Irvine Real Estate Podcast with Robert Mack

We’re experiencing some unprecedented times right now and trying our best to roll with the punches. Today I wanted to share some advice in terms of what you can be using your spare time for these days while you’re at home. For example, this is a great opportunity to take a step back, reconnect with family and friends, and be present. Exercise is also a great way to snap out of any funk, too.

Here’s what you can do now in order to get another escrow on the books fast. One of my mentors once told me that it’s several times easier and more cost-effective to go after referrals through people you know as opposed to those you don’t know. Agents need to avoid the ‘shiny pennies’ of the real estate industry—we can be distracted by websites that promise to send you leads if you spend lots of money on social media. You can certainly get leads that way, but those are low-quality leads because those people don’t have a relationship with you. Relationships are key to successfully closing a transaction. So how do you get ahead of the problem? Start talking to the people you already know and like, people who will stand behind you and refer business to you if you do good work. I don’t expect referrals from people if I’m not doing a good job, and you shouldn’t either. That’s why we’re always pushing to enhance our clients’ experiences—so they’ll recommend us to their friends and family. Think about who you’re comfortable with that you can call. I’ve heard of so many agents’ family members selling properties without telling the agent because they think they’re too busy or they don’t want to bother them. Don’t assume that people are just going to come to you for their buying and selling needs just because you have a relationship with them. You need to nurture your friends and family just like you do your past and current clients. The rule is the same for them: out of sight, out of mind. “Don’t be a secret agent.” Some good examples of people to contact are friends, family, past coworkers, and the members of any clubs or organizations you’re involved with (both personal and professional). I’ve sold many properties simply because of my gym membership! There’s no wrong way to generate business, but if you’ve had a slow quarter and you’re looking for another transaction quickly, comb through your database for people who know, like, and trust you and start sending them updates. There’s an opportunity right now to take advantage of the market, whether you’re buying, selling, refinancing, or looking to invest, so get out there and spread the word. Control the narrative by letting your people know that the train’s in the station and it’s about to leave. As you educate people, you add value to their lives, and they’ll start to see you as a professional resource, meaning they’ll send you business. Don’t be a secret agent. If you have any questions or would like more tips and tricks about how to generate business quickly, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d love to help you.

How will a team help you to get to the top? Find out today. In March of 2018, one of my extended team members and business coaches said, “Robert, I have an idea and I want you to come along.”  When I asked him to tell me more, he said, “I want to climb Mount Aconcagua in December, and I want to know if you’re in.”  I told him I’d never heard of Mount Aconcagua. Before that point, I’d always been an avid backpacker and hiker; I loved the outdoors. So after researching it, I learned that he was talking about a 14-day expedition to climb the tallest peak in South America! I thought to myself that there was no way I could do that—I couldn’t be disconnected from work for two weeks! Long story short: I did it. But how does this relate to real estate and life in general? From the photos we took on the climb (see 1:58 in the video above), you can see three of my friends and I hiking from Camp 1 to Camp 2 on the ninth or tenth day of the climb. The conditions were extreme, and the pictures look pretty epic. However, what you don’t see behind the scenes are the 30 people who helped my team get to that point. We had three expert mountain guides from Aventuras Patagonicas helping us get to the top—we didn’t realize how many people were involved with making sure we had an amazing experience, like the medical team, the porters, the mules, the kitchen staff, and so on. “Having a team of professionals to help is the best way to get the most people to the top.” That’s why this story is relevant: Only a  team of professionals can help you get to the top. Buying a home can be a big, scary decision, and if you don’t have the right team on your side as you climb that particular mountain, you won’t have someone to ensure your experience is excellent and that the decisions you’ve made were good ones. The same is true for selling property, liquidating your assets, and then transitioning to a different home so your family can have a better quality of life. About 90% of agents in Orange County are solo agents who take on all the sundry parts of the home buying or selling process on their own. Could I have climbed the mountain with just one person? It’s not impossible, sure, but having a team of professionals helping is the best way to get the most people to the top. I don’t personally believe that I could have climbed to the top of my own mountain with just one person; it would have made the situation so much more challenging (and potentially unsuccessful). My team absolutely helped me get there. The bottom line is that when you’re buying or selling a home, there are a lot of moving parts to the process. You’ll want to work with an agent who will hold your hand from the beginning to the end and who also has a team on staff to make your experience efficient, pleasurable, predictable, and successful. So if you’re thinking about buying or selling a home in the Orange County area and you’d like to learn more about how my team and I can help you get to the top of your own real estate mountain, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We’d love the opportunity to work with you.

