Are You Selling, or Being Sold?

People have gotten, and will continue to get, into real estate for a number of reasons.  Many don't want to be held to a schedule.  Lots don't want to be told what to do.  Some say they want to help people.  And, of course, there's the potential for all that money.  
And while many other sales jobs, like pharmaceutical sales and investment brokeraging have extensive audition processess and sales training to get, and keep, your job, the real estate industry only has a laws and definitions course to get your license.  There is no standard sales training or coaching; it's all voluntary. 

Now, some brokerages offer in-house sales training/coaching, and some of it is actually quite good if you stick with it, which most agents do not.  And, many brokerages simply do not have proper sales training.
The result of this is roughly an average of about 4-6 homes sold per agent, per year . That means the average agent is selling a house only every 60-90 days.
There are a few reasons for this.  One reason, as I mentioned above, is the lack of good, quality here's-where-and-how-to-find-the-business-and-here's-what-to-say-and-how-to-say-it-when-you-do-find-the-business coaching/training. 
Another reason is that many of real estate agents are order takers and not order makers.  These are agents who don't actively look for business, rather they wait for it to come to them.  And when they do get potential business, they take the listings overpriced and run their buyers to 50 different houses and submit ridiculously low-ball offers.  An agent like this will consider anyone they talk to that owns a home as a potential lead, yet never actually ask them to set an appointment, or list their home with them...then they're surprised when that person lists and sells with another agent.  They'll also lose many buyers to other, more aggressive agents.
And, finally, many agents aren't actually doing the selling.  They are being sold to by the prospect or client.
Let me show you what I mean with the questions below.  Let's find out who's doing the selling.  Is it you, the professional salesperson, or is your prospect/client doing the selling on your incoming/outgoing calls, door knocks, open houses, showing and listing presentations, offer presentations and negotiations?
Prospects- When making outgoing calls/door knocking, talking to call-in buyers, or sitting in open houses...

Do you find yourself answering a lot of questions and/or justifying your, or your company’s track record?
Do you typically mutually end a conversation with a listing prospect because they said they’re going to wait for the market to get better, re-list with the same agent, or they already have an agent in mind? ("Oh, ok.  Thank you for your time.  Take care.")

Do you find yourself mostly talking to dial tones instead of finishing conversations with buyer call-ins, because they just wanted the price, or say they’re already working with another agent, rather than setting an appointment with you?
Do you run into people who don’t sign in at your open houses, or ask you tons and tons of questions about the house, then tell you they’re already working with an agent.  Or when you call them to follow up, they don’t respond?
Appointmentswith Sellers
Do you find your listing presentation is mostly answering their questions and handling objections (usually about commission)?
Do you have a lot of listing appointments that end in “we want to think about it?”
Do you typically get less than 50% of the listings you go on?  Or, are you above 50% because you mostly only take friend and family listings?
Do you find yourself taking overpriced listings and/or cutting your commission because that's the only way the seller will list with you?
Appointments with Buyers
Are you taking your buyers to what seems like virtually every house on the market in their price range?
Are you taking buyers to homes that are above the price range they originally told you they wanted?
Are your buyers making you take them to homes that don’t fit what they say they wanted…maybe just because they “want to rule it out”?
Are your buyers making very low-ball offers?
If your market has it, are you afraid to ask your buyers to sign a Buyer Agency Agreement?
Do you work with buyers who haven’t yet gotten pre-qualified by a local lender?
Negotiations
Do you let what other agents tell you about their clients and offers/counter offers affect how you present to your clients?
Do you let your client do exactly what they want, even though calling the other agent back in 30 seconds, not countering, or telling the other party to go pound sand might actually hurt the deal?
These questions are a checklist, if you will, to size up who is doing the selling…you, or the other party.  If you answered “yes” to even a quarter of those questions, unfortunately, you’re the one being sold to.
3 Basic Tips on How to Avoid Being Sold To
1. Always, always, always ask questions.  Asking questions is tantamount to selling.  I would go so far as to say you could consider answering a question with a question.  Regardless, after validating what the other party asked or said, your default response in all interactions should be to ask another question.
Ask questions about what they’re looking to do, how soon they want to do it, why they want to do it.  Anything to find out their motivation and how you can best help them.
If you’re answering a lot of questions, and not asking a lot of them, the other party is in control of the conversation and selling you.
2. Know and believe in the stats.  I’m not saying you should spout off statistics every chance you get, however if a potential seller asks how you/your company is any different from their last agent,  it would be helpful to know that 70% of the listings on the market don’t sell, yet you sell 60% of yours.  Or, it might help to know that your listings sell 30 days faster, on average, than the average listing in the market…or for 3% more money than the average listing sells for (list to sale price ratio).
Stats go a long way when, for example, a For Sale By Owner gives you an objection, and you know that no matter what they think, the actual empirical data shows they will a) most likely not sell their home and, b) get 15-27% less than if they sold with an agent…if they actually do sell (according to CREA yearly studies).
3.  Get, read, learn, practice and memorize scripts and objection handlers.  Part of the reason the average agent only sells about four to six homes a year in a good market is because so many get caught off guard.  They wing their prospecting and presentations, and don’t know what to say when someone has a question or objection.
Just remember, you’re the professional salesperson.  You're the one doing the selling...don’t be sold to.

