Archive for Insider Insight
If you work in any communities where there are many non-English speaking residents, you might be interested in the article on ActiveRain written by Steve Mun, a Keller Williams agent in California.
Steve’s recent experience is that there are many foreclosure scams being directed at ethnic communities. The “mortgage consultants” who contact people in trouble play on the feeling of community they create. These consultants look like real saviours. They speak the language of the person in trouble, and emphasize their goal to assist others in their community. I thought it was a good word of warning.
Steve also cited a new regulation in California requiring foreclosure consultants to register with the State Attorney General and post a $100,000 bond.
Is that happening in other states? What a concept! Could this perhaps help eliminate some of the abuse??
What Was Your Income Last Year?
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I hope you made some money last year. But, did you make any income?
That might sound like a silly question. But, following up on my conversation with James Smith, I find that question very relevant.
Like many real estate agents, James started in real estate treating his business like a hobby. That’s not to say that he wasn’t very professional and effective in providing real estate consulting services. But, from a business management perspective, he started out being caught up in the traditional real estate agent model. Even though he had years of business experience, he just never thought about the fact that since he was building a business, he should treat it like one from a management standpoint.
One of the best things he did for himself was to create a business entity for his consulting practice. Now, he knows for sure that he has income because his company pays him a salary. Why does that matter?
Think about going to get a loan, for example. What does a loan officer look at first thing? Your income. If you’re acting as a 1099 employee of your broker, you don’t really have any income. You might be making money, but from a loan officer’s perspective, that’s just not the same as income.
When you create a corporation of some type (Sub-S or LLC for example), you’re creating a business entity that pays you a salary, and pays for all of your other business expenses. Now you’re a company and you can do all the things a real business does. And, you can claim income just like back when you were working as a W-2 employee for somebody else’s company.
I’m running a small business, and from my perspective, it never occurred to me to do that without forming a corporation. That’s why the writing at the top of the blog says “Build Real Estate Results with Getting It Write, Inc“! And, that’s why I say that the most important thing I bring to the table is the ability to apply solid business and marketing principles to the real estate industry. I recognized early on that the industry needed all the fresh perspective it could get to stay viable.
If you haven’t investigated how forming a real company could benefit you in the long run, do it now!
Where Will You Be in 10 Years?
· CommentsI had an interesting discussion with James Smith, a Keller Williams agent marketing Charlotte NC Real Estate a while ago, and we started talking about how his business is going and where he sees the industry going in the future. James made this point:
When the public learns to differentiate between good and bad agents, the real estate industry will be revolutionized.
I think he’s right. So, where do you think that will put you 10 years from now?
As James gained experience in the real estate industry, he discovered that he needed to stop modeling himself after traditional real estate agents and apply his business background to his real estate business.
Right now, James is selling a lot of homes. He’s specializing in working with investors, helping them to optimize their real estate portfolios to maximize return. He’s not doing traditional real estate sales. He’s using a consulting model, charging investors a minimum commission for managing the purchase and sale of very low-end investment property.
As James says “The majority of real estate agents sell houses, but they don’t know much about the real estate industry.” And, without a Unique Selling Proposition (USP) that sets them apart from the crowd and identifies a niche where they can contribute value-added knowledge and skills, the majority of agents, traditional agents, are turning into a dying breed.
So, what do you think? Do you think you’re in danger of becoming obsolete? If so, what are you going to do about it?
From the Web: Beware the NAR Police
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I found an interesting post on ActiveRain written by Marchel Peterson, an agent from Spring, Texas. She describes her run in with the “NAR Police” who contacted her about an unintentional trademark violation in her original real estate website domain name.
Marchel makes a good point that bears repeating. The word REALTOR® is a collective trademark owned by NAR. And, regardless of the fact that you can find the word in a dictionary, NAR is very aggressive about enforcing the rules related to its trademark.
I could relate to Marchel’s post because I had the same experience when I first established a real estate focused website. Yes, the infamous www.BuildRealEstateResults.com website originally had a domain name that contained the word realtor.
If you think it’s weird getting a cease and desist if you’re a real estate professional, imagine how I felt as a professional trying to assist real estate professionals!
Take a look at Marchel’s post. It’s definitely worth thinking about one more time – you really don’t want to tangle with the NAR police!
Insider Insight: Who Cares About Me?
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This guest post was written by Sam Chapman who markets in Austin, TX
Many real estate agent websites have an “About Me” page on them, but does anyone ever read it? Most people go to real estate websites and don’t look at anything initially except the property search page. That is why agent sites need to have a really good property search feature. However, some recent experience taught me something about the About Me page and other pages on my own Austin real estate website.
I have worked with three sets of buyers within the last 6 months and all of them chose me to work with partially based on my About Me page. The story went something like this with all of the couples: First, they were all 40+ years old. These are people who have bought and sold homes before and who understand the value of a REALTOR®.
They all found my website, registered to look at home listings and were on and off the site almost daily for about 2-3 months. When they had narrowed down the area they wanted to look in, they started jumping to other pages on my site such as the ones about schools and recreation.
One of the most interesting things these folks did was start learning about me. One of the ladies told me that she liked the section on my Meet Sam Chapman page entitled “Some Things Most People Don’t Know About Me.”
I added this personal trivia because I didn’t want people just looking at education, affiliations and the like. The first part of the page was a short bio, but the things most people don’t know about me made me more human to these people.
One of the buyers told me that she read that I was an Eagle Scout and that gave her a trust factor. Another family with kids read that I had been a substitute teacher and loved that. Another thought it was very cool that I had jumped out of a hot air balloon from 10,200 feet outside of Fairbanks, Alaska.
When an initial likeability and trust level was reached, the buyers called or emailed me. That started the relationship that they felt they already had even though we had never talked before. From there, two of the couples purchased within 30 days.
My point is simply that although most people will just look at the property search page, others, especially the more mature ones, will want detailed information. Some will even want to know who that agent is. So if you are an agent with a real estate website, get a little background on yourself out there for the people who want to know you.
A Note from Kathleen: Sam’s post reinforces a couple of my philosophies. First, I’ve always said that the goal of a real estate website is to get visitors to adopt it as their real estate research headquarters. That obviously happened with the visitors in Sam’s examples – they started with the home search, then came back for more over time.
I’ve also always encouraged agents to have an effective “about” page on their sites. You’re not there when your visitors start to wonder who you are. You need a marketing message that explains to visitors why they should work with you as opposed to another agent. Sam’s idea of the “things people don’t know about me” could be a great addition to your marketing message to get more personal with those visitors who want to know!