There are six key reasons why forming a team might be the right move for you. Learn more here. My mentor Gary Keller always said, “If you want to go up, you’ve got to let go.” That sounds backward, but it actually means that you might have to let go of your ego to advance in this industry. I was able to absorb a lot of good information from my mentors and coaches, and today I’d like to give something back. Here are six reasons why joining or forming a team might be the right move for you: 1. Overhead. Real estate is an expensive business; if you’re selling at a high level, you likely have several out-of-pocket expenses each month to keep your business running. When you work on a team, you generally have low or even no overhead. If you’re sick and tired of spending all that money to be able to make more money, it might be time to join a team.  2. Systems. Having systems creates a predictable process that homeowners can feel comfortable being a part of and that gives buyers a sense of certainty about your success. A process that can be duplicated by many people helps to make everything more efficient. If you work by yourself, you probably don’t have the systems in place to sell as many homes as you want. 3. Mentoring/coaching. When you work on a team, your team leader may have a coach they share with you. On our team, we get coaching through Tom Ferry and Team Plus, and all of our agents have their own coach to learn how to become even better. On top of the third-party coaching, I offer my own training sessions every week and mentor my team on a daily basis to help them succeed by learning from the mistakes I made.  Working on your own, it’ll be hard to reach the highest possible level of production because you don’t have anyone in your corner to hold you accountable and root you on. “No matter where you are in your career, you can definitely benefit from working in a team environment.” 4. Collaboration. Real estate can be a very lonely business. When you’re on a team, you can collaborate not only with the team leader, but also with the administrative staff and fellow agents. Our team has become a little family where we leverage each other’s brains and find ways to improve. 5. Culture. Because our team is a family, we hold each other accountable during tough times, but always lift each other up when times are good.  6. You get to have a life. When you’re a solo agent without any systems in place or anyone to collaborate with, there’s no one to keep your business going when you take a vacation. Having a team means a group of capable people to ensure that business continues as usual as you take time to manage your life outside the workplace. With a team, you can have a life of your own. No matter where you are in your career, you can definitely benefit from working in a team environment. If any of these reasons speak to you and you’d like to schedule a strategy session with me to learn more about what my team has to offer, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. I’d love to learn more about you and discuss what the next step for you could be.

Today I’m revisiting a topic I’ve already touched on to give you a clearer picture of its importance. Here’s why you need systems in place. This topic may seem familiar, and with good reason; I recently made a video about the importance of having systems in place versus just wingin’ it, but today I’m going a little bit deeper.  A few weeks back, I was at a Tom Ferry event called Sales Edge. It’s designed to train you on how to become a better salesperson. It was a nice mix of agents—seasoned veterans, emerging agents, and newbies all under one roof.  A lot of newer agents were coming up to me and asking about where and how to start, which is understandable considering that this industry can be so complex. Unless you pick one or two areas to focus on, you’ll likely end up spinning your wheels. The theme of my responses was this: Do you have systems in place? At this event, they really pushed the value of prospecting more. The more conversations you have, the more opportunities you create. The group of people you don’t know is always larger than the group that already trusts you, and knowing how to balance your time between both is key. Solidify your existing relationships, but be sure to establish new ones.  “You need to be prospecting, even when you’re busy.” That being said, the more phone calls you make, the more networking mixers you go to, the more emails and texts you send, etc., the more you’ll receive an influx of people to help. Assisting one or two people isn’t too hard, but if you’re dealing with five or more people in a month, you’ll simply run out time, especially if you’re a solo agent.  The best way for a real estate agent to make money is to meet new people and have conversations, but ironically, the first thing agents stop doing once they get busy is having those conversations! So often, you see a real estate rollercoaster: Successful prospecting gives an agent a lot of business, but once they close and satisfy those few clients, they return to their prospect well to find it completely dry.  You need to be prospecting, even when you’re busy. To do this, you need systems in place. A system doesn’t have to be something elaborate—you don’t even have to use technology. It could be as low-level as a piece of paper with a checklist on it (or a Google Doc, or Excel Spreadsheet). Simple software like Trello can go a long way, too.  Essentially, a system is a checklist you can create for a given process that will allow you to perfectly replicate that process so you can improve each time you go through it. For example, you’ll want a system in place for escrow; what are the 80 things that have to happen from the minute you open escrow to the minute you close? If you don’t have these steps written down, you’ll spend too much time thinking, and not enough time prospecting. A system takes the ‘thinking’ out of the equation, allowing you to efficiently slice through any real estate process.   If you have any questions about how to implement a system in your business, please reach out to me via phone or email. I’m happy to hear from you. 

