Driven by Heart, Grounded in Hustle
For Allison Watkins, real estate wasn’t a lifelong plan—it was a bold pivot. After earning degrees in special education and communication, she was navigating life as a newly single mom and needed a career that gave her both flexibility and financial freedom. “I wanted to be the kind of mom who could show up for my kids at the ball field,” she said. A friend suggested she get her real estate license. That one suggestion changed everything.
Allison entered the industry in 2007—right as the market was beginning to crash. But she didn’t know any different. “Everyone else was getting out, and I was just getting started,” she laughed. That grit would set the tone for everything that followed.
From the Basement to Breakthrough
Allison's first role in real estate was behind the scenes—working as an assistant to Jim Buff, a real estate powerhouse and one of the early leaders to bring Keller Williams into the Carolinas. She describes it as a tough but transformative experience. “I worked in the basement of an office building and hated being behind a desk, but I learned so much behind that desk,” she said. Those two years gave her the confidence and knowledge to launch her own production—and she hit the ground running.
After moving to Charlotte, Angela began to build her business from scratch by meeting people where they were—literally. “I went to different breweries every week,” she said. “We turned it into social prospecting, and it worked.” Within her first year in a brand-new city, she closed 38 transactions—without spending a dime on leads.
Learning to Lead, Learning to Attract
Over time, Allison moved into leadership roles at several cloud-based brokerages. Under the mentorship of Charles Boyett, she began to understand the power of agent attraction—not as a recruitment tactic, but as a relationship-driven approach. “It wasn’t about pushing people to join. It was about building something together,” she said.
Allison has led military divisions (inside of brokerage), served as a broker-in-charge, and mentored dozens of agents into success. But her biggest joy? Helping agents believe in themselves. “Most of this business is mindset,” she explained. “When someone sees that you believe in them, they start believing in themselves.”
Why ENRG?
For Allison, ENRG isn’t just another brokerage—it’s a full-circle moment. She’d always told herself that if Erinn and Peter (ENRG co-founders) ever built something new, she wanted to be part of it. “Their integrity, their transparency—it’s real,” she said. “The people you see online are the same people you meet in person.”
What stood out most was the emphasis on culture over quotas. “So many downline models forget that there’s no revenue share without production,” she said. “ENRG gets that. It’s production first, always.”
She also appreciates the intentionality around community. “This isn’t about throwing people into the system and hoping it works. It’s about choosing the right people to build the right kind of culture.”
Life Outside the Business
When she’s not helping agents scale their businesses or setting up new markets for ENRG, you’ll find Allison outside. She’s an avid hiker, boater, and beach lover. She and her family live near Lake Norman, and they still own property in Asheville and Boone. “If it’s outdoors, I’m in,” she said.
With heart, hustle, and a clear vision for what real estate culture should be, Allison Watkins is helping shape the future of ENRG Realty—one relationship at a time.
