Archive for July, 2008

Who’s For Real And Who’s Faking It?

Tuesday, July 29th, 2008

As we approach August, many schools will be starting up again within the next 30 days. So unless consumers with children plan to move within the same school distict, a portion of the market is settled in right now and won’t consider moving until next year.

It’s now time to determine who your serious and motivated clients are.

When working with consumers, it’s imperative to thoroughly qualify your prospects to make sure that they are financially able to make a move and want to take advantage of this great buyer’s market. I believe it’s better to have quality clients right now instead of quantity of clients and prospects that aren’t motivated to listen to you.

Sellers, who have had their homes on the market through the summer, need to buckle down and really look at what needs to be done to get their home sold.

Here are 3 steps you need to take:

  1. If you have active listings that aren’t selling, meet your sellers with an updated CMA and discuss the current market place with them. (Hopefully, you’ve been keeping them updated throughout the listing period.) See if they’ll adjust their listing price to get an offer on their property. Do they need a dose of reality in having their home in top showcasing condition? If their home needs some work, show them other homes on the market that you know show well, because that’s what they’re competing with. Your sellers need to be motivated to sell or you’re just spinning your wheels going into the fall months. If they aren’t serious about selling, then recommend they take their home off the market until they improve its condition or until the market rebounds. (We’ve all heard “It’s no time to just test the market”.)
  2. Review your list of current buyers who said they want to buy a home this year and if it’s been awhile since you’ve shown them a property, schedule a time to meet with them again one-on-one and have them re-focus on their housing goals. Find out what’s most important to them. Interest rates are still great with favorable housing prices and plenty of inventory to show, so see who’s ready to buy a home in this buyer’s market.
  3. Do you have any prospects that have fallen by the side over the past few months? Call them NOW and see if they are ready to sell or buy now. If not, find out when they’ll be ready and keep in touch. If you have any buyers, who are waiting to buy, because their credit situation is not where it needs to be, help them by having you or your mortgage partner put them on a game plan for restoring their credit. Some buyers only need 6 - 12 months to bring their credit score back to where they can qualify for FHA/VA or conventional mortgages. Don’t blow off buyer prospects that can’t buy this moment! If they make a sincere effort to qualify for a mortgage, you’ll have a loyal buyer when they’re ready to buy in the near future.

One last question: When someone asks you about what’s happening in the market based on all the news, what are you saying? Are you all gloom and doom? (It’s easy to fall into that trap.) I tell them “It’s a great buyer’s market. Who among your family and friends do you think is next to buy or sell?”

To your success,

Dan

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It’s Time To Refresh Your Listings!

Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008

If you’ve had a listing for more than 3 months, it’s time to make some ‘cosmetic’ changes to the MLS information.

First, look at all of your listing photos posted online.

  • Are there any glares or spots on them?
  • Are they dark, poor lighting or overcast photos?
  • Is there overgrown landscaping?
  • Are they winter photos with snow or no leaves on trees?
  • Too much furniture in the photos?
  • Is it vacant? Add some staging furniture.

Head back out to your listings with your digital camera and take tons of photos. You can even move furniture around and shoot from different angles. Do things like take stuff off the kitchen counters and magnets off the refrigerator. Then decide which ones look the best for right now and replace the old ones with the new.

Next, review your MLS remarks on each listing. Are they up to date? Are you using abbreviations that the buying public doesn’t understand? If it’s important, write it out. Change them around a little bit and really think about a buyer’s emotional ‘Hot Buttons’. Why would they want to buy your listing?

Your listings need an edge! Put your listing’s best foot forward.

First impressions are very important, because if you don’t motivate the buyer to salivate over your listing, they may be gone forever.

There are too many choices available for buyers right now, so do what you have to do to get them to select your listing.

Consider seller incentives, whether paying for the buyer’s closing costs or pay for a temporary or permanent interest rate buy-down or paying condo fees for 6 months to one year. Ask your lender partner about how to do this. Ultimately, your listing needs to be listed in the right value range or none of this will matter. Don’t offer agent incentives - how is that going to motivate a buyer? Make sure that whatever you offer that’s over and above the price is legal in your area. Check with your broker, etc.

Also, where are you posting your listing besides in your local MLS system? There are many web sites that the buying public goes to in addition to the local real estate company sites.

Here’s a couple to post on:

  • zillow.com
  • trulia.com
  • cyberhomes.com
  • google.com
  • yahoo.com
  • different blogs

You can also buy a domain name address for your listing, i.e. 1234MainSt.com. There are services out there that offer this type of property-specific web site.