If you don’t have systems in your business, it’s time you implement them. Here’s why. Today’s message is for the agent who’s winging it.  Let me be clear: There’s nothing wrong with winging it. I winged it for eight years until I figured out it’s much easier to have systems in place than transfer everything that’s in your head and laying it out into the entire process. You might be a great agent with a lot of experience and the heart of a teacher, but if you don’t have systems, your life will be harder. We know that predictability creates consistency, consistency equals certainty, and certainty equals trust.  When you meet with a seller and they say “You’re hired!”, do you have an outlined plan? In other words, a step-by-step strategy covering what you need to get done so that the home is ready for the market? If you open escrow on a buyer, do you have a plan to help them get from point A to point Z smoothly and efficiently?  By “system,” I don’t mean something that has to be high-tech. All you have to do is take the entire process (whether it’s onboarding a listing, opening a buyer or seller escrow, etc.), dissect the plan, and write down everything that has to happen before the next step.  For example, if you have a new listing, you know you have to do things like clean the carpets, make some minor repairs, stage it, and take photos and video, right? All these items are part of your strategy, and on my team, we dissect the process and outline everything that has to happen before the home is ready to hit the market. “If you don’t have systems, your life will be harder.” There may be 80 things on this checklist, but only 50 might apply to us. If we walk into a home that’s already staged, we don’t have to worry about cleaning the carpet, making repairs, and all that other stuff. All we have to do is focus on photos. Not everything has to be done, but having a comprehensive list of everything that could happen will make your life easier. It will make your process more predictable and more duplicatable.  If you decide to hire an assistant or expand your team in other ways, they’ll be able to help you through the process because everything won’t be confined to your own mind anymore—it will all be on paper, so to speak. So I encourage you to take all the different processes that can happen, break them down into a system, and create a more predictable process. It will make your life easier, you’ll be able to help more people, and you’ll make more money. On my team, we have all the processes outlined so that our agents don’t have to think. They can focus on what’s most important: making phone calls, going on appointments, and writing contracts.  If you’d like to know more about implementing systems in your business or have any other real estate questions, don’t hesitate to call or email me. I’d love to speak with you. Until then, happy selling!

Today I’m sharing a story to help show you why you should never compromise your integrity in this business. When I was a newer agent, I didn’t have many standards. Oftentimes, I was just so desperate to have a client that I would take anyone—and any property— I could get. I simply thought I needed more business.  Thankfully, of course, we’ve been able to grow our team to the point that we can be selective with the people we work with. Real estate is already challenging as an industry. Working with very challenging people just adds to the complexities and headaches.  We want to work with people who have a genuine need, who will trust us and value our advice. To illustrate my point about standards, I’ll share a recent experience.  A few months ago, we worked with a homeowner on a strategy to sell her home. She needed a new carpet, new paint, and a general decluttering. Her community also had very high inventory and affordable new construction. If her home wasn’t in tip-top shape, marketed aggressively, and priced correctly, it wasn’t going to sell in that highly competitive market.  Despite having an agreement to fix the carpets and have our designers stage the home, the homeowner suddenly had second thoughts; she said some friends had advised her that staging wasn’t necessary. As much as I wanted to help her, I knew her new strategy of leaving the home as is and just doing some minor “rearranging” wouldn’t work at all.  “Lowering your standards and trying to sell the unsellable will only hurt your image as a top agent.” Do I want a $1.2 million listing? Absolutely. Do I want a $1.2 million listing that won’t sell? Not at all. This is the type of client I don’t want to work with. Trying to do things her way would have led to anguish: The weeks march on and I have to repeatedly tell her over the phone that her home still (unsurprisingly) hasn’t sold.  So when I ask, “What are your standards?” I really mean, “What are you willing to do, and what type of clients are you willing to work with?” After going back and forth trying to explain the process and help her understand the market, I ultimately decided that the client from my example was unhelpable, and I released the listing.  Don’t let your quality of life suffer unnecessarily in this business. You should be working with people who are going to trust your advice, and who are truly motivated to reach their real estate goals. I’m not willing to compromise my listing strategy just because I want another listing.  I hope you found value in today’s message. Next time you come across someone whose attitude and demeanor are unhelpable, think twice before you say yes to them. Feel free to reach out to me by phone or email if you have any questions or want to set up a strategy session. 

Today I’m discussing why you may want a referral partner, not just referrals. Do you want referrals or referral partners? Today I hope to help you find ways to improve your business, make more money, and help more people.  Not everyone knows what the difference is between referrals and referral partners. A referral is a one-off; for example, if your neighbor refers you to their friend, it’s a one-time deal. Could you conceivably receive more referrals from that neighbor? Absolutely! Is that going to be a constant stream of income? Probably not.  We’re grateful for every opportunity we receive, so if someone referred us to another person, thank you so much; it means the world to us that you endorsed us! However, let’s shift our focus to something a bit bigger. What’s a referral partner? They are professionals who share the same type of client you’re looking for. They may need your services as they help their clients.  “The goal is to generate referrals that keep on coming.” One of my favorite referral partners is an estate planning attorney—they deal with homeowners all the time. Often, when a homeowner passes away and the property passes on to a beneficiary, they may want to sell that home. That person may not have a relationship with a real estate agent, but they do have a trusted relationship with their attorney. If you have an excellent relationship with that estate planning attorney, they can refer you.  So, when I talk about referrals versus referral partners, the goal is to generate referrals that keep on coming. You could spend tons of time touching base with family, friends, neighbors, and so on, or you could spend some time on them, and some on the referral partners and find different people to help. Some examples of good partners are general contractors, CPAs, divorce attorneys, etc. These are the people who work with the type of clients you’re looking for.  If you can establish a solid relationship with them, you can generate a lot of referrals. Also, you can refer clients back to them if you know of someone in need of their services.  One year I sold five homes as a result of referrals just from my estate planning attorney referral partner. So, if you’re looking to help more people and spend less time prospecting leads, consider looking for referral partners.  If you know someone who might benefit from today’s message, please share it with them. If you have any specific questions to ask me or my team or you would like to set up a strategy session to learn more about what it’s like to work with the Robert Mack Group, I’d love the opportunity to speak with you. Call or email us if you need anything.

