December 31st is one of the most important days for entrepreneurs.
On this day you can create tax deductions that count for the
whole year. (Please talk to your tax adviser or accountant to verify my
suggestions.)
It is also a great day to review the transactions you closed
in 2018, figure out how much you earned (before and after splitting commissions
with your broker), and analyze which lead sources are most profitable for you.
6 Actions to Take on the Last Day of the Year
1. Buy Business Equipment
like a new laptop or cell phone and pay with your credit card. You need to put it in use today, so don’t order online. Most likely you can write off the full purchase price in 2018 and pay off your credit card 45 days from now.
2. Pre-Pay Bills Due in January
As long as you send the check today you can deduct it as a business expense for 2018. This includes property taxes on rental properties that are due on January 20, 2019.
3. Delay Income
by pushing the payout of your final closings to January. Less income in 2018 means lower taxes.
4. Make a Donation
to your favorite charity. Most take credit cards online. Even if you can’t deduct it from your taxes, it makes you feel good and you help others in need. Looking for a good charity to donate to? Check out Charity Navigator.
5. Analyze Your Closing
Prepare a list of all transactions you closed in 2018. If you don’t have a spreadsheet yourself (you should!) you can download the list from the MLS. For each closing ask yourself where the lead came from and how much money (if any) you had to invest in marketing to generate this lead.
6. Set 3 Goals for 2019
I suggest you set a goal for how many transactions you want to close and how much you want to earn (profit). Then set a personal goal (like a trip you want to take with your family or the new car you want to buy). As you can imagine, setting 3 goals for 2019 is not enough. Write down specific actions you will take in the first 10 days of January and prepare a detailed plan later this week.
We appreciate all of you who support Columbus Real Estate Coach and continue to embark on greater success in your real estate career! Good luck in 2019!
Our office is small, our agents are dedicated and hard-working, and we focus on growth and productivity throughout the year.
But … we also have a lot of fun!
Last Friday we had our annual Christmas Party at the RAM Brewery in Dublin. The secret gift exchange was one of the highlights of the evening – see pictures below.
On a more serious note …
… as the year comes to an end I would like to share with you 3 tips to win more listings in this changing market.
Strategies to Get More Listings in 2019
Next year will be different than 2018. Over the past few months we saw how the housing market began to “normalize”. This means fewer buyers, higher inventories, longer list times, and more frequent price reductions.
In the second half of this year sellers accepted 5% discounts to get their homes sold (as compared to less than 1% in spring). According to NAR, 77% of homes will sell below list price in 2019.
Here are 3 strategies you should implement to get more listings.
1. Listing Presentation Skills
In a changing market you must use dialogues with confidence during your listing appointments. Experience, confidence, and honesty will win the day.
Confidence comes from practice. You need to practice your scripts. It’s best to practice with your coach, mentor or another agent, NOT with the client.
Tom Ferry published a great article (including video) on this topic: Pricing, Positioning and Being Direct.
Click here to watch the video and learn his killer scripts!
2. Go After Expired Listings
Many sellers have unrealistic expectations about the value of their homes. They are holding on to the believe that their house is worth more than their neighbor’s.
More listings will expire in the next few months than during all of 2018.
The good news is that most of the homeowners still want to sell. They already committed to sell with an agent. They just did not find the right one, yet.
These sellers are disappointed with their current Realtor. They are looking for new ideas and for an agent who confidently tells them what needs to be done to sell their house.
This is an excellent opportunity for you to shine. If you solve their biggest headache, i.e. sell their house, expireds will love you and become a great source for referrals.
3. Align with the Best Brand
As listings become harder to sell, homeowners will look for agents working with a reputable brand. It gives them confidence. They see the brand as the key to a successful sale.
The days are gone when anyone with a license could get a listing by discounting their commissions.
The personal brand you created through social media is great for referrals from your sphere, but it’s not enough to win listings in a competitive market.
Sellers want to be represented by a professional working for a well-known, global brand.
This fall the majority of Susanne’s listings came from sellers who fired their agents. They were looking for someone they can trust to get the job done.
RE/MAX was a big reason why Susanne received these calls.
I hope these tips will help you make 2019 your best year ever. If you are looking for a change, because you want to grow your business, you need a trusted brand behind you, or you want to personally work with me, don’t hesitate to call or text me at (614) 395-7375!
Staying in touch with the contacts in your database is one of the most important tasks of any business owner. We know we need to do it. But most agents don’t do it consistently. You want to keep it personal and encourage leads to call you when they are ready to buy, sell or refer a friend.
Let me show you 3 methods to automate the process.
Method 1: Personalized Mailers
Snail mail is still an excellent way to stay in touch with your database. It is more expensive than the other methods, so fewer agents use it consistently. That’s why you will stand out.
I like postcards, because the receiver sees the information right away. It’s best to send “sticky” content, like calendars, home improvement tips, even recipes. People will save these cards and keep your information handy.
Handwritten notes and hand addressed greeting cards are best for people you know well, because they will likely open the envelope.
With email you have 2 options: you either set up a drip campaign to automatically send ready-made emails to your list, or you write a weekly newsletter (like this email).
A drip campaign is totally automatic – once it’s set up. In our business we use a 30-week drip for listing leads with tips on how to get their home ready to sell. Drip campaigns take effort to set up, but once they are ready, you simply add names and emails.
The weekly newsletter option requires regular work. You have to sit down and create content every week. You must be consistent. The benefit is the currency of the information you provide. It also allows you to re-purpose the content for blog posts and videos.
Texting has become the best way to reach people. Only 35% of people pick up their phone if they don’t recognize the number, and email open rates are less than 20%.
There are services to automate texting, so you can send personalized messages to all your contacts. They even allow you to create drip campaigns that send texts on a regular basis.
