How My Safe Agent is Revolutionizing Real Estate Safety

Cathy Hickman (00:00)

You’re encountering people you know or you don’t know.

And sometimes it’s not even about the clients. It could also just be maybe the area you’re in, just like you were talking about your friend. People know our schedules. And especially, even an investor, you’re going to the house daily. People really want to check things out. They’re able to see. They can figure out your schedules, where you’re going to be at, what time you’re leaving, and things like that.

Cody Crabb (00:13)

Yeah.

Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m Cody Crabb with Investor Fuel, and today I’m joined by Cathy Hickman, co-founder of My Safe Agent, a platform focused on what happens during a showing when seconds matter and keeping agents safe. Cathy, great to have you on today.

Cathy Hickman (02:12)

Thank you, Cody. I appreciate it. I’m excited to be on your podcast today and get to be able to have a conversation with you.

Cody Crabb (02:18)

Yeah, same. ⁓ As soon as I saw what you did, I was very like, really? Like that is really interesting. So I would love to hear, know, where did the idea, ⁓ where did the idea come from for My Safe Agent? Where did this kind of start? ⁓ And kind of give me the origin, if you could.

Cathy Hickman (02:33)

Okay.

Yeah, of course. So I’ve been doing real estate about eight years and during this whole entire time we were doing real estate. My husband, who also is a co-founder, he is a former police officer, corporate security, NFL security, anything you can think security, the man has done it. And so anytime I started showing properties, he always had all these special text codes, know, checking codes, all kinds of things when I was showing. And what we were realizing is as time would go on that sometimes like it didn’t always work out the way we would need it to.

Maybe I didn’t text in the correct amount of time or you know, just stuff that he was getting really worried about it. So we just started doing some research and we realized out there, there just wasn’t anything for any type of real estate Agent that when you are showing properties and if something were to come up, how can you get the police there as fast as you can? And so it was kind of one of our last, one of my last times I showing a vacant home and someone was actually, ⁓

in the property living, which should never have been in the property living. And so when I went to go open up the door to get it ready to show ⁓ the person that was inside actually yanked the door open and asked what I was doing there. And I told him and he immediately shut the door in my face. And I remember that moment thinking, wow, that was kind of strange. And so I got on the phone to call my husband, what was going on? He was like, you need to call the police. Like they’re not supposed to be there. so later on that night, we just started talking and he was like, what would you have done

that person yanked you, pulled you in there and took your phone. Like how are you gonna get help? And so from that kind of that part, we just started doing a lot of research and realized there just wasn’t anything out there that if you need that immediate assistance, like how are you gonna get it? So that was the development of my Safe Agent.

Cody Crabb (04:10)

Yeah, seriously.

Wow, okay. So yeah, I actually have some friends that are realtors that are women and they’re young. mean, they’re maybe not very tall or strong or anything. I mean, they would definitely have a concern about this. I’ve heard them talk about like my whole day spent with strangers who I don’t know, who are just like, who know my picture and exactly what I look like. And they’re like, Hey, pretty girl, come alone to this house with me. And it’s like, they’re scared. I’ve heard this exact complaint before. So give us a little idea of how it works. what is the…

Cathy Hickman (04:36)

yeah.

You ready?

Yeah.

Cody Crabb (04:53)

⁓ What’s the basic idea? Because you said that you’ve tried some other ones with like texting a code or like responding in an app, but this one is specifically made for real estate people.

Cathy Hickman (04:59)

You know what I Yeah.

It is, it is. And so what’s so great about it is it’s an app that you can download off of the App Store and it works on your smartphone and your smartwatch. And so we actually are patent pending with the smartwatch integration with that and also our geo-fencing. So the minute any real estate Agent books a showing through our broken right.

Broker Bay are showing time. It’ll sync to that calendar and then our SafeAgent app actually picks it up. And then, you you just go to the property. Once you show up to the property, that geofence picks it up and lets you know that you’re there. And it reminds you, hey, you need to check in. A little green button.

