In a shifting real estate market, the guidance and expertise that Inman imparts are never more valuable. Whether at our events, or with our daily news coverage and how-to journalism, we’re here to help you build your business, adopt the right tools — and make money. Join us in person in Las Vegas at Connect, and utilize your Select subscription for all the information you need to make the right decisions. When the waters get choppy, trust Inman to help you navigate.
Since the middle of May 2022, we have been covering the shift, the turn, the cooldown, and a myriad of other ways to highlight the changes that seem to be staring back at our readers in a hall of mirrors that they cannot find their way out of.
This is causing many in the industry to question if they are working hard enough to sustain their business.
In a sense, many agents have been operating at such a high-stress level of demand that the slowdown, though forewarned, feels dramatic and even ominous. Meteorological summer is about 55 percent complete, and the usual summer slowdown (heat waves, vacations, etc.) feels slower than what we can remember.
But are you remembering the right things? Are things, in fact, twisted?
Agents and teams alike are finding themselves disoriented by the drastic shift in activity, and even our coaching experts like Carl Medford believe that “the full effects of the shift are only beginning to be felt.”
It may feel daunting trying to assimilate and facilitate your business, but the good news is that it’s perfectly normal. It’s not the time to panic, but it is time to prepare.
Here are three ways to untangle the current mental, emotional, and professional space you are in and build back your confidence.
Time travel and take notes
You need to journey back to the summers of 2018 and 2019 and take an in-depth look at how your market was performing. You need to get in touch with what your business was like before things went pandemic bonkers.
Although the pricing will look very different, you should see some data that will indicate more standard marketing periods for homes. Next, generate your sales data reports, have them on hand, and ask yourself the following questions.
- How many listings did I close?
- What was the average timeline I required to market and sell a listing?
- How many purchases did I manage?
- How long did it typically take for me to convert and nurture a lead to a purchase sale?
- How many leads did I capture into my CRM?
- How many open houses did I hold?
- What were my total marketing expenses?
- Am I at the same brokerage?
These questions will help you build a more accurate picture of your job performance and marketing activities before the unusual market conditions the pandemic thrust upon your business.
You should be able to identify the agent that you were, and it might make the agent that you are now regain balance on unstable ground.
Assess your present circumstances and take action
Next, with your notes on hand, you need to step back and take a pause and stop the negative thoughts and mindset that many agents are struggling with right now.
That uneasiness you feel is because you are in new territory, and you might as well be a new agent because you will have to learn new skills to get your business back on track.
It’s safe to say that every real estate office worth its salt is having a meeting of the minds between now and the end of August to figure out what are the next steps to safeguard their place in the present marketplace.
If you feel uncomfortable, uncertain or even lost about what to do next with your business, you need to do the following.
- Create an accurate assessment of what you have to work with. Not your business plan of what you want to do or a strategic plan of how you want to do it, but the actual assessment of your book of business.
- This means any and all leads are categorized with updated status, an up-to-date database of past clients, and all of your monthly business expenses.
- If your income is not where it needs to be to meet expenses, you need to have an emergency meeting with your leadership to see if there is anything they can help you do to cut costs and generate more income.
Great leaders would rather troubleshoot to help keep an agent motivated and selling than have them sit on the sidelines with anxiety. When you meet with leadership, have a clear picture of what you want, and then ask for realistic costs and steps to get there.
If you are meeting expenses but are not growing the way you want, make sure to put your growth against inflation. The cost of living does not seem like it is going to improve anytime soon.
Even if you have had growth this year, it may not feel like it because everything is so much more expensive. If you have grown, take a moment to celebrate. You are growing despite many uncontrollable circumstances. You are doing better than you think; again, don’t get the numbers twisted.
Build back your confidence
Find an open house to work, tour new construction that you have not had time to explore, say hi to the hard-working people at your local association, and see if there are any summer networking opportunities for you.
Time-block prospecting, and then put those worries and intrusive thoughts aside. Be proactive about prospecting, so you have something to do that tells your brain not to overthink.
Prepare a backup plan. Cut expenses ruthlessly to give yourself some room to breathe. Make it a game. Call it a challenge. Do what you need to do to take some of the pressure off of closing a certain percentage of deals.
It costs money to make money, and after seeing the cost of a big push to build where you want to be again, you may be more satisfied with where you are at. Ultimately this may be a long-term waiting game and you will need to make peace with where you stand amongst your colleagues.
The biggest favor you can do for yourself is making a decision. Commit to waiting it out for a certain amount of time with a solid plan to attempt to make things better.
Sitting around, wringing your hands and twisting facts will not improve your mindset or circumstances. Make a plan, follow through and get untangled from the hype.
By day, Rachael Hite helps agents develop their business. By night, she’s tweeting and blogging. Feel free to tweet her @rachaelhite.