Have you planned for 2020? Today I’ll shed some light on planning for the upcoming year now that we’re approaching the end of 2019. Making a business plan doesn’t have to be that complicated. I think a lot of real estate agents, and people in general, tend to overthink things. Today let me break it down into three parts so you can put together your business plan for 2020. Last year, the Robert Mack Group had a team retreat; the theme was crafted around the questions “What, Why, and How?” WHAT: How many families do we want to help? How many homes do we want to sell? WHY: What is the driving force behind all your activities? HOW: What do we have to do on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis to be able to achieve our goals? Suppose you want to sell 12 homes in 2020. Knowing what that number is is a fantastic start, but knowing how you can get there is a whole different ball game. You might have to break it down first. If you want to sell 12 homes in a year, that means you’ll have to sell one home per month.  “Having a strong motivating factor that will inspire you to do what you have to do is a powerful aspect of achieving your goals.” From there, what do you need to do on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis? Who do you need to call? What should you say on those calls? How long should calls last? Do you have to go to networking events and meet with other professionals? Do you have to send out mailers, call expired listings, knock on FSBO’s doors? There’s no wrong way to generate a lead, but you have to know what to do on a micro-level in order to achieve your macro-level goal. Don’t forget your ‘why,’ either. Having a strong motivating factor that will inspire you to do what you have to do is a powerful aspect of achieving your goals. In real estate, there are no standards or thresholds to get into the business, so motivation will fuel your fire to ensure you succeed.  If you want to have a great home for you and your family, that’s your why. If you want to take your spouse on a trip, that’s your why. If you want to pay off your parents’ house for them, that’s your why. If you want to build an animal sanctuary because you’re passionate about animals, that’s your why. There’s almost certainly something there beyond wanting to make money so you can be financially free—everyone wants that. What are you going to do with the money that you’ll earn from the families you help? If you know another agent in the marketplace who might benefit from seeing this video, feel free to pass it along to them. If you’re a solo agent or you’ve been in this business for a while and you’re looking for something bigger and better, reach out to me. We can discuss how my team operates and figure out whether or not our process would be good for you. Hope to hear from you soon!

As an agent, you’re better off implementing systems in your business instead of just winging it. Here’s why. Today’s message is for the agent who’s just “winging it.” To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with what you’re doing. I did the same thing for the first eight years of my career. Then I figured out that it’s much easier to have systems in place. You might be a great agent with a lot of experience who genuinely wants to help their clients, but if you don’t have systems in place, that will make your life harder. Predictability creates consistency, consistency is certainty, and certainty equals trust.  So if you meet with a seller and they hire you, do you have a plan? In other words, a step-by-step strategy that outlines what must be done to prepare their home for the market? If you open escrow with a buyer, do you have a plan to help them get from point A to point Z smoothly?  A system doesn’t have to be high-tech. All you have to do is take your processes and dissect them. Write down every everything that has to happen for each step. For example, if you have a new listing that you know needs work done, has to be staged, and needs photos, fliers, videography, etc., you also know that all these steps are part of your strategy.  “Predictability creates consistency, consistency is certainty, and certainty equals trust.” On my team, we outline every step that has to take place in this situation before that home hits the market. There may be 80 items on this checklist, but only 50 of them could apply to us. If we walk into a home that’s already set up to be staged, we don’t have to worry about cleaning the carpet, making repairs, and so on. All we have to do is focus on photos.  In any case, having a list of everything that might have to be done will make the process more predictable and more duplicatable in case you decide to expand your team. So again, take your processes and make a system out of them. We use Google docs to do this, but there are other software systems (e.g., Trello) you can use. All of our processes are outlined so the agents on my team don’t have to think. All they have to do is focus on making phone calls, going on appointments, and writing contracts.  The bottom line is that by doing this, you’ll be able to help more people and make more money.  As always, if you’d like to talk more about this topic or you have any other real estate questions, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me any way you can. Until then, happy selling!

