception of membership. We were renegades, but sometimes you're the right person for the job at the right time. I think I might've been that bloke.

**George:** What were some of the high-level achievements? I know you changed the constitution, brought in the female director, female CEO - but what else are you proud of?

**Peter:** CPD - Continuing Professional Development - is one of the most important to me. That was ten years of hard slog against governments that you'd think would say, "No-brainer." If you want to be a marriage celebrant in Queensland, you've got to do CPD. But when we're involved in the largest transaction of most people's lives - their single biggest asset - real estate agents had no legal requirement to stand in a training room from the day they got their licence. I got my licence in 1980, and that was that.

That's not even bad. It's disgusting.

**George:** People should want to stay current. Lawyers have to do CPD every year. We've had seller's disclosure, we've got anti-money laundering laws coming in soon. If you don't know this stuff - and you care about the people you're looking after - you should want to know.

**Peter:** And it's scary that we had to fight and fight with both sides of politics to get it across the line. Finally, reluctantly, they said yes.

**George:** About a year ago, right? And you said it took a decade?

**Peter:** A decade. Yes. Is it the best possible outcome? No, but it's a start. It will require people who've never stood in a classroom before to go and learn about little things called ethics. Ethics is not a little town outside London - it's values you live as a real estate professional. We're teaching people about that, about good practice, about their responsibilities. It's the start of an exciting time.

Not everyone's excited about having to do CPD. But I say - let them move on. It's time for change.

**George:** I do a lot of work going around to real estate offices, training and upskilling. There's a world where I could be involved in CPD. That's where I get a lot of joy - helping the industry learn.

Because there was a world - I don't know if it still exists - where people would go through real estate courses and not even know how to fill out a contract.

**Peter:** Fascinating. REIQ puts through around 3,800 students each year. New entrants to the profession. And it's telling that a number of people who train with other providers then come back to the REIQ to learn how to actually fill in a form.

That's terrible. We've had providers putting answers up on the board, tick-and-flick, done in two days.

We have to lift those standards - and that's on government, on the Office of Fair Trading, on ASQA. But it's also on the business owners employing those people. Mentor them. Spend time with them. Make sure they actually know what they're doing.

**George:** Courtney Corfield was on the podcast last week - top-performing agent. She said: "These are the standards to work in our office. We'll coach people toward them, but we don't accept less, because it doesn't align with our values."

**Peter:** I've done hundreds of careers nights for the REIQ and the question I hear over and over is: where's the best money? Where's the best commission?

And I go - don't worry about that. Work for a business with the right values. Work for someone who's going to teach you the right things. Because what's historically happened is people get three things: a desk, a phone, and a month. Good luck. And that has to stop.

I was at a conference in New York a few years back, and Simon Sinek was speaking. Fantastic. He took questions from the floor and a woman stood up and said, "Yeah, yeah, all that namby-pamby stuff is nice. But what if you've got an idiot working for you?"

He looked down the barrel at her and said: "Who employed them?"

If we see enough in someone to give them a job, it's incumbent on us to make them successful. To teach them, mentor them, guide them. That's the responsibility.

**George:** There's a book called Extreme Ownership - it's basically that concept. Whatever happens around you, if you take the lens of "I'm ultimately responsible," be it hiring someone or making a call - it falls back on you. If you play the blame game, you're never going to get anywhere. You have to ask: how can I do better? What can I do to fix this?

**Peter:** A hundred percent. And I think if more people adopted that style of thinking, not only the industry, but humanity in general, would be better.

And on that point - when we talk about raising the bar, everyone sits back and says, "Someone should do something about that." I had it for years at the REIQ. And look, there are certain things the REIQ can do and certain things it can't. But I think a lot of it is incumbent on the practitioners themselves.

When someone rings me from a real estate business and says, "You can't believe what that bloke down the road did!" - Why are you ringing me? Either I become your counsellor and send you an invoice, or you be an adult and go to that person yourself. Say: "Mate, one of your people is letting all of us down. It doesn't reflect the values I know you stand by. Would you be prepared to do something about it?"

If they say no, then we've established that. But I think it's a worthwhile conversation. Don't hide behind professional rules. Pick up the phone.

**George:** It'll go one of two ways - you get a positive result, or if not, there is machinery in play. The Office of Fair Trading, the Law Society. If enough people do something about it, change can happen. Sitting around complaining won't fix anything.