And you can check in on your phone or you can check in on your watch. And once you’ve checked in, you’re good to go. ⁓ It’ll send a message to anyone, you your important contacts, you just want to let them know like what property you’re at, the exact location. And then you just go show the property. And if anything were to happen at that property, that green button that you just pushed actually turns to what we call a panic button. And it’s now red. So you actually can push that button, whether it’s on your phone or your watch, and an immediate ⁓ dispatch will go to a live monitoring system.

and they will immediately text you, this an emergency or was it by accident? If you don’t respond within 30 seconds, they call you. If you don’t pick up the phone, they immediately dispatch police to the live location that you’re at.

Cody Crabb (07:12)

Wow, okay, yeah, can definitely see why someone would want something like this. ⁓ So, I mean, has there been, we can cut this if you don’t have a good answer for it, but do you already have a really good story about something that was, you know what I mean, like a testimonial of something, do you have a story like that?

Cathy Hickman (07:16)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Not where I’ve had to use the actual real app for that, no. But like I said, the one where the vacant property, that was actually a real life situation as well. And then a couple, you know, just being in open houses and I had left my phone downstairs and I was upstairs. I know you’re not supposed to do all that, but I still was kind of showing and all that. And I remember thinking that I don’t know anybody at this open house and if anything were to happen, my phone is completely downstairs. Like I have no access to it. And I have a bad habit of leaving.

Cody Crabb (07:41)

Yeah.

Cathy Hickman (08:01)

my phone places so that’s why when my husband was really coming up with this idea he’s like we’re gonna have to put it on your watch because that thing never comes off.

Cody Crabb (08:09)

Yeah, yeah, that’s really

smart. Well, and I think just from a practical standpoint, mean, clients want to look like you, they want to feel like you trust them, but at the same time, like, how can you if you don’t know who they are? So like, I completely understand why someone would want something like this. So ⁓ let me kind of, so because our audience is made of, ⁓ you know, investors listening, like landlords, flippers, you know, people that are doing showings, like where does this actually show up in

Cathy Hickman (08:20)

Mm-hmm.

Right.

You’re welcome.

That’s Thursday, huh?

Cody Crabb (08:39)

the investor world.

Cathy Hickman (08:41)

fantastic. Well, you you think about a lot of investors, they’re coming in and they are ⁓ a lot of times and you know, they’re they’re buying.

a of homes very, very cheap because they are wanting to put in their spin on it, make another beautiful home and then make a profit off it, obviously. And so when you’re in a lot of these properties, you don’t even know what’s in that. That house could be vacant for months. It could be years. And then even when you’re within the property, you don’t know what’s all going on. And so you’re going there all the time. A lot of these investors do a lot of their own work. They don’t hire people. They’re their own contractors. so you’re going out there

and you don’t know who you’re going to encounter. ⁓ You also are working with contractors in the sense that you know your main contractor, but maybe that day they picked up some extra people on the shift that you don’t really know. And if a dispute or something were to come up, you could again have access to that panic where you’re not having to explain anything, the police are just gonna come out and at that point help you in that type of situation. So definitely, I even see it for investors, because they do a lot of stuff by themselves.

Late at night, early morning, I’ve heard of a lot. have some investors that they actually have to hire security guards while they’re out there working, you know, staying the night because of the all the expensive materials that’s there, but it’s not necessarily installed. And so, you know, this would be just if you’re already kind of in an environment, I feel like you’re having to hire a security guard to watch your stuff at night. You know, this definitely would be an added bonus for while you are there working. If you didn’t need police to be dispatched, you could get to them.

Cody Crabb (10:49)

Yeah, wow, mean, it seems like one of those things that you don’t think about until afterward. Like, you know what I mean? You think about it after you go, wow, I probably should have done something about that. ⁓ So ⁓ you mentioned you’re only about six months in. ⁓ I mean, that’s awesome that you’ve already got this much functionality and whatnot. What’s been kinda harder than you expected so far? I mean, it seems like you kinda just whipped this up, but I’m sure it was much more complicated than that.