Today I’m sharing how to grow your database and therefore expand your business. Are you speaking to new people every day? Today I want to discuss building your database. It’s critical to have a database and you should make sure to call and engage with the people in your database. Most of your business should be coming from your database. Your database should make up about 50% to 70% of your business. If it’s not, you may want to review your business and see what you’re doing each day.  How do we continue to grow our database? We’re receiving customer information from multiple different sources. You may be getting contacts from Zillow, Facebook, open house customer inquiries, and so on. You are continually being bombarded with contacts that you don’t know that might need help with real estate. You need to take all this information and regularly add it to your database.  On my team, we have different stages of clients: Stage one:  Someone you’ve never met. Stage two:  Someone you’ve had a conversation with.  Stage three: You’ve met in person, they’re in your database, and they’re now going to be a client. “Make connections with new clients and maintain them!” Expand your database by having new conversations with new people. The beauty of this world is that we’re extremely connected now. Whether it’s on social media (which has steadily become a colossal part of our lives), in line at the grocery store, in church, or anywhere else, our lives are full of opportunities to meet new people. When you’re in sales, you’re always “on.” The most crucial part of the message today is to make connections with new clients and maintain them! The database is essential to any agent’s business. If you’re not on the hunt for new conversations every single day, and you aren’t concentrating your efforts on your database every day, you’re going to have a rough time developing a sustainable business in real estate.  If you want to set up a strategy session to learn about the methods we use to build up our database, please reach out to me. Those sessions are free because I enjoy speaking to other agents and learning more about them. If you have any video ideas you want me to talk about in the future, send those my way. If you have any questions about real estate, reach out to me by phone or email. I would be glad to speak with you. 

Do you really understand how important it is to stay in touch with your database? Let’s delve deeper into this topic, today. Having a strong database is important, but building one up isn’t something every agent takes the time to do. If you’ve been following my content for a while, you probably know that it took me eight or nine years to fully grasp this, myself. Now that I have, I’d like to share what I’ve learned since then with all of you.  One of the most crucial lessons to remember on this subject is that it’s eight times easier to get leads from someone you already know than to get leads from a new business. I first learned this from my friend Bill Pipes, a Tom Ferry real estate coach, and keeping this in mind has made an incredible impact on my career. “Established relationships are a great doorway into new relationships.” This isn’t to say that other prospecting methods aren’t effective; only that agents must never underestimate the importance of staying engaged with the people who you know and who have supported you. The people in your database don’t need to be convinced of your skills or experience. They already trust your abilities. So, as you can imagine, these established relationships are a great doorway into new relationships. And, as those new relationships are nurtured, your database (and the opportunities that come from it) will grow exponentially over time.  On our team, we make it a priority to connect with our database between 50 and 70 times each year. Whether through phone calls, emails, text messages, or event invites, our team endeavors to let past and present clients know that we are always available as a resource to them.  If you have any other questions or would like more information about nurturing your database, feel free to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

As an agent, your buyers and sellers trust you to be a steady source of guidance. Let’s discuss how you can achieve this today. The real estate process can be quite overwhelming for buyers and sellers. Emotions run high, expenses can run deep, and energy can run low after days or weeks of striving toward the closing table. This is where you come in.  As an agent, part of your job is to advocate for your clients. When you work by a buyer or seller’s side, you’re not only bringing your knowledge, experience, and resources to the table, but also a neutral perspective through which they can more clearly assess the deal at hand.  So if you inadvertently put off negative or nervous energy around your client, this can create an unfortunate domino effect. The slightest hint of unease on your end can easily snowball into an emotional meltdown for your clients, who will tend to use you as their “rock.”  “To be a rock for your clients, you need to have a mentor who can be yours.” Now, you may be thinking that all of this sounds well and good, but feel uncertain as to how you can actually put these concepts into practice. How can you be a rock for your client?  First, you need to have a mentor. Whether this mentor is a business coach, a colleague, or a broker, the most important thing is that this person is someone you can trust to be your rock. Your mentor should keep you steady so that you can do the same for your clients.  But what if you don’t have a team, broker, or mentor you can turn to? If this is the case, please reach out to my team and me. Our team has systems, structures, and training in place to help agents like you succeed at their full potential, and we’d be happy to have a conversation about whether joining us could be the right next move in your career.  If you have any other questions or would like more information, give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