**Peter:** Everything starts with communication. And when people are called to account, they might think harder. Or in some cases, business owners genuinely don't know they've got a troublemaker.

**George:** I say this to the referrers we work with all the time. We work with a lot of real estate agents who are kind enough to refer clients to us. I say: if I don't know about it, we can't fix it. It's not getting anyone in trouble - it's letting us know so we can see if there's a knowledge gap or a customer service issue. If you don't know, you don't know.

**Peter:** Can't fix it if you don't know. And it's always easier to say "bugger that mob, I'm going elsewhere." It's harder to pick up the phone and say, "Hey, I thought you'd want to know." But that's the culture we need to breed. Makes us all better. Makes us accountable.

---

**George:** Funnily enough, I believe this is Episode 21, and I haven't asked this yet - so you're the first. What does "raising the bar" mean to you?

**Peter:** It means that when the AC Nielsen survey comes out each year - the one that rates professions - real estate agents aren't sitting at the bottom with the politicians and whoever else is down there.

Here's the sad thing: in any profession, there's always going to be a "dickhead factor." Some people will stuff it up for the rest. I've had a career of 46 years in real estate. Ninety percent of my best friends are real estate people with good values - good human beings who contribute to their communities. But that 10% stuff it up for everyone.

Things like anti-money laundering laws, statutory disclosure, higher standards around marketing - they're going to start weeding some of those people out. You're just going to have to be a better, more educated, more committed professional to survive going forward.

Raising the bar means having the expectation that business owners don't take people on for the wrong reasons. I want it to be about service and experience, not the money. I want to go on social media and not see a real estate agent posing with their watch and their BMW.

**George:** The Form 6 on the steering wheel - I just can't.

**Peter:** Let's make the property the champion. Let's have some humility. If I look at your socials, George, I bet there's no "hashtag another settlement, hashtag we are great lawyers." That's just not your vibe.

And I don't see you calling yourself a rockstar conveyancing lawyer. But I see real estate people doing that everywhere. And here's the thing - every time someone stands up and says "I'm a rockstar real estate agent," everyone looking back is thinking: no you're not, mate.

If you want to do personal marketing, get your consumers to tell your story. If you're good enough, they'll say it for you. People believe third parties. When you say it about yourself, they go, "You're a tosspot."

**George:** Ash Hansom was on the podcast a couple of weeks ago. We went down the rabbit hole on the flashy stuff and she nailed it. She said, "Mate, who cares? Other agents might care. Nobody else does. Just get on with the job. Add value."

**Peter:** Word of mouth. Get involved in your community. Be a good human being. Care about someone. Then good stuff happens.

**George:** I always say - put good people together, do good stuff, and good results follow.

---

**George:** Alright, let's go to the second point - how do we actually drive change? You've lived through this at Professionals, at the REIQ. You've modernised a few different areas of the property profession. How do you have the hard conversations? What have you learned along the way?

**Peter:** There's a Japanese word - kaizen - which means small incremental shifts. And I'm very much a bull-at-the-gate guy. I want to sort stuff out today. But unfortunately it doesn't work that way.

It starts with all of us having better expectations, being better humans, and calling out nonsense when we see it. Things like CPD, quality education, measuring people on performance rather than just money.

It frustrates me every year at the various awards nights - everyone gets a trophy for selling the most. I'd rather see trophies for being good human beings and contributing to community. What gets measured gets done - cliché, but true. Set the expectations around the right things, and things change.

I look at the real estate profession today versus 40 years ago - it's dramatically better. And there's a new breed of real estate professional coming through who gets it. Better educated, higher expectations. They understand that yes, there's good money to be made, but it's about doing the right stuff.

Time will fix some of it. Business owners calling out the crap when they see it will help. And the Office of Fair Trading could get a bit more serious.

Quick story. Years ago it's illegal for real estate offices to trade on Anzac Day in Queensland. I happened to be at the Anzac Day parade at Wynnum, and there was an office with the front door open, with someone soliciting business from people watching the parade go past. Reprehensible.

I rang the Office of Fair Trading the next day to confirm it was illegal. Then, the following year, coming up to Anzac Day, I circulated all the local real estate agents: let's do the right thing. Let's all close. Show some respect. Have one day off.

Of course that same office was open again. So I rang OFT the next day and said, "Just to let you know, this office was open." They denied it and ignored it.

