For more than five years, we’ve traveled the country teaching real estate agents on a wide-variety of topics ranging from short sales to lead generation to hiring. After teaching thousands of real estate agents, it’s unfortunate to watch many agents distracted by the “shiny objects” that imprison them in their current financial situation while watching many more go broke before ultimately leaving the business.
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Every year, hundreds of thousands of new real estate agents “come in the front door of the business” while nearly the same number of real estate agents “exit out the back door of the industry.”
I’ve heard (not verified) that the attrition rate could be as high as 30 percent — what is wrong with this picture? Of the nearly 2 million licensed real estate agents (according to the National Association of Realtors) throughout the United States, very few are prospering at the level they once imagined. The dream of six-figure incomes and “I can create my own schedule” may be alive and well on HGTV, but in the real estate world most of us live in, it’s a farce.
Let’s examine the three reasons that you’re not making more money in real estate (or making a living at all) …
1. Leads. The greatest tragedy of real estate schools in America is that they fail to discuss how to generate real estate leads. Real estate school is a great crash-course in state laws, federal laws and receiving a passing score on your real estate exams, but, it fails to teach the most fundamental part of any business — lead generation.
What good is a real estate license if you can’t find anyone looking to buy or sell real estate to practice your specialty on?
2. Skills. If you can overcome the first hurdle and learn to generate leads, the next hurdle many real estate agents encounter is a lack of skills-based training; meaning, they don’t know what to say.
They simply don’t know how to effectively communicate with home buyers and sellers because they haven’t spent any time training and developing these skills.
3. Mindset. We all deal with doubt and fear; the question is, how do you respond to those doubts and fear?
What do you set your mind on each and every day? How quickly do you recover from your self-doubt?
How to turn the tide
Being a professional real estate agent can be one of the most rewarding careers on the planet, but it can also be one of the most stressful. As Theodore Roosevelt said, “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.”
If you’re determined to rise above the “lost and broke” in our industry, here are three things that can change the course of your real estate career.
1. Commit to educating yourself on the best practices in lead generation and to focusing on lead generation a minimum of two hours every day. Not sure where to start? (Register for an Inman event and learn and implement lead generation strategies from industry experts.)
2. Find a scripts and dialogue partner in your real estate brokerage or via an online forum like a real estate Facebook group and commit daily to practicing scripts and dialogues. Start by practicing a sign call script or Internet lead script — these are great foundational scripts.
3. Commit to setting your mind right at the beginning of each day and find an accountability partner, mentor and/or coach who is willing to invest themselves in to your success and cheer you on from the sidelines!
After years of growing a real estate team and expanding our business in to multiple markets, we can assure you that if you’ll follow these simple steps, you’ll begin to see your career take off and your bank account grow to new heights.
Fred Weaver is the co-founder of the Group 4610 Real Estate Network; you can follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