If you’re looking to grow your business as an agent, now is a great opportunity to leverage social media to get your brand out there.  Social media can be overwhelming for a lot of people, but at the end of the day, that’s the world we live in. So many people communicate via social media, and the one thing we know about sales is that people want to do business with people they know, like, and trust. That’s why it’s important to build an online brand that allows people to get to know you.  I’m personally not a fan of having a business page and a personal page. I believe that, as a real estate agent, people want to work with me—not my brand. They want to work with someone honest, who knows what they’re doing, who they can have fun with, and who they can have a great experience with. Social media is a casual platform to let people know who I am.  A key mistake a lot of agents make is constantly talking about business. Buyers, sellers, and anyone else following you don’t necessarily care about your newest listing. They want to know more about you. My rule of thumb is to keep about 60% of my social media personal and 30% business-related. I want them to know who I am—a real estate agent working on doing great things for great people.  “Now is a great opportunity to leverage social media to get your brand out there.” On top of that, you have to craft your social media according to who you are. Document what you’re passionate about in your personal life because people want to relate to you on a personal level. Similarly, when talking about business, instead of talking about what you just sold, share the stories you’ve witnessed. People love stories, and they want relatable stories.  For example, in July I created an Instagram story for a client of mine. This client was a first-time buyer who didn’t have a lot of money and was generally terrified of the home buying experience. However, she connected with the right lender, got a great grant, and was able to buy her condo with just $8,000 out of pocket. Afterward, 38 people reached out to me saying if they could buy a home for the same price she bought hers, they’d love to know more about how to do so. People felt comfortable with me, they fell in love with my story, and they wanted to learn more.  So moving forward, embrace social media and let people into your life. Show them what you like to do outside of business, but also talk to them about how you help people in your professional life. Don’t just talk about how many homes you sold last year; talk about the lives you changed. That’s what will draw them in.  If you have any more questions about how to step up your social media game, give me a call or send me a message. If you’d like to know more about how we do business or you’re looking to align yourself with the Robert Mack Group, feel free to reach out to me as well. I’d love to hear from you. As always, happy selling! 

What’s the difference between someone who invests in themselves and someone who doesn’t? To answer this question, let’s move away from real estate for a second. If you look at how a professional athlete spends their year, about 90% of their time is devoted to practicing—i.e., finding ways to be better. They’re in the gym and working on their diet so they can be as strong as possible and have the highest energy levels. They’re running the same plays thousands of times so when it’s game time, they’re ready to go.  If, on the other hand, they just go out and play the game, will they be able to run the plays correctly, or have the endurance to last the entire match? Probably not.  As an agent, you need to use the same philosophy. If you just come into the office with no practice, structure, or strategy and try to do your job, you won’t find yourself among the top 3% of agents nationwide. You have to spend 90% of your time practicing, whether that means practicing role-playing scripts, listing presentations, buyer presentations, etc. When you meet with a client face to face, it’s game time. You want to win these “matches,” and if you’re not practicing on the back end, you’re practicing on your clients. If that’s the case, you’re probably not converting at a high level. “When you meet with a client face to face, it’s game time.” So ask yourself, do you have a business coach or team leader who can be your mentor? Are you masterminding with other agents? Are you attending events and learning more about the real estate industry? Are you taking continuing education classes or subscribing to important market newsletters? Do you understand what it takes to be a great agent in today’s industry instead of the one from 10 years ago? Being a real estate professional requires an immense amount of knowledge—not just about what’s happening now, but also about what’s happened in the past and what’s anticipated for the future. You need to use the most up-to-date systems and strategies to help your clients at the deepest level, and surrounding yourself with talented individuals will help you create your vision. If you want to learn how to be a better agent or you’re looking for a mentor, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d love to know more about where you are and where you want to be.  As always, if you have any other questions or there’s anything else I can assist you with, feel free to give me a call as well. I look forward to speaking with you. Until then, happy selling!

Today I have some real estate industry statistics to share with you so you can understand where you sit among your competition. I was at a Tom Ferry event last week where he discussed a surprising statistic for real estate agents both globally and in our local market. Right now, there are 1.7 million Realtors in this country. Of them, only 43,000 were able to sell 25 homes or more. That’s just 2.5%.  If you’re selling 25 homes or more each year, then you’re in the top 3% of Realtors nationwide—congratulations! However, the numbers shift a bit here in Orange County. There are over 16,000 agents here, but only 400 sold 10 or more homes. That’s also the top 2.5%. If you’re selling 10 or more homes per year here in Orange County, congratulations to you. You’re in the top 3%, too. “We have a strong structure, systems, and great admin staff.” The reason I’m sharing this with you is that the other 97% of agents are struggling. These agents need help, they’re winging it, and doing their best to keep their heads above water. What can you do to position yourself to be in this top 3% if you aren’t? For starters, you need to start treating real estate like a business. You need to be committed daily by generating leads, showing homes, and getting deals done. If you’re a solo agent and desire to build a business that’s thriving, you simply can’t do it on your own. You need to align yourself with talented individuals that will take you and your business to another level.  This is what we offer at The Robert Mack Group. We have a strong structure, complete with systems, great admin staff, and other full-time agents that you can align yourself with and learn from. If you have any questions about how our team operates or how you might be able to elevate your career by joining us, don’t hesitate to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