If any of the above makes sense, we should talk if you are not doing at least a deal a month!

   While I was helping another agent the other day , I  started writing down the things I've learned from being in this market and still having a successful business, here is what I wrote:

1.  Sometimes it will truly take hard work, long hours, and dedication to keep a business afloat.  Accept and just do it.

2.  Staying away from the news and media is a must to maintain a strong mindset.

3.  Isolation is sometimes necessary to do the things others are unwilling to do.  Continuously talking to people about how horrible the market is and what's not working isn't going to lead to your success.  Isolate yourself if necessary.

4.  Carefully track where your business is coming from so you know what's working and what's not.  You should know where every single deal initiated from.

5.  Choose what works for you and do it.  Don't allow yourself to be overwhelmed with all the different avenues of growing your business.  It's just like the chewing gum section at the convenient stores, there's too many choices!  Find your niche and stick with it.  You can become the best at whatever you choose but being involved in too many different things will only lead to stress, overwhelm, and an unpredictable business at best.

6.  It's imperative that you know your market statistics.  And by that I mean detailed statistics.  Whether working with buyers or sellers they're looking for your knowledge and expertise to guide them in these unstable times.  Be prepared to confidently answer questions about average list price, sales price, days on market, list to sales price ratio, number of homes for sale, sold, and not sold in your market. 

7.  Dress for success.  If you look professional and well put together, automatically confidence exudes you. Consumers want confidence.

8.  Be honest, don't tell sellers what they want to hear just because it's the easy and comfortable way.  They need to know the truth about the price and length of time it may take to get their home sold.  Don't just try to take the listing and get out the door.  Later, you'll wish you had educated them ahead of time.  The more they know up front the better for both of you.

9.  Take care of yourself.  Eat better, exercise more, drink more water, and go to bed earlier.  It takes much more out of you to sustain a tough market so you've got to put that much more in.

10.  Talk to and study what other top agents are doing.  Don't be jealous of them or just shrug off that you can never do what they do.  You can and will if you want to.  Ask them to lunch or for coffee so you can pick their brain and learn from them.  If you aren't comfortable talking with agents in your marketplace then Google top agents across Canada and call some and ask for a few minutes of their time.  You'll be surprised at how willing and honored they'll be to support you.

11.  Whatever you are around on a daily basis is what you will become.  Pay close attention to who you spend your time with and what you spend your time doing.  If you want to have a highly successful business it takes different choices.

