Top 5 Tips to Jump Start Your New Career in Real Estate

With the market being so “hot” right now in most areas, many people are looking to get into real estate as a career. The ease of getting your license and the appeal of making your own hours and unlimited income seem irresistible. But breaking into the market isn’t as easy as people think, and the failure rate is high. Agents are seeking all kinds of coaches to help them get ahead. After being in the top 1% of sales in the country and having closed over 650 homes in my 12 years in the business I have this advice to give the newcomer.

LEARN THE MARKET
- Go to new construction neighborhoods every day. Talk to the on-site agents and learn what their inventory is.
- Schedule agent previews on homes in one neighborhood at a time, learn the local market and become an expert.
- Preview investment properties, take videos, and run comparables as practice to learn what is a “good buy”
- Attend Agent open houses, but don’t linger there and gab, you are a busy, successful agent. Get in, and get out
NETWORK
- Join a networking group, if you can find one that doesn’t have a real estate agent already. If you can’t find one, make your own. Meet weekly and exchange leads
- Wear your name tag EVERYWHERE you go
- Bring your business cards everywhere, leave them wherever you can
- Meet local business owners and ask them for referrals, let them know that you will be referring your clients to them in return.
- Get out of the house and office. Wherever you go keep in mind that meeting new people is part of your job.
ESTABLISH A SOCIAL MEDIA PRESENCE
- In todays day and age social media is a must to keep in front of your sphere of influence.
- Post regular updates about your family, life, kids, pets. AVOID any posts, comments, or photos that have anything to do with politics or controversial subjects. You may have a strong opinion about next weeks election, but your friends may not all feel the same. Why exclude half of your friends by appearing too one sided on social media.
- Social media is reality. In the outside world’s eye, what you post is what is real. We all know in our hearts this isn’t true, but unfortunately that’s the truth of today’s society. Feeling down one day? Break up with someone? We don’t need to see your nasty hate posts, or vague read-between-the-lines crap.
- Stay positive and stay classy! Your image is your first impression
- Make a goal to increase your sphere on social media at every event you go to add friends and followers.
- If you don’t have any listings, ask a successful top producer if you can borrow one of their listings to promote, and of course give them credit for the listing, but you are shopping for a buyer for their amazing listing. Promote it to your social media sphere.
- 80/20 rule….20 % of your content about real estate, the rest about you, your life and interesting things that draw attention to your posts.
FOLLOW UP
- When someone asks you “How’s the Market”, this is an opening to get their contact information and put them in your pipeline for future business. Your answer should be “That depends, where do you live?” and begin a conversation about keeping them update on the stats in their neighborhood. Ask them if it’s ok to mail them the activity in their neighborhood once a month to keep them up on the current sales. Most people will be happy to have you provide this service. When it comes time to sell their homes they will have you in the forefront of their mind as an expert who has consistently e-mailed them with the information.
- Start with a great Contact Database and use it. Programs like Top Producer can help you keep on top of all the leads in you have and remind you to e-mail, or call them on a regular basis.
- Call your friends and sphere of influence regularly. Yes, e-mail and text is great, but a in person call goes a long way in todays market. Always ask “while I’ve got you on the phone, who do you know that is looking to buy, sell or invest in real estate?”
- Track down every lead, and continue to try to contact at least 14 times. Call, e-mail, text whichever you can do if you have their information. Internet leads are the toughest to wrangle. However, not many agents are consistent with follow-up. This can be the key to your success.
EXUDE PROFESSIONALISM
- Get up every day and get dressed for work!
- Get out of the office
- If you don’t know the answer to something “I don’t know the answer to that but I will find out and get back to you right away”
- Be honest and operate with your clients BEST interest ALWAYS!