If you’ve been tuning into my recent videos, you know that my mission is to offer guidance, mentoring, and tips and tricks to help you and others in the community become better agents. To that end, today I’ve brought on fellow agent Ryan McMillian to talk about his experiences since joining my team and as someone who was in hospitality for over a decade, what it’s been like to reinvent himself professionally. Ryan was in the restaurant and bar business for just over 11 years before deciding he wanted to break into the real estate industry. So, he completed his classes and earned his license to practice. As a new licensee, he wasn’t sure what his next step should be, but he knew he wanted to be part of a team. He got in touch with a few different teams and brokerages, and in the process, he met me. Thanks to his previous experience, Ryan had developed strong interpersonal skills and had a knack for customer service, but he knew that above all finding a mentor would be his key to success in real estate. During our conversation, I assured Ryan that I would teach him the practices and systems that would mold him into a great agent over time, but I also let him know in no uncertain terms he’d be required to learn from the ground up. This was refreshing to Ryan: He was skeptical of other brokerages he spoke with because they attempted to persuade him with unrealistic claims that he’d have instant success and wealth working for them. Not long after, the two of us arranged another meeting and we discussed what it would take for Ryan to become a great agent—a decision Ryan says he’s glad he made. Being part of our team has allowed him to grow his business far beyond what he believes he could have accomplished on his own. “As daunting as it may seem, becoming a great agent is possible and Ryan’s story is evidence of that.” When I got into the business back in 2006, real estate teams were the exception, rather than the rule. In fact, I didn’t really know what a mentor was, and I didn’t have the money to hire a business coach. I was mostly left to fend for myself and learn through trial and error what worked and what didn’t. Though I had a solid family and friend base to help me get my start, my first six to eight years were a grind. Over the years, as I’ve built my team and fine-tuned our systems and strategies, I’ve gained an abundance of experience helping buyers, sellers, and investors as well as an understanding of what it takes to become a great agent. If you’re a newly licensed agent or you’re in the process of earning your license and you’re watching this, we can’t emphasize enough how tough this industry is. The failure rate is right around 90%, and if you don’t have a mentor looking out for you in the early stages of your career, your likelihood of success is significantly lower. As daunting as it may seem, becoming a great agent is possible and Ryan’s story is evidence of that. Beyond leveraging his relationship-building skills, Ryan needed to learn the fundamentals of the business—how to show homes, write offers, help sellers, negotiate commissions, negotiate on behalf of his buyers, and the list goes on. All in all, Ryan’s decision to become part of our team couldn’t have worked out better for us or him, and we’re grateful he’s with us. In closing, if you’re currently or about to be an agent and you’re wondering what your next step should be, Ryan and I would love to have a conversation with you, so don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We’d be happy to answer any of your questions or set up a strategy call with you today! Until then, happy selling!

If you’re a newer agent or one who is building their business or a veteran agent who is looking to set yourself apart, you need to pay attention to follow-up. Once you have a database, and as you learn how to add people to it, follow-up becomes extremely important. It’s not about just making one phone call and hoping for the best. It’s about nurturing a relationship over time, building trust, earning business, and closing the sale. Here’s a short story from my experience that might put things into perspective: I was in the market to buy a new car, but I hadn’t bought one in a long time. I became a lead and I wanted a Toyota 4 Runner. I sent an email out to 10 different dealerships asking them all the same questions.  I got a lot of automated responses, I got a lot of people who followed up with one email, and other people had manual custom emails from the start. I went back and forth with a few different salesmen until I narrowed it down to three. I based my decision on the quality of content they sent me, how authentic I felt their emails were, how much value they brought in those emails, and the quantity of their follow-up. At the end, I had a phone conversation with all three finalists. It was a nice lesson for me as an agent. Sometimes you have to work an email until you can get in touch with a person.  After my phone conversations, I got their pricing, and ultimately one salesman stood out. I went in and was out within an hour and a half with my new car. “You can’t just call a lead once and expect them to buy in.” You have to understand that buying a home is a huge decision for someone. It’s a massive commitment and a lot of buyers are scared and nervous, but excited. That’s exactly how I felt when I got my new car. It’s important to keep those emotions in mind, because if you don’t have empathy, you will lose.  Above and beyond the empathy, you also have to understand that our leads are talking to more than one agent. If you reach out once, you’re wasting your time. What should you do to follow up? You could: Send mailers Door knock Invite them to an event Send texts Send videos Reach out through social media Call them Email them On our team, we average about nine touches per prospect until we get a contract signed. They can include any and all of the above.  The moral of the story here is that if you’re getting leads and referrals, you can’t just call them once and expect them to buy in. You need to consistently follow up and offer value. We don’t just check in—we contact our prospects and offer value at the same time. It’s so important. If you have any questions for me in the future, don’t hesitate to reach out and give me a call or send me an email. I would love to hear from you.