I said, "Out of interest, how many people did you prosecute yesterday?"

The answer: "We don't - we had Anzac Day."

I get it, sort of. But how can you hold people to account if you've got no one policing the rules you put in place?

**George:** It's a toothless tiger. Not knocking them - I don't know what it's like in the modern day. But that's what has to get better.

My vision - and I have these chats with my mum and dad around the dinner table - you know, the Eagle Street lawyers look down on conveyancing as the scum of the industry. And look, let's call a spade a spade. We're a fixed fee model. The legals are basically the cheapest part of any property transaction. Your broker's making more than the lawyers. Agents are making more than the lawyers.

And there's this "race to the bottom" - people treating conveyancing as a commodity, thinking a $500 conveyance offshored overseas is the same as, say, Greta and Maddie sitting in the room next door, who've spent nearly a decade upskilling to provide a great service. And we charge more than $500, so apparently we're the worst people in the world.

**Peter:** Years ago, some prominent Brisbane lawyers used to come down to the Yacht Squadron at Manly on Wednesday evenings talking about how they were going to reduce the fees of law firms. I thought: wow, they're in trouble. You were paying more for your legals 20 years ago than you are today.

And what really confused me was a lawyer down in that Bayside area who went on to become Attorney General in Queensland - and was one of the people who championed the reduction of fees for lawyers. That's obscene. It's not respecting the craft, the education, the professionalism. It shouldn't be about doing it the cheapest. It should be about doing it the best.

**George:** Not out to rip anybody off - that's not the goal. But it's got to be some level of value for the service provided. When my mum started in conveyancing, it was on a percentage basis, like real estate. Then they moved to a fixed fee model and everyone started undercutting each other. Something's got to give - either the quality of the person doing the job, or the amount of time they can spend on it.

My passion point is helping people understand that not all conveyancing is the same. Make an informed decision. That's all it is.

And it goes deeper into kickback territory. The banking and broking worlds got cleaned up by the Royal Commission - all that under-the-table stuff has to be disclosed now. To the Law Society's credit, same rules apply for us. But what it's meant to be and what actually happens are two very different things.

**Peter:** There's always someone trying to rort the system. The everyday person is the one who gets hit. They get told by the agent - who wants the kickback - to go to the cheap conveyancer who doesn't know what they're doing. Because they're cheap and they pay the kickback.

We proudly don't do it, and yes, it makes business harder. If we just jacked our fees up and paid kickbacks left, right and centre, we'd be swamped. But as a professional solicitor, I don't believe in it. People should make free choices based on reputation and trust - not based on how much money the introducer is getting paid.

It's the same thing across so many professions. Real estate agents sending their new salespeople off to the cheapest training provider because there's a 30% special. They get a certificate, but no real training. And then they wonder why that person didn't last.

**George:** It's like when I did my personal training course in my early twenties. I went with the one done in person, where you're taught to correct form and technique. There were other providers doing it completely online. How are you going to teach someone who's never been in a gym how to do a squat or a deadlift without doing themselves an injury? You have to be boots on the ground.

**Peter:** One of the things I do since I pretended to retire - I do a roughly 12-week course for the REIQ, Tuesday and Thursday nights online. One of the trainers teaches the various components of the salesperson and licence course, but they also get me to come in for two hours, twice a week. I sit there and tell war stories. I help people become desk-ready.

There's certain stuff you can do online, but unless you hear the stories, unless someone teaches you the context behind what you're doing, it's just... theory. I love sharing information and making sure people go beyond the certificate.

**George:** And the best ones I've seen have shifted away from "here's a desk, here's a phone, good luck." I'm seeing more teams - high-performing agents building a team, with people starting as juniors, doing a cadetship, and either clipping into the team or eventually spreading their wings as lead agents.

**Peter:** I'm a massive advocate for that. It's like an apprenticeship. Everyone wants to be the fully-qualified tradie on day one. But you're not. I don't want an electrician coming to my house on day one saying he'll rewire the whole place.

My recommendation to new people: calm to the farm. Take your time. It's a long game. Go and spend some time with someone outstanding who's going to teach you and invest in you.

One of the best people who ever worked for me was a young bloke called Chris - my mini me. He had seven years at McDonald's, so he understood systems and processes. I gave him the real estate overlay, and he was outstanding. When he was set free, away he went. Beautiful.