12.  You must have highly efficient streamlined administrative systems in place to handle the back end of your business.

13.  It's imperative that you have strong affiliates who are willing to support you.  Lenders who don't need you to do their job by pre-qualifying buyers or doing loan applications.  Lawyers who don't need you to co-ordinate closing times, surveys, homeowners insurance, and title searches.  Find highly competent affiliates, meet with them to discuss your expectations of them, and then get out of the way and let them do their job while you do yours which is to sell more houses. 

14.  Know what to say and how to say it when handling questions and objections from your clients and other agents.  I have a collection of over 400 answers to more than 70 of the most common questions and objections we face in real estate.  You can purchase a copy if you'd like to discover some proven ways of handling objections. 

15.  You have to continuously work on price reductions if your listings aren't selling.  I can't tell you the number of times I get a call from an expired listing and the first thing they say is "I never heard from my agent, I thought we should reduce the price but my agent never discussed it with me".  First of all to list a house and never communicate with your seller is completely unacceptable.  You should be communicating with them on a consistent basis that goes without saying.  But you should also discuss with them at the listing that in this market if the home isn't selling you need to continually look at whether or not the price needs to be adjusted to remain competitive with the market.  If you educate them up front this will much easier when time to adjust the price. And whenever discussing a price reduction don’t call it a price reduction call it a price adjustment.  The word reduction just doesn't feel good to a seller.

16.  Before you ever give advice to a customer or client always align with them first.  This is something you'll see throughout the objection handler book I mentioned above.  Before we handle an objection we always align with the client and let them know we are their side.  Validate their question, concern, or objection.  Say things like; I understand, that makes sense, most people feel just like you do.  Before negative news say things like unfortunately, I hate to have to tell you this, I wish it weren't this way.  This sounds simple and almost as if we would naturally do it but if you pay attention to your communication I bet you'll discover that you rarely do it if at all.  As Zig Ziglar says, "people don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care".

17.  Clean up, clean out, and organize everything in your life.  Your car, your home, your office, your closets.  If you aren't using it or haven't in over 6 months throw it away.  Clutter only clutters the mind and create unrealistic overwhelm and sense of busyness that isn't really there.  Cleaning up, cleaning out, and organizing makes room for fresh new stuff and time to truly be busy doing income producing things. Relationships too, if you need to forgive, clear up, or sometimes sever relationships then do so.  To not do so is a heavy load to carry.

18.  Have a goal and business plan for what you want to do in your business and in your life.  Don't just aimlessly begin every day.  Have a purpose, a scheduled, and a pre determined goal of what you want to do each day, week, and month to accomplish your goals for the year.  Read this and recreate as necessary.  Things change, the market changes, we change.  The business plan doesn't have to be the end all, it's a guide to get you to your destination and sometimes there are road blocks and detours that have to be overcome.  Speaking of which, as these occur in your life be like water and continue flowing around them.  To stop wouldn't lead water to larger bodies of water just as your stopping won't lead you to your large goals and dreams.

19.  Look at your expenses on a monthly basis and stop spending where not necessary on things that aren't benefiting your life or your business.  You have heard me talk about Green Light, Red Light. Know your finances and know them well.  A great coach of mine once told me if you can control your money, your weight, and your environment you can have anything in life you want.  I believe this and have lived by this rule ever since.

20.  Speaking of coaches, it would highly benefit you to have one.  And no, I'm not saying this so you'll join my brokerage or hire  me, however I would love to support you and teach you everything I know to help you get where you're going.  Whether it's me or another coach having one will without a doubt help you get where you're looking to go easier and faster than you'll do it on your own.  You'll have someone in your corner that has been where you want to go holding you accountable, and teaching you everything you need to know to get there. 

Do you go on a long road trip without a map showing you how someone else has gotten there?  Not likely.  The same should hold true for your goals and dreams.  Why would you try to get there without a road map?  Money, yes it will cost money but the best investment you will ever make is in yourself. 

When I started my business 9 years ago where I didn't know hardly anyone in London, I  had no money and my life partner was quite ill.  I knew I wanted a highly successful business in real estate but didn't know how to get there or what to do. 

