Love and Your Real Estate Career

This is Valentine’s week, so thoughts of love are in the air. All the candy and flowers speak of romantic love, but as most of us know, there are many more varieties of love.

I love my husband and sons, my dogs, my friends, and… the smell of new mown hay, huckleberries, and a nice nap in the afternoon. And that’s merely the beginning of a long, long list.

I also love you for reading my posts, I love my customers who use my prospecting letters, and love those who hire me to write custom copy, such as their agent bios, community pages, and custom letters.

I love getting comments and suggestions for post topics and letter sets. I love it when someone spots a typo in my work and writes or calls to let me know about it.

But this is about YOU and your real estate career (or any career, for that matter).

There are two points to consider:

• What do you love most about your real estate career?
• Are you letting your career get in the way of your “other loves?”

What you love about your real estate career:

As a real estate professional you wear dozens of hats. You may love some of them and wish you could take others off and stomp on them. So why don’t you do it?

Take a little time to think about that. Whatever you love to do, you do best. It’s fun and energizing and you put your heart into it. Whatever you dislike doing, you probably don’t do well, because your heart isn’t in it.

Are there ways to do more of what you love and permanently hand those other hats to someone else?

Maybe you love dealing face to face with clients but dislike entering listings into MLS.

Maybe you dread doing those mundane tasks like putting up signs, filling flyer boxes, and keeping your car clean and filled with fuel. (That would be me – I really don’t like going to the gas station.)

Maybe you love working with first time buyers or investors who buy fixers, but go after the high-end clients because there’s more money to be made.

Maybe you love working only with buyers but take listings because someone says you must – or it’s the other way around.

Maybe you love writing web pages, prospecting letters, postcards, property descriptions, etc. that help bring the buyers and sellers to your door, but don’t want to list or show homes. (This was where I found myself after 18 years in real estate – so I switched careers.)

Maybe you love marketing through social media – or maybe you only do it because you know it will help give you more exposure and thus more clients and closings.

Stop and think about those tasks you don’t love.

Some things, like entering MLS data, putting up signs, and keeping your car clean and full of fuel can easily be handed to an assistant.

You might say “But I can’t afford it.” Are you sure? Have you looked into what it costs? Does it cost more per hour than you could make if you were in front of clients in those hours?

Then there are the clients you choose to work with.

Yes – you do choose. You choose via your marketing, which is why so many of us urge agents to develop niches and to use your marketing to attract people in those niches.

If you really prefer working with either buyers or sellers, why are you still doing both?

If your marketing brings in both buyers and sellers and you only want to work with one or the other, share the ones you don’t want with a partner or refer them to someone who will pay you a fee.

And thinking of niches… when you work with the properties and people you love most, two things will happen. You’ll be happier and healthier, AND you will close more transactions. Read this post from last June to see why.

What about marketing?

If you love marketing more than dealing with clients, why not affiliate yourself with a team and become their marketer? Do all the writing and marketing for the entire team and receive a percentage of every sale. Perhaps you could even negotiate something like a salary plus a percentage for doing the marketing for your entire brokerage.

If you really don’t like marketing, you can turn to people like me. You probably know that I have 40+ sets of pre-written prospecting letters available. I also write custom letters, agent bios, property descriptions, and real estate web pages of all kinds.

QUOTES OF THE WEEK

“We are supposed to enjoy the good stuff now, while we can, with the people we love. Life has a funny way of teaching us that lesson over and over again.”
Sheena Easton
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“If you have only one smile in you give it to the people you love.”
Maya Angelou

~~~

Back to your Other Loves…

Are you paying attention to them? Are you making time for them?

Whether it’s the people you love or the activities you love, they do need your time and attention. After all, what is the point of working and making money if you aren’t enjoying your life and the people you love aren’t enjoying your company?

I know – you have way too much to do. That’s another good reason to hire someone to do the tasks you don’t love doing.

As for giving your clients exceptional service:

No reasonable client will expect you to be available 24 hours of every day. They know you aren’t a robot. They know you have a life outside of work.

So set some boundaries. Tell clients that you’re only available between X a.m. and Y p.m. While you’re at it, if your family sits down to dinner together at a certain time each evening, let people know that if they call between certain times, you’ll be unavailable but will return the call ASAP. Then turn off the phone and talk with the people you love.

I just read an email today about Attention Deficit Marriage – does that describe you? How about Attention Deficit Children? They’ll be grown before you know it, so make time for them.

The same goes for doing things that energize you. It really is OK for you to take time for a game of golf, a boat ride, a horseback ride, a card game, a book club meeting, or an evening spent dancing.

The truth is simple: As long as you do what you say you’ll do, good people will respect you and will respect your ”real life” time. Love them for it.

People who don’t respect you aren’t worth having as clients.

I wish you a Happy Valentine’s Day – every day.

Love key courtesy of Stuart Miles @ freedigitalphotos.net
Woman washing a car Image courtesy of Witthaya Phonsawat at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Love each other courtesy of cuteimage at FreeDigitalPhotos.net