One final point: Are your sellers motivated enough to sell? Are they being unrealistic or living in a dream world when it comes to pricing? You know in your heart if they are or not. Have you counseled them enough about how your market really is right now? Do you send them weekly updates on what’s happening the market? If they need a dose of reality, it’s your job to give it to them.

In most areas right now, there’s still a glut of inventory for sale. If you have an unrealistic or unmotivated seller, then you should seriously consider whether or not you want to waste your time and resources on that listing. Remember, you’re running a business. In order to be profitable, you need motivated buyers and sellers. I believe that quality clients are better than a lot of unqualified prospects. Make sure you take the time up front to interview and counsel prospects to see if they meet your standards. Otherwise, you’ll end up spinning your wheels and going nowhere.

To your success,

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Do You THINK Like A Top Agent?

Tuesday, July 15th, 2008
Do you want to be one of the top agents in your market?

If you want to become a “TOP-PROFITING”, real estate agent, then you first have to think and act like one.

What does that mean, Dan?

Are you serious about wanting to list and sell several million dollars worth of real estate each year?

I mean REALLY SERIOUS……not just ‘interested for the moment’?

How commited are you?

You see, it’s easy to dream about it and think that one day you too can be a top agent in your market.

Even though there’s always some amount of frustration at any level of business, top agents spend less time in their business than struggling agents, because they have systems in place to be able to do more transactions in less time.

People say they’d like to play golf like Tiger Woods. Oh, really? Would you be willing to do everything Tiger does and has done every day, every week, every year, for year after year?

If you got a sneak peek behind the scenes of how Tiger or any other successful professional runs their business, you’d be amazed and probably overwhelmed at laser-focused and commited they are to achieving their goals.

But the important thing to know is “They all took a first step!”

Top agents didn’t become masterful overnight. It’s a process…a journey.

Whether you build your business quickly or slowly, the more people you add to your team, the quicker you’ll be able to achieve your goals. But beware, because you need to have a business plan in place that shows you which systems, when effectively used, will make your business profitable.

It’s important to build a solid foundation first, so that your business doesn’t crumble later.

When writing your business plan, you must make it system-dependent, not people-dependent. What I mean by that is you need to hire a person who can handle the tasks of the system, not build a system around a
person. People come and go. You must be able to interchangibly move people in and out of working your various systems in order to make it all work smoothly.

Top agents also are very focused individuals. When they have 1 or 2 systems in place, i.e. FSBO system or Sphere of Influence system, they work on improving the effectiveness of that system until it’s running at
maximum capacity. They test-market different strategies within the system to see if they can increase their conversion rate. If they can get 2 additional clients per month by tweaking their system, that can generate tens of thousands of dollars of income over a 12-month period.

Don’t try to do 5 to 10 different target markets in your business plan. You’ll become a jack-of-all-trades and master of none. When you get really good and profitable at one or two systems, then look to add one additional system to the business plan.

Remember, growing your real estate business is a constant and never-ending journey. That’s what I love about real estate. You never have to retire, if you choose not to. You can build a book of business (your clientele) that you can serve over the years either by yourself or with the help of a team.

Every day in real estate is a new adventure.

You never know what’s going to happen and you can shape your business any way you like to make it a fun part of your in life.

To your success,

Dan

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All content copyrighted © 2008 - Dan Weis, Agent Success Coach

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Some Powerful Quotes To Live By…

Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
I was reading my Quotes Journal (I write down quotes from others that touch me) and I got to thinking that what you allow to infiltrate into your mind, your thoughts and your sub-conscious can make a big difference in your life.
Here are some of the quotes that I live by. If I know who wrote them, I will acknowledge them.
“Some people dream of success…while others wake up and work hard at it.”
Y.O.L.O. - You Only Live Once!
“If you help enough people get what they want, you’ll get what you want.” - Jim Rohn
“You have to be disciplined and keep your goals in front of you and know what it is that you want to accomplish.”
“If you knew you could not fail, what would you do?”
“Go to seminars/conferences to be around like-minded people, who are doing what you want to do.”
“Don’t go to bed until you complete every task on your list from today!”
“The truth is you already know the right things to do. The hard part is doing them!”
“Decide to get it done and take action today! Don’t delay another day!”
“What will get you out of bed in the morning for, when you don’t want to?” (That’s your WHY.)
“The key to your success is having the discipline to do the thing you must do, even when you don’t feel like doing them.”
“Most people give up just when they’re about to acheive success. They quit on the one yard line. They give up at the last minute of the game one foot from a winning touchdown.” - H. Ross Perot
“You are what you repeatedly do. Excellence is not an event, it’s a habit.” - Aristotle
“Action is a great restorer and builder of confidence. Inaction is not only the result, but the cause, of fear. Perhaps the action you take will be successful; perhaps different action or adjustments will have to follow. But any action is better than no action at all.” - Norman Vincent Peale
“Learn to enjoy every minute of your life. Be happy now. Don’t wait for something outside of yourself to make you happy in the future. Think how really precious is the time you have to spend, whether it’s at work or with your family. Every minute should be enjoyed and savored.” - Earl Nightingale
“The ability to discipline yourself to delay gratification in the short term in order to enjoy greater rewards in the long term is the indispensable prerequisite for success.” - Brian Tracy
“Any time you sincerely want to make a change, the first thing you must do is to raise your standards. When people ask me what really changed my life eight years ago, I tell them that absolutely the most important thing was changing what I demanded of myself. I wrote down all the things I would no longer accept in my life, all the things I would no longer tolerate, and all the things that I aspired to becoming.” - Anthony Robbins
“Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.”
“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.”
“Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strength. When you go through hardship and decide not to surrender, that is strength.” - Arnold Schwarzenegger
“Energy is the essence of life. Every day you decide how you’re going to use it by knowing what you want and what it takes to reach that goal, and by maintaining focus.” - Oprah
“Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.” - Og Mandino
You really need to read some of these quotes a couple of times to get the true meaning of them. They are powerful!
When the real estate market is tough, it’s time to tilt your head forward and run like a bull. Avoid all of the negativity. Don’t watch the news or read the newpapers. Stay focused on your goals. Tweak your marketing strategies to help get your listings sold. Continue to educate your home sellers about what’s happening in their market. Are they doing everything you’ve asked them to do? Have you told them everything they need to do? Now is not the time to be bashful. You are their real estate expert!
There is business out there. I just listed 3 homes in the last 2 days. They are motivated sellers. I also just had another client take their home off the market after 5 weeks - they wanted to sell, but didn’t HAVE to sell. Now is the time for serious, motivated sellers. If there’s excess inventory in your area, when you schedule a listing appt, find out before you go if the seller really needs to sell.
To your success,
Dan


I would love to know which quotes have motivated you in your life. Please send me yours at dan@agentsuccesscoach.com.

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Are You Where You Thought You’d Be?

Tuesday, July 1st, 2008
We’re now at the halfway mark of 2008.

How is your year going so far?

Are you were you thought you’d be with the number of closings or dollar volume in your real estate sales?

Did you start the year out with a business plan?

If yes, but you’re not where you thought you’d be, review your plan. Are you doing the strategies that were necessary to have a good year?

Is your income not keeping up with your expenses?

I read an article recently that talked about when agents earn more money, they often times end up with less of it in the end. It got me to thinking.

If you go from making $40,000 in a year to doubling it to $80,000 a year, that sounds great. But the problem is many people then trade in their Ford for a Lexus or sell their 3 bedroom home for a larger 4 bedroom home.

Unless you’re paying a large percentage in cash, you’re trading a little bit of debt for a larger amount of debt. In reality, you’re still in debt, but at a much higher level. You’re putting a financial ball and chain around your leg.

Your newfound increase in income is only giving you more stress and headaches to worry about and pay for.

Don’t let this happen to you!

Work towards becoming debt-free!

Forget about instant gratification!

Get out of your monthly debt first!

Learn to live below your means and pay more things off.

It can be nice to not have 1 or 2 monthly car payments.

Sock some money away for an emergency fund.

You have the power to decide how to spend every dollar you make. You don’t have to keep up with the Joneses.

Do you really want to be like everyone else? You’d be amazed at just how how fragile many families financial situations really are. Work towards building a solid foundation around you and your family.

You should also look at your business expenses. I’ve talked about this in the past. With the age of the Internet, digital photography, web sites, blogs, videos and audios, advertising mediums are going through a big change and expensive print advertising is one area you may be able to decrease your expenses in.

Now I’m not saying to stop all print advertising. You need to analyze what’s working in your market and determine what’s the best use of your marketing plan dollars.

Take a snapshot of your expenses so far this year and see if you can move your money from any ineffective areas of marketing to another area that will give you a better return on your investment.

Please don’t do wasteful, ineffective marketing just because your seller wants you to. Be strong enough in your presentation to show your sellers what it really takes to sell their home in this market.

By determining the most effective way to utilize your marketing dollars, you can actually increase your business by focusing on the marketing and advertising strategies that work in today’s marketplace.

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