I hired my first coach for $1,500 a month.  $18,000 for the year.  Even completely broke it didn't seem like too much to me.  I figured if they could help me sell ten or twelve homes that year it would pay for it.  And if I did what they actually told me to do I would do that and much more.  Which I did, I sold 41 homes my first year in the business in a city where I didn't know hardly anyone, and get this, the big ‘shooters’ in the office said I was wasting my time, that stuff doesn’t work!

Guess what, 3 of them are broke, 6 are no longer in business and 2 I really remember well are really struggling. I should add however, those who embraced what I was doing encouraged me, helped and to this day, are doing quite well in London. 

It proves that by helping others, even so called competitors, can really help you more!

If I can do it, you can do it too.  I would love to help you get there.  If not me, then choose someone who can. 

I was speaking to a group of real estate sales people the other day and they had asked me why I had such a great passion for real estate. I asked them if they really thought that they

provided superior value to their clients? Some said “absolutely.” Some didn’t know.

I asked them the question differently. I said, “Well let me ask you these

questions: If I chose another real estate agent over you, would he/she represent me at the

same level? Would he/she research the market? Would he/she market me to other

realtors? Because that’s what you really are when you list the property – you’re a

marketing agent whose job it is to sell that property to other agents.”

Next, I said, “Would other agents negotiate, research, identify opportunities for

me to buy the same way? Would they negotiate the transaction? Would they hand-hold

it? Would they fight to get me the lowest rates? Would they negotiate to give me a lower

cost that most people have to pay?”

And they said, “No – we do things that other people don’t.”

I said let’s take some scenarios. If a family had come to you eager to sell their

house for any number of reasons, either positive or negative. And you helped them

realize a greater outcome than they thought they could get. (i.e., They thought they were

going to have to sell for $200,000 but you were able to get them $215,000. They thought

it was going to take three months and you were able to do it in two months.)

Didn’t you enrich their life?

But how well did you enrich it? First of all, you took one month worth of

uncertainty out of their life by selling the house quickly. Or, you put several thousand

extra dollars in their pocket, money they otherwise wouldn’t have had. Money for

retirement. Money for paying bills or to invest in their new house, or use to fund

education or holidays.

If you help somebody who thought he/she could only afford a $300,000 house get a $350,000 house because you got them a better rate, then you are looking out for your

clients well being. You increased their life style. You moved them into a different

environment. You gave them more than they expected.

Conversely, if somebody thought they were going to have to spend $350,000 but

you were able to get them a house for $300,000 that was even bigger and better, you

changed the quality of their life. You gave them enough money so they could do so

many more things.

Just look at the impact of your efforts. You did them so much more than you’ve

ever given yourself credit for. Didn’t you really enrich their life at a deep level? Didn’t

you have a major impact?

And they said yes. And I said, well, if that’s the case, and you invested three or

four months of your life in the relationship, didn’t you? And they said yes.

And I said, did you get emphatically involved in their hopes, their dreams, their

needs, their situation? All the key issues? Their complexities? Their family problems or

situations? Yes?

I said, didn’t you really befriend them? And they said yes.

So didn’t they reciprocate and befriend you? They said yes. Then doesn’t that

mean you have a very deep, rich friendship which you invested in? And they said yes.

Would you just drop any other friend of yours and let them fall out of your life

after you had one social transaction with them? And they said no.

So I said they why would you let that happen with this friendship?

If they are dear and a valued friend,

would you let any other friend let a dangerous    mistake? Would you let any other friend really jeopardize their life? Would you let any other friend let somebody important to them do something stupid or dangerous or inadvisable? And they said no.

Then why would you allow any important friend of yours who is a past client, let

any important friend of theirs or a relative or family member or co-worker do anything

that was dangerous? In the scope of any given period of time, or in the lives of any

important friend or yours, i.e., a former client, there are so many people whose lives are changing.