On November 1st a group of 118 motivated sellers emerged in a niche that was almost forgotten during the hot seller’s market.
I am talking about homeowners who are committed to listing their property with an agent. The total market value of the properties they own is $ 29,067,937 with a commission value of around $1,744,076.
Would you like to learn how to grab a small part of this opportunity?
As you can see below, I am talking about expired listings.
The Comeback of a Targeted Niche
Expireds have skyrocketed as of November 1, 2018. And this is just an indication of what’s coming. As the market shifts it will be harder to sell houses, and more listings will expire.
This offers an exceptional opportunity for agents who know how to market to expireds and convert them into fresh, new listings.
Do you want to learn how to convert expireds? This is one of the topics I’ll cover during the Marketing Masterclass on Nov 14.
When homeowners list their properties and the listing expires, they are already committed to selling with a Realtor. They just need to find the right one.
Many agents don’t pursue expireds, because they assume, they have unreasonable expectations. You may believe that they don’t listen to their agents and that they are demanding too much money for their properties.
Maybe. But that’s not always the case.
Some expired listings simply need new positioning, new pictures, better staging, a fresh description, and a new sign in the yard.
What Does It Take to Convert Expireds?
Skill and persistence. Both are completely under your control.
There are many ways to market to expireds: you could call them, knock on their door or send postcards and letters.
When you talk to the seller you need to find out why they believe their home did not sell. There are only 3 possible reasons:
location
condition
price
You probably can’t change the first two, so you’ll need to “re-position the property” at a competitive list price.
Learn the Skills to be Successful
It takes skills and persistence to convert expireds.
I can teach you the skills: strategies to get expireds to call you, so you don’t have to door knock or cold call.
You will have to commit to persistently market to them and convert them to listings!
Don’t miss the Marketing Masterclass on November 14, 2018!
Many real estate agents tell me they have two challenges: not enough leads and not enough time.
Leads are the lifeblood of any business. Without a consistent flow of leads your business will die.
If you can’t find time to generate an abundance of leads your income will be unpredictable. This is the “feast and famine” cycle many agents experience.
Forget Cold-Calling
This is 2018, and most brokerages still teach cold-calling as the only way to find clients for your real estate business? Want to learn our secret?
Agents hate cold-calling and don’t do it consistently. That’s why many fail and don’t build a thriving business.
How do you react when a telemarketer calls to sell you Zillow leads?
Do you even pick up?
Appointments Are More Important Than Leads
Most agents claim they are great closers when they are in front of a prospect. So, it’s critical to set more appointments.
Appointments are a great indicator of the number of transactions you will close. The more appointments you can schedule, the more you will earn.
Unfortunately, many agents do not know how to keep their leads pipeline full. Without leads there are no appointments.
Here’s how I can help you …
Implementing Marketing Systems
I am a big believer in inbound marketing to attract motivated buyers and sellers. That’s what top producing Realtors do.
If you want to find out how the most successful agents run their marketing, I invite you to join me to the all-new Marketing Masterclass on November 14, 2018 at Columbus Realtors.
When we opened our brokerage in Dublin in 2012, we had NO referral clients. We had been selling HUD homes and foreclosures for 5 years during the Great Recession. None of these buyers were interested in expensive, suburban homes.
In just 3 years my wife Susanne grew her sales business to $15 million and 70 transactions. She did not get any referrals from her sphere in the first year. And, she did not make any outbound calls to strangers.
Would you be interested to learn how she did it?
Do you want to find out which systems she used to generate hundreds of inexpensive leads, how she converted these leads to appointments, and how she follows up with previous clients to get high quality referrals?
That’s exactly what I’ll be teaching in the new Marketing Masterclass.
You’re bombarded with training topics on a daily basis. Webinars, seminars, conferences, and events all compete for your already limited time and attention.
The purpose of training is to gain or improve the skills. It’s also about the knowledge you need to achieve your goals. If you don’t know what you’d like to achieve, you can’t know which training is right for you. That’s why you must start by setting goals.
Determine the Training Topics You Need
With goals in place, the next step is to ask yourself what knowledge and skills are necessary to attain them. For example, if you want to take more listings, you might need classes in seller lead generation, listing presentations, or property valuation.
Determining the training topics you need upfront is vital to your success. With so many training opportunities available, it’s easy to get distracted by classes that are irrelevant to your goals. Do you know any agents who never seem to get anything done? They’re always chasing shiny objects. Now you’ve seen the danger of attending irrelevant training.
Go Broad & Then Go Deep
Once you determine the training topics you will need. The next step is to decide whether to start by going deep on one topic or broad on several topics. As a general rule, if you’re unsure which topic will benefit you the most, start by going broad.
As you begin to implement the material from the different classes, pay attention to which training topic has the biggest impact on your business. That’s the topic you’ll want to dive deep into by attending – and repeating – classes on it.
Consider How You Learn Best
The final step in choosing the right training is considering how you learn best. You might do better in live training because there are fewer distractions than watching videos at home or in the office. Or, you might prefer videos because you can pause, rewind, and re-watch confusing or complex topics.
By the same token, you might enjoy the immersion of all-day or multi-day events and conferences. Or, you might like to do one training class at a time so you have a chance to absorb and implement the information.
Training isn’t nearly as valuable to you if it’s offered in a format or environment where you’ll struggle to retain the information.
P.S. – Mastery is an important component of training. Just as you catch new things when you watch a movie or read a book for the second time, you pick up new things every time you return to the same training class. Don’t make the mistake of assuming you only need to attend each class one time.
This is 2018, and most brokerages still teach cold-calling as the only way to find clients for your real estate business? Want to learn our secret?