**George:** And to your point - they stay in the industry longer. If you're just left to drown, you'll burn out and move on. But if you're kicking goals, getting job satisfaction, learning from someone - you've got a much better chance of standing the test of time.

**Peter:** At those careers nights, when someone says, "I can go to this office and get 92% commission" versus 74% somewhere else - I say: it's 74% of nothing and 92% of nothing. You're probably going to be a liability for the first year. Take 20% and treat the rest as education. Once you're really nailing it, you can renegotiate. Just make sure the business you go to has values that align with yours. Make sure they're going to sit with you every morning and help you understand how to add value to people.

**George:** I see people in real estate land making TikToks all day - and look, social media is a powerful tool, but mate, if you've sold three properties in 12 months, just go knock on some doors. Get some runs on the board first.

**Peter:** There's a great quote I picked up from a mate of mine in Chicago - Todd Carpenter. He said: "Peter, people get really confused about the difference between social networking and social not-working."

You're not working. You can make TikToks all day. You look amazing online. You're not making any money. You're selling real estate.

---

**George:** Let's hit the last point and then wrap up. Looking into the future - what's coming for property and real estate in the next three to five years?

**Peter:** I am genuinely excited about the future. The professionalism is getting stronger. I look at the franchise groups and institutes that were traditionally run by - I'll say it again - fat old white men like me. And a new breed of people is coming through. Really exciting young men and women who are taking the bull by the horns, understanding the new consumer, and saying: we need to behave better, we need higher standards.

Their level of education is so much stronger. I used to go to the Inman conferences in the US - New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas - real estate and property tech. We went every six months pre-COVID. Best learning ground going.

I got to do a study tour to Facebook with Inman, which was incredible. None of the ceilings were finished. I asked why, and they said it was Zuckerberg's message to the team: the job is never finished. Little things you learn.

At a conference in San Francisco, one of the presenters shared a stat from the National Association of Realtors: 58/31. The 58 was the average age of a real estate agent in the United States. The 31 was the average age of the person consuming the product.

I brought that stat back and shared it across the franchise groups, the independents, the institutes. The average age of the people running the profession is 58. The average age of the consumer is 31. And for years, the 58-year-olds were driving the profession without understanding the behaviours of the 31-year-olds.

My son Sam - if I want to talk to him, I call. Ring, ring, ring, voicemail. Five seconds later, a text: "What do you want?" I text back: "I want to talk to you." He texts: "What about?" I text: "Your inheritance." He calls me back immediately.

We have to understand the behavioural differences. And I say to offices now: your next best hire is probably 17, 18, 19, 20 years old - someone who understands digital marketing and today's consumer.

Quick story. I was helping an office recruit staff a few years back. The business owner wanted someone willing to door-knock - around Paddington, which is a challenge. Steep hills. And they wanted a 23-25 year old. I didn't fancy the chances.

But I get a call from a young bloke - 23 years old - who says he's happy to door-knock. I asked where that came from. He said: "I'm a Seventh Day Adventist. Since I was four years old, my parents have been pushing me up driveways to knock on doors. I have no fear."

And true to his word, he knocked on doors like a machine for a long time. He's since gone on to be a very successful buyer's agent.

**George:** I love it when I can't tell where a story's going. I wouldn't have guessed that one.

**Peter:** So - putting the raising the bar filter back on the future. What more can we do?

First: you are dripping with passion. Nothing beats passion. Second: what you're doing is a magnificent start. It's about raising the bar, getting the message out, keeping organisations like the REIQ honest - and while Antonia and the current board are there, they absolutely will be.

Things like the REIQ's Lift conference - that sort of initiative is going to do a lot of good. The courses they're running around business management and ethics. Peter Campen has just done a tour of Queensland talking about ethics as part of the CPD program. That's the stuff that will make people sit up and go - oh, that's the standard we should be holding ourselves to.

It's about showing some humility. Understanding that the best way to make impact in a community is to be part of that community.

My philosophy has always been: give to get. You just give to get. You don't do much marketing. I don't do much marketing. You just be a bloody good human being, and people work out - they're the good ones. They're the right people to do business with.

There are some interesting people out there - I remember a prominent journalist who said to me, when it came to selling her home, she wanted a "low-down dog" working for her. Someone who would shake the buyer's pockets out and squeeze every dollar. So there's a market for everything.