As an agent, your database is vitally important to the continued success of your career.  For a frame of reference: 60% of the homes we sell on a yearly basis come from our database. Our database includes our friends and family, past coworkers, other professionals in the industry, vendors, past clients, other agents in other areas, etc. I’m constantly looking for ways to grow my database by talking to new people every single day.  What can you do to build and grow your database? There are tons of different databases out there to choose from. Don’t get caught up on which one is the best. Just get one you’ll use, and the simplest one is probably your best option. Just have a place where you can store emails, phone numbers, addresses, names, and other relevant information. Also, make sure it’s a place where you can write notes and task reminders about your clients in a timely manner.  Your friends and family know you sell real estate, but the fortune in this business is found in the follow-up. Your clients won’t always be thinking about you, and they won’t always think to call you if they have a need. They’ll call the first person they think of, but if you haven’t positioned yourself as the professional agent in their life, you won’t get that call. “If you add people to your database and stay in touch with them, you will make money—I guarantee it.” I can’t tell you how many of my close friends never ended up calling me to help them buy or sell a home because they assumed I was too busy for them. That shouldn’t be happening to you.  So find a database you’ll use (you’ll probably have to spend a little bit of money) and add your friends and family, past coworkers, your current and past clients, and anyone else you pay money to. My hairstylist is in my database—so is my mechanic. You need to grow your database every single day. On my team, our goal is to grow our database by five to 10 individuals each day. How do I find these people? There are a variety of ways. They could be random connections at the grocery store. They could be the result of cold calling or expired listings. In any case, you should always be collecting data, and every time someone reaches out to you because they want to buy a home, they go into your database.  How do you stay in touch with your database? We have a 55-point marketing plan, meaning we “touch” our clients at least 55 times per year through email, text, direct mail, newsletters, etc. If you don’t have a lot of money at your disposal, though, I think at a minimum you should do a monthly newsletter. Focus more on who’s getting that newsletter on a monthly basis rather than the content of that newsletter.  If you add people to your database and stay in touch with them, you will make money—I guarantee it.  If you’d like to learn more about building your database or you’re thinking of joining a new team, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d love to speak with you. Until them, keep selling houses! 

When new agents finally break into the industry, their success is determined by the number of conversations they have with people they can develop relationships with, and who, over time, they can help buy, sell, or invest in real estate. In order to be a great Realtor, you have to have a lot of conversations with people about the services you offer. If you have four or five of these conversations a day, in two or three months, those interactions will lead to clients. The problem is that when these agents spend so much time making phone calls, sending texts, and attending networking events, they get busy helping clients find and sell properties and stop having these important conversations altogether. Your business becomes an entrepreneurial roller coaster once you’ve stopped doing what’s necessary to maintain a pipeline full of prospects. It’s at that point that your business starts to fail, causing you to panic and revert back to making phone calls and networking. “Your business becomes an entrepreneurial roller coaster once you’ve stopped doing what’s necessary to maintain a pipeline full of prospects.” So what can you do to avoid this roller coaster business style? Here are three suggestions: 1. Hire someone to help you with the paperwork. Whether that entails hiring an administrative assistant, a transaction coordinator, or working with a virtual assistant, you need to find someone to take some of the work off your plate so that you can focus on higher-level activities. 2. Consider joining a team. A lot of successful teams in Orange County already have the administrative help on the back end. As an agent on a team, you can leverage the admin assistant to help you close more transactions and focus on keeping up with your pipeline and prospects. 3. Work longer hours. If you’re not willing to hire help or find a team with, then unfortunately, you’ll just have to work longer hours. However, don’t stop prospecting altogether—if you do, you’ll be stuck in the roller coaster once again. If you’re struggling to get off the entrepreneurial roller coaster and would like to set up a strategy session with me, please feel free to reach out. I’d love to help you figure out how we can help your business grow in a sustainable way. Until then, happy selling!

If you’re a new agent struggling to create a business model that enables you to close transactions on a monthly basis, I know what you’re going through.  13 years ago, I was a new agent who had no idea what I was doing and no money to spend on marketing. I had to find a way to get in front of people and build a rapport with them so that if they had any real estate needs, I would be their go-to resource.  That being said, there are three prime lead sources you can use that require little-to-no budget at all.   The first is your database. I wish someone would’ve told me when I first got into the business that I would need to get a CRM and start storing all the people in my sphere of influence. Who are these people? Your friends, family, past clients and current clients, other professionals who share the same clients you do, people you used to work with, and anyone else you do business with. Your database is the people who know, like, and trust you. They know who you are and how you can help them.  “There are three prime lead sources you can use that require little-to-no budget at all.” The second lead source is open houses. As a Realtor, it’s very rare to get walk-in traffic to your office. What’s the best way to get in front of buyers and sellers, then? The open house. It doesn’t have to be your listing. If it is, that’s great, but it can be your team leader’s or any other team member’s listing. If you’re not on a team, you can ask your broker what listings you hold open houses in.  At the end of the day, just make sure you get into these open houses and make sure people come who you can talk to. It’s the best way to get in front of people who don’t have an agent. You can then build a rapport with them and collect their information so that one day, once they’re ready to buy, you’ll be able to help them.  The last is a farm, or a geographic area an agent chooses to build their visibility. When I started my first farm, I would print my own half-page market updates and deliver them door to door in my neighborhood. I did that for two years, and from there, I built a business by selling more homes, doing more open houses, and doing direct mail.  If you have any questions about this or any other real estate topic, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. I’d love to speak with you. Until then, happy selling!