Cathy Hickman (10:53)

Right. ⁓

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay.

You know, I think some of it has just been honestly people really understanding the product. think because there are lot of wonderful products out there that a lot of agents use to like, you know, either just determine like the clients are working with the unknown clients, location, places, you know, texting people, letting you know that you arrived at the location. So there’s a lot of fantastic stuff out there. And so I think what it’s been for us is really having people understand the difference is the fact that it truly is a wearable panic button that does dispatch police.

And so we’re a lot of the right now there is nothing in our market out there that actually has that You think about like bank tellers and stuff like that like they actually wear those wearable like panic buttons, right? And so and and so what we were talking about like but most people if they’re going to you know Maybe rob a bank or whatever. They know that’s a panic button. They’ll tell you don’t press it Whereas in our situation, nobody even knows that you have it on I have it on my wall

Cody Crabb (11:59)

True, yeah.

Cathy Hickman (12:13)

nobody even knows. I can just you know, discreetly push it. They’re not, you’re not gonna have any idea until the police come bang on the door that they’ve arrived.

Cody Crabb (12:18)

Yeah.

Exactly, Wow.

So this makes me wonder, what is it specifically about ⁓ real estate that, I I could see tons of applications for this. mean, what is it that makes this specifically ⁓ useful for real estate?

Cathy Hickman (12:38)

Well, my Safe Agent really was developed for real estate because my husband got tired of me going to properties and not necessarily having like that backup.

Cody Crabb (12:45)

It is the most husband thing ever,

I can say as a husband, to be like, let’s make a whole app just so I can not have to worry about this.

Cathy Hickman (12:50)

I think I was

giving him like I think I made him go bald. Honestly, I’m just kidding the stress, but from that what was what was been so great about this is so we’ve I’ve been pitching it to a lot of other agents in our DFW area and the first thing everybody always says. What do have for my college kid?

what can you do for my college kid that’s running around the campus at 10 p.m. at night by herself, and they have their phone, but their phone is tucked into a pocket, a sports bra or something like that. So really from that aspect, we really started thinking, and my husband were like, why not? That’s so true. And so we were on the verge of about to release another product called Alert Pro.

and it is for anybody to use. You don’t have to be a real estate Agent. You don’t have to have it in your calendar system. Basically, you just decide, okay, I’m ready for it to turn on and track where I’m going. And if something were to happen, that green button, I just told it to track where I’m going, it turns red. And if I need it, I can push the red button and police are gonna know where I’m at.

Cody Crabb (13:52)

Yeah, I think a lot of anxious moms and spouses and all kinds of people are gonna be like, thank you so much for this. I was just thinking, the whole time I was like, this sounds like a genius idea for a lot of different situations. So I’m glad to hear that you already thought of that. ⁓ So that’s cool. do you have any sort of timeline on when it’s gonna be available or anything?

Cathy Hickman (14:07)

Thank you.

We are, it’s probably gonna be in about a month or two, like we’re almost completely done building it out. So we’re kinda, at this point we’re doing like the whole testing phase and making sure it all is working how it’s supposed to work. But he told us probably in the next month or two. So, cause literally after we launched My Safe Agent and we started talking to people, that’s when we were like, oh wow, you’re so right. And I have a son in college too, and I didn’t even think about it. he’s at Texas A &M and they have

a

program to where, you know, if you’re stuck after hours like from like 12 to 6 a.m. and you need someone to walk you from the library to your dorm or wherever, you actually can call, it’s, you know, the Corps of Cadets and they’ll come out, they’ll send someone out to escort you wherever you need to go. And so, but I was like a lot of universities don’t have some kind of system set up and so, you know, just more I started thinking about, was like, wow, you know, this would be so great for, you know, any of these young kids or not even kids, but anybody.