But it comes with risk. If you want cheap and nasty, there's no guarantee your place settles. No guarantee someone's in your corner when the building inspection goes sideways, or when the finance gets tricky, or when things fall apart on settlement day. That's probably not going to come from a desk somewhere in another country.

**George:** People put more energy into researching their favourite footy team or their next car than they do into choosing the lawyer or agent handling the biggest financial transaction of their life. But the beauty of technology is that it's all online. You can look up who sells in what area, how much, their star rating, their reviews. The transparency factor is extraordinary. In this world, it's hard to hide the slime.

**Peter:** Speed, simplicity, personalisation, transparency. Those are the four trends that drive the world right now. And the one most often forgotten is transparency.

Australians will forgive a stuff-up. They'll never forgive a cover-up. So you've got to be transparent.

**George:** We put all our pricing on the website. So many people in 2026 are still gatekeeping that. I just don't get it. We've got nothing to hide. This is what we charge, you can use us or you can't. No sneaky plus-plus-plus model. Fixed fee. What's on the website is what you pay. And nothing has built trust better than that.

You find your people. The ones who want to pay $499 will move on, and that's okay. They find the right people for them.

**Peter:** It comes down to trust and transparency. And on that note, I've got a golden nugget. One piece of advice I'd give the audience - about anything in life that adds value.

Tell your story. Everyone's got a story to tell. And this isn't just a deliberate segue to the book - but it kind of is.

I can tell you a lot about my parents, a little about my grandparents, and almost nothing about the generations before them. So three years ago, I sat down with my mum and recorded her for three hours. Just two mics, a camera, and I asked questions about her life. And I said: Mum, can you share some stories for my kids and the grandkids you don't even have yet? Messages to them.

I've now got three hours of absolute gold.

**George:** I've got full-on goosebumps, mate. That is an amazing idea.

**Peter:** All we need to do is find the time and say: Mum, Dad, tell me your story. Not for you. For the generations to come.

Part of me writing the book was wanting to tell my story so that my kids and grandkids could sit back and say - that's what that silly old fart was about. It's incredibly fulfilling.

Nothing special about me - I'm just a boofhead. But every one of us boofheads has a story to tell. So: number one, tell your story. Make some notes for your family. Number two, go and record your meaningful people, if they're still with you. Get something down.

My boy Sam's oldest daughter, Sid, is nearly three. My mum was a cabaret singer. Sid is already asking: "Do we have any videos of Nana singing?" And so we're digging through and finding them. Mum passed away three years ago, but she's immortalised in that little girl going, "I'd like to watch those videos."

**George:** And it's forever now. It's saved. Very cool.

My own family came out from Greece - my grandparents' generation. I've been lucky enough to visit the patriarchal home. In the tiles at the entrance - still there to this day - it says "D. Sourris." Dimitri Sourris. My great-grandfather. They carted every stone up from the bottom of the village by hand. No car, no machinery up there.

I hear these stories third-hand from my father and I think - I wish my grandfathers were still around so I could hear them first-hand. We're in Australia, mate. We are very lucky people.

**Peter:** Blessed. Absolutely.

My point is simple: make some notes. Record your parents. Get some stuff down. Because those stories matter beyond you.

**George:** That is the nugget. I don't know that it's strictly on the topic of raising the bar - but it's about having a life you value, and passing it on.

Mate, on that note - shout out to Sam Brewer. Best sparky ever. Thanks for always helping out when I need a hand.

Pete, to wrap up - what are you doing with yourself now?

**Peter:** The kids ask, "What are you doing, Dad?" and I say, I don't have a plan on growing up. I'm just having a great time.

A bit of consulting. One of the nice things about being a crusty old fellow, and life being kind, is you get to pick and choose what you do and who you do it with. That's a nice place to be.

A bit of time in the van, a bit of consulting, a bit of training for the REIQ. And I love doing things like this - sharing a message with passionate people.

From me: thank you for what you're doing. Thank you for continuing to want to lift the bar. I really appreciate it, on behalf of all of us. Hopefully people will share this, take a few moments from it, maybe pass on a bit of wisdom to the people they know.

**George:** On that note - thank you, Pete. You're a titan. You've achieved some really good things for our industry, and I appreciate you taking the time to sit here and have a chat. Hopefully the right people see this, and we'll keep fighting the good fight.

**Peter:** My pleasure, my friend. Thank you, mate.