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As a real estate author of three books and a life-long student of the industry, I try to read as many books as possible. Each year, I craft a list of the best real estate-related books published that year.
Last year, I had many eager authors contact me with requests to include them on this year’s list. My general criteria for consideration are as follows:
- The book needs to have published within the year of review
- It must be widely available in print
- The book must have generated a decent amount of sales
Not all books that I have read made the final cut. In fact, this year, there were quite a few that I decided to leave out due to lack of quality. Without any further ado, here are the real estate books from 2020 from newest to oldest.
1. Selling Through Relationships: Why Cold Calling Sucks and Relationships Win!
Katrina Madewell, Nov. 18, 2020
Forget constant cold calling — the best salespeople build their networks and book of businesses through relationship-building. They genuinely get to know their customers by investing their time and energy with integrity, honesty, excellent communication and insightful listening. If you’re in sales or just thinking of a career in sales, this book is for you.
2. World Class Admin Assistant
Michael Hellickson, Sarah Santa Ana, Tara Hellickson, Oct. 29, 2020
Assistants, agents who have an assistant and anyone contemplating hiring an assistant need to read this book. Everything, including how to hire and train your admin and checklists and systems they can implement in your business immediately, is included in this in-depth bible for real estate agent assistants.
3. Think Bigger: It’s Your Time – Step Into Leadership
Rebecca Donatelli, Oct. 7, 2020
Young Professionals Network (YPN) leader, Realtor and national speaker Rebecca Donatelli recounts her path to leadership, volunteering and success in the real estate business, including her experiences and challenges along the way — good, bad and ugly.
4. Star Agent: The Path to 50+ Real Estate Transactions Per Year
Michel Friedman, Sept. 30, 2020
Based on 30 years of experience selling real estate and attending seminars, Friedman shares the proven path to 50-plus transactions per year that he has taught to thousands of Realtors throughout his career. The book includes a wide range of techniques for doing business and scripts for objection handling.
5. Secrets of Top Selling Agents: Habits, Mindsets, and Tactics of Real Estate’s Super Producers
Joe Sesso, Sept. 12, 2020
A sequel to the original best-selling book Secrets of Top Selling Agents, this book is based on interviews with some of the industry’s biggest names. It covers four main topics: lead generation, real estate investing, building a real estate team from scratch and creating a super-producer mindset. Expect all-new content with actionable insights that are relevant to real estate agents today.
6. Peeling the Onion: Bring Your Relationships Back, Layer by Layer
Leigh Brown, July 24, 2020
Leigh Brown believes in living an authentic life. Keeping it real, she conveys this throughout this transformational book. When reading, you’ll get an understanding of how we became dependent on social media, learn how to start reconnecting with people in real life and brush up on communicating the information you’d never share on social media with friends. Enjoy more profound, fulfilling relationships.
7. What to Post: How to Create Engaging Social Media Content that Builds Your Brand and Gets Results (for Real Estate)
Chelsea Peitz, Feb. 2, 2020
Social media is a hot topic in real estate, often covered on-stage and in online articles. Peitz shares her real-world experience and examples in an easily digestible format, including illustrations, worksheets and additional resources.
While reading the book, I tested out a few of the recommendations and was shocked at the amount of engagement those posts got on Facebook.
Bonus book
Although not available yet, I did receive an advanced copy of Ron Howard’s next book Profitability and Performance Pitstops. In 2018, I reviewed Howard’s Create Demand and Stop Chasing Business, an easy read full of useful ideas for building a high-volume business without the chase.
With Profitability and Performance Pitstops, Howard packs 400-plus pages with ideas, models and concepts to build a big and profitable business.
Howard shares the right behaviors to adopt, key operational models and team-building ideas. I enjoyed different perspectives from the successful coaches and profitable team leaders Howard interviewed and some of our favorite authors’ big ideas. If you’re looking to build a real estate sales business with a core of profitability and performance, this is a must-read.
Hungering for more? Here are a few other recommendations from readers, contributors and staffers:
-
A book for every type of agent: 15 (newish) releases worth checking out in 2020
-
Pulse: The books that should be on every agent’s summer reading list
- 20 resources to help you begin your anti-racism journey
Brandon Doyle is a Realtor at Doyle Real Estate Team — RE/MAX Results in Minneapolis and co-author of Mindset, Methods & Metrics – Winning as a Modern Real Estate Agent. You can follow him on YouTube or Facebook.