Cody Crabb (15:04)

Yeah, well I yeah

I mean I’m thinking of people that like work nights that maybe don’t want, you know, they’re doing something a little unsafe. you know, whenever I buy a toaster on Facebook Marketplace or something like that, my wife is like, bye forever, you’re toast, no pun intended. You’re gone, so even something like that, as simple as that, it sounds like it could just relieve a lot of anxiety, because most of the time nothing is gonna happen, but just the idea that you have something there, it’s kind like a baby gate.

Cathy Hickman (15:53)

Yeah.

Yes!

Yeah, I get it. Yeah.

yeah, absolutely. Great.

Cody Crabb (16:15)

You know, they’re probably not gonna fall down the stairs, but if they do then you’re gonna be glad that it was there Well, this is amazing. This is actually a super good idea I think ⁓ so who who do you think is the ideal audience for? ⁓ My Safe Agent like who should who should be getting it right away and and can you get it right away? Is this already available right now in the app store?

Cathy Hickman (16:15)

Exactly. Uh-huh. I know.

Thank you.

It is, it is. Right now it is available on the Apple Store. You can download it, My Safe Agent. I would say anyone, know, especially because this one is geared towards real estate, anyone that is in that real estate realm would be so beneficial because it’s whether, you know, whether you are an individual Agent or like I said, you’re an investor, you know, we’re all in that same boat together.

You’re encountering people you know or you don’t know.

And sometimes it’s not even about the clients. It could also just be maybe the area you’re in, just like you were talking about your friend. People know our schedules. And especially, even an investor, you’re going to the house daily. People really want to check things out. They’re able to see. They can figure out your schedules, where you’re going to be at, what time you’re leaving, and things like that.

Cody Crabb (17:08)

Yeah.

Cathy Hickman (17:21)

so that’s what we realize is that people will take advantage of you at the times you’re.

you’re not really paying attention to the surroundings. so, or the.

Cody Crabb (17:29)

in a new area

that you just recently purchased property, potentially. Yeah, I completely see what you mean, yeah. So, I mean, if safety’s ever been a concern for you and you’re in the real estate space, this sounds like a no-brainer. ⁓ tell me, so how can people find it online? You said it’s in the app store, but do have a website?

Cathy Hickman (17:39)

Thank you.

Yeah, we do have a website as well. You just go to the www.mysafeagent.ai so you can go to there or you can like I said go to the Apple Store and just do My Safe Agent and you can download and get started from there. And it is subscription-based so it’s just less than ⁓

$10 a month. so, and we don’t, there’s no contracts. If you like, okay, I’m doing real estate for three months and now I’m out, you know, I can cancel it. Same thing, you you’re investing and you’re working on this house and it’s taking you six months and then maybe you’re taking a three month period off, cancel it and then sign back up for the next house.

Cody Crabb (18:04)

See, that’s doable, yeah.

I think anybody with an anxious spouse or an anxious, anybody that is worried about them, whether or not it’s for you, it’s probably for them more than it is for you, but I think that $10 a month would be well worth it. I’m thinking of my wife who is anxious about everything. That would be well worth it to me to help her feel more Safe that I’m taking care of out there. Well, thank you so much for joining us. This is actually really interesting and cool. Oh, one last question. So what about the other app?

Cathy Hickman (18:26)

Mm-hmm.

It is.

Cody Crabb (18:46)

Will that be available in the same place or where can they go to find out more about that one when it’s out?

Cathy Hickman (18:51)

So that one will be again, it’ll be at the ⁓ www.alertpro.ai. So it’ll be on that website.

Cody Crabb (18:56)

Okay.

Gotcha. Okay. Well, thanks again. This is really cool. ⁓ And if you listeners, thank you so much for joining us. And if you’ve got something out of this episode, and you did because this sounds awesome, ⁓ please go ahead and like, subscribe, comment, do all the things and follow us to make sure you get ⁓ more episodes with awesome people like Cathy. Cathy, can’t thank you enough. Thank you again for joining us and we’ll see you next time.

Cathy Hickman (19:20)

you Cody.