Scottsdale Real Estate Podcast with Natasha Greenhalgh

I was out showing properties recently and wanted to share a quick tip for all the buyer’s agents out there. We know we have to jump on properties the minute they come on the market because a lot of times we’re in multiple-offer situations. I recommend giving a quick call to the listing agent before you make an offer. It might seem simple, but it will help you write a solutions-based offer that the seller is eager to accept. Find out what’s important to the seller and make sure to put that in the offer. If you have any other questions for me in the meantime, don’t hesitate to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.  

If you’re receiving this message, then congratulations! You’re formally invited to join us for our upcoming Real Estate Lunch and Learn event on Thursday, June 20th. This event is intended to help both new and experienced real estate agents who are tired of the status quo to change things up a bit based on our experience selling over 3,000 homes over the past decade. We’ll give you the exact recipe for our success, which helps us net over a million dollars a year. Furthermore, Natasha will discuss how to recommit yourself to the real estate business by giving you some tips and tricks to really make your business flourish. Other topics will include our 1-3-5 business strategy, what makes a winning script, how to capitalize in this shifting market, and more. Lastly, we’ll go over those things you must do in your business today if you want to convert leads at unparalleled levels. There will be a lot to cover in our two-hour session, but don’t worry—Natasha will serving up something delicious for lunch to tide you over! Click here to RSVP for the event. If you have any questions in the meantime, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We’d be glad to hear from you.

What does the future hold for real estate agents? On our team, we talk about this question a lot, often in terms of what kind of “threats” are out there that we need to be aware of. Right now, there are two primary disruptors in our industry. The first is technology. We don’t believe that technology will replace Realtors, but we do think that Realtors who don’t embrace it are at risk. There are plenty of tried and true ways of doing business, but if you don’t embrace technology within the next few years, you’ll get left behind. So much information is already directly available to buyers and sellers, so if you don’t know what they’re looking at or how they’re looking at it, you’re in trouble.  With that in mind, your focus should be on the consumer experience. The days of needing to register on a certain website to look at properties, for example, are long gone. We live in an age of instant information, so you need to adapt.  “The value we bring is relational, and we need to fight to ensure that nobody—not an iBuyer or a new technology—steals our SOI from us.” This brings us to the second disruptor: iBuyers. We don’t think iBuyers are as big of a threat to real estate agents as others do, because real estate is a relationship-based business. People buy homes in places where they plan on raising their families, and they want to deal with someone who understands them and actually cares how their transaction ends up.  The value we bring is relational, and we need to fight to ensure that nobody—not an iBuyer or a new technology—steals our SOI from us. The business was built around our SOI, and it’s still the key to maintaining a profitable business.  If you’d like to talk more about what the future holds for our business or you have any other questions we can answer for you, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We’d love to speak to you.

All too often, agents looking to succeed in the industry focus their energy in the wrong places. They look for quick fixes instead of seeking out real solutions. With that in mind, it’s no wonder why so many Realtors fail. To help you steer clear of this same fate, today we’d like to share a few tips and tricks for launching (or relaunching) your own career in real estate. The first tip on our list is quite simple: You’ve got to treat real estate like a real business. This may sound obvious, but many agents get started in real estate because they want to escape the doldrums of a typical nine-to-five lifestyle. While getting into real estate can give you a lot of personal freedom in your career, it’s important not to conflate this freedom for a lack of responsibility.  You need to hold yourself accountable and truly commit yourself to working on dollar-producing activities consistently each day. A good way to achieve this is by time blocking—which means dividing your day into a series of tasks to be completed within specific “blocks” of time. “The most intimate communication strategies are also the most effective.” With that said, time blocking is actually our second tip. Every agent’s schedule will vary slightly, but we highly recommend dedicating the first time block of each day toward lead generation. Consistent communication with prospective clients is crucial, and the more personal this contact is, the better.  The most intimate communication strategies are also the most effective. This means you should prioritize face-to-face meetings over phone calls, phone calls over text messages, and text messages over emails when reaching out to potential clients.  The third tactic we recommend when launching or relaunching your career in real estate is to reconnect with your sphere of influence. Most agents’ first deals come from people who already know, like, and trust them. Sometimes, converting a lead out of your sphere of influence can be as simple as telling the people in your life about your decision to enter the industry. This can spark a conversation about their goals, and the rest is history.  If you have any other questions or would like more information, feel free to give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Today we’re excited to talk to you about your sphere of influence. Over the years, we’ve both learned that the No. 1 source of business for real estate professionals should be from those individuals who know, like, and trust them, aka their “sphere.” At Home Helper Consultants, we like to implement a touch campaign for each person in our SOI. We touch them intentionally 21 times per year through a mix of texts, phone calls, emails, personal meetings, and more.  If you fail to interact with them every few weeks, individuals will fail to recognize you or refer your business. What we’ve done is come up with a system of frequent interactions.  “The more intimate an interaction, the higher the rate of success.” We’re not as much focused on the content as we are about consistency and frequency. The intentional activity behind it is what creates business. If you’re a real estate agent, you probably have your name, phone number, and title in your signature. You don’t have to run around and ask everyone about potential buyers and sellers as long as you’re making frequent touches. One thing we do is called Friendsday Wednesday. This week, we’re writing personalized notes every day to people in our SOI. I have one gal who is writing a joke, and that’s the only thing that she’s putting. No business card, no ad. The endgame is to have people think about you when they think about real estate. The more intimate an interaction you have with a prospect in your SOI, the higher the rate of success. Ultimately, our SOI interactions always lead to a conversation or face-to-face meeting, the most intimate interaction you can have. From there it goes phone call, text, note card, and email. The higher you can climb on this ladder, the more likely that you’ll see success when it comes to converting new business. If you have any questions for us in the meantime, don’t hesitate to give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Here on the Home Helper Consultants’ sales team, we make a point to study all our numbers. What does that mean? Well, we start with how many minutes you spend on the phone to prospect for new leads. We look at how many people you have contacted through those efforts and how many of those contacts are added to the database as nurtures (or people you’re going to keep in touch with). Then we examine how many appointments you’ve made from those leads, how many you’re actually attending, and how many of those appointments you’re converting into a signed listing or buyer agreement. Tracking each of these areas allows you to see where the deficiencies in your business lie. Knowing that will give you an idea of how to improve your process, be it through education, role play, script practice, or whatever else is necessary. Our entire training calendar and curriculum is framed around the deficiencies that we find in our numbers. For example, if you get X number of contacts, and those contacts lead to Y number of additions to the database, but Y is a relatively low number compared to your contacts, what might your problem be? “Whether you’re a new agent or an experienced one, you need to be tracking your numbers—not just the number of closings, but rather all of the lead metrics that come before closing, as well.” In that case, scripting might be the problem, meaning that the agent with a low ratio between their contacts and the number of leads added to the database would need to focus on their script-reading and role-playing skills. Now let’s say that you had X number of appointments, but you weren’t listing any sellers or buyers—what might the problem be there? The problem might again relate to scripting, but this time, it has to do with your listing presentation and your closing abilities.  Additionally, we sometimes find that the appointments we may be setting are incredibly weak, and that with them, we weren’t setting ourselves up for success. Whether you’re a new agent or an experienced one, you need to be tracking your numbers—not just the number of closings, but rather all of the lead metrics that come before closing, as well. If you have any questions about tracking your numbers, feel free to reach out to us. We’d be glad to share our knowledge and tips with you to help you identify (and rectify) the deficiencies in your business.