They’re getting older and they’re outgrowing their house because their children

are gone and they need a smaller place. They’re getting married and they need a bigger

place. They have been married and living in an apartment but now they have children

and they’re ready to make a commitment. They have a death in their family and they

have a necessity to downsize. They have a divorce in their family and they have a

necessity to downsize. They have a move, or reversal in their business, and they have a

necessity to downsize. They have a great achievement and great richness and they have a

necessity to expand. They’re blessed with richness and maybe they’re pregnant and they

need to expand.

The point is constant, constant flux. Constant dynamic change. People who are

important, valued friends to people who are your valued friends, deserve to have the best

reasoned, the best informed, the most objective and knowledgeable advice they possibly

can get about important emotional decisions. Because they could get into someone’s unscrupulous clutches and make a critical decision that could negatively impact a big

portion of their lives and finances.

Don’t you then owe it to your past clients, who are your valued friends to contact

them and tell them that you care deeply about them and if anybody in their lives is at

these crossroads, you want to encourage them to refer them to you if for nothing more

than just to get your best judgment on something. It doesn’t matter whether they

ultimately take advantage of your services. It just matters to you that they at least get the

best take they can on the situation before they make an ill-advised decision.

That awareness of the value people have created, of the friendships and the

investment and the importance of their past clients and others who are important to them

helped a bunch of real estate agents double and triple their sales. And in the process they

had even more fun by making more great contributions to their clients’ lives than ever

imaginable. You can do the same.

You need to recognize the impact you have on peoples’ lives in the business you

are conducting. What you render, the way you are conducting. What you render, the way you render it, has changed their lives. It has helped enriched them. It has helped their security. 

Half the real estate deals that do not work out are from poor negotiation, ego (sometimes from both) and usually stubborness! If you doubt me, go over the last 5-6 deals that did not work out, reflect and see if it wasn't one of the 3 above, 

As a REALTOR and a Broker of Record and owner of a boutique real estate brokerage in London Ontario, here are four tips to help you negotiate and succeed in most real estate markets:

1. Know the market.Without exception those who have the most information and use it wisely win negotiations. So know the average days on market, list-to-sell price ratios, home amenities and all the other basics. Today's homebuyers are educated and well versed in the home buying process, due mostly to the Internet. Nevertheless, moving from renter to homeowner is daunting and so many need an agent for guidance and expertise. Be an expert in your market!

2. Know buyers’ motivations. Relative to knowing the market is knowing (and understanding) buyers. Are they moving with a job? What’s their timeframe? Do they like the school district? Real estate professionals often ask me how to get buyers off the fence. The answer? Understand buyers by asking the right questions. And that means sharpening your scripts so that you ask open-ended questions and unearth key information about your buyers and their motivations.  

3. Create a sense of urgency. Smart buyers know there are deals to be had, and they don’t want to lose out on a good deal. Will interest rates start to rise? Just maybe. And even though there are homes on the market, don’t think buyers won’t start snapping up those good properties at any time. And remember the power of suggestion. Use this statement: “Here’s what I recommend we do …” kind of verbiage will often get the buyer moving toward action.

4. Be prepared to compromise.It’s rare when win-win actually means that the buyer and seller got everything they wanted. In the real world, it means they both did their share of give and take. So instead of negotiating from a I-must-win-at-all-costs position, stay focused on your top priorities and keep your emotions in check. And be careful and tactful with how you respond to offers you know you won’t accept. You’ve done your homework to arrive at the asking price, so explain that to those who make offers instead of a flat rejection. 

And remember, when buyers and sellers get serious, the only thing that closes the deal is competent negotiation.

The article below was written by Lisa Orme and I feel her blog here describes what it takes to get ahead in real estate sales and that real estate is a business, not a job.

Treat it as a business and choose who you start out with if you are new to the business, your chance of success depends on it.

Large is not better and small may not neccessary be any better but hands on coaching and training (and not the book stuff) will really help you.

Ty