Rich Levin

It’s one of the most interesting parts of my job.  When an Agent that I coach is in the middle of a tough negotiation I ask them to call me.  Debbie did.

The asking price was $769,000.  The offer came in at $625,000.

Debbie is smart and talented.  As the owner’s anger and frustration arose, Debbie calmly explained that, “All offers are good offers,” that in this market Buyers feel that owners may be desperate.  The key is that she kept the owner objective.

She did not disparage the offer, the other Agent or the Buyer.  She didn’t compliment them either.  Instead she kept it objective.

The owner countered at $725,000.  The Buyer came back at $640,000.  Again, as you might expect the owner was angry and frustrated.  Again, Debbie kept her cool and told him.  “I want to be as upset at you are but my job is to keep my eye on the goal of getting you the price you need to get the job done.  So, let’s decide do we want to tell them we won’t respond until they raise their offer?  Do we want to make a small concession and keep inching closer?  Or do we want to go to or close to your bottom line and send the message that we want to get this done with less “Mickey Mouse” back and forth.”

She explained the risks of not responding and allowed the owners to lead the decision making with her guidance.

So many Agents who are far less skilled negotiators than Debbie empathize with their Client in ways that paint the other Agent or the other party as wrong, greedy, etc.  Debbie demonstrated three key negotiation skills of a talented negotiator.

1. She kept the negotiation and her Client objective.
2. She kept the conversation and the negotiation focused on the goal.
3. She kept herself objective and focused on the goal.

Rich Levin

For some reason this is working better right now than ever in the past.

Agents that I coach all over the country are using this and literally everywhere it is generating listing leads.

You have a Buyer who you have shown everything on the market and they can’t find what they want.  So, you send what I call a “Property Need Letter.”

You drive the Buyer around the area and select the specific homes and or the specific blocks of streets that truly have what they are looking for.

Then you send a letter to those specific houses.  The letter has to have a specific structure and language so that it is credible.  In fact, don’t do this unless it is real.  The letter gives some details about the Buyer, what they are looking for and what they are not finding.  It offers a confidential one time showing request.

My coaching Clients have been doing this for many years.  Right now it seems to be more effective than ever.  Perhaps because there are so many Sellers who are waiting for the market to improve but given the opportunity they would like to sell and move.

If you would like a copy of the property need letters, e-mail me.  Although they are one of hundreds of documents exclusively for our coaching Clients, I’ll offer them to you to encourage you to listen to our free webinars www.FreeCoachingWebinars.com and to introduce you to a bit of our Success work.

Rich Levin

My recent blog about listings got a lot of positive comment, thank you.

Let’s be clear on another thing. If listings are the name of the game, Buyers are the rest of the game. You don’t make a commission with a Buyer. In fact, a qualified, motivated Buyer with an urgent need is as good as the average listing (particularly in today’s market) any day; in fact, the better the listing, the more of those valuable Buyers it will attract.

So, as I said in the previous blog, keep taking listings. At the same time, keep searching for qualified Buyers who are eager and ready to buy. The key is to be rigorous in asking the Buyer questions about their financial qualification, motivation and urgency as early as possible in the relationship (with complete respect for Agency and Agency laws).

Yes, I saw the statistics on how much more money is made by Agents who focus on listings. And I completely agree that consistent success is based on a listing focus. I coach Agents every day to extraordinary listing success. But the statistics are flawed. Here’s why.

Most, possibly all, Agents with a team focus on listings. On their team are Agents who focus on Buyers. In fact in many those ‘Buyer Specialists’ refer all of their listing leads to the Primary Agent. The team leader (I call them the Primary Agent, thank you Patrick Daily) gets a portion of all the Buyer sale commissions. This enormously skews the statistics. The more accurate measure would be individual Agents who focus on Listings versus the ones who focuses on Buyers. The problem with that is that the vast majority of individual Agents necessarily focus on both.

The point is that focusing on Buyers in a smart way is necessary for Agents with or without a team. For the teams it would be a waste to get all those listings and not benefit from the Buyers they would attract. For an individual Agent it is also most often a matter of survival.

Buyers or Listings there is opportunity in this market. It absolutely takes more talent and effort to find it and close it in this market. Those who tough it out and learn to succeed in this market will be the top Agents and the leaders as a healthy market re-emerges. And with a bit of blessing, it will.

Rich Levin

Here’s why.

First, I know that in many markets listings are not selling very quickly.  The listings have to be priced right, in very good condition and still may not sell.  (Although by definition priced right means they will sell. ) But keep taking listings.

Kyle Killebrew has taken 88 listings so far this year.  That is about 30 more than previous years.  His listing sold percentage is way off from previous years.  He has sold just 68% of them.  Oh, that’s 60 of them isn’t it?  And from the leads generated from all those listings he and his team have sold another 52 houses to Buyers.  Even if less listings sell, having more of the listings means you sell more.

It is tougher to get listings sold in this market.  The Clients’ situations are often negative.  There are job losses, divorces, and involuntary moves.  We are always dealing with these types of situations but in this market and in this economy there are a higher percentage of those negative circumstances.

There are more Sellers who believe their house should sell for a higher price.  A higher percentage of Sellers who sell are disappointed with the price they get.

All of that is true and keep taking new listings, getting price reductions, and re-listing because there are flurries.  A flurry is when, suddenly, for no apparent reason a bunch of properties sell.  The Agents with the listings benefit from the flurries.  These listing Agents benefit in two ways.
First, their listings sell.  Second, they the Buyers contact them.

Kyle said, “Rich, you are right about the flurries.  We sold six properties the first week in September.  School started, right after Labor Day, I wouldn’t have expected that.  But I’m glad to have had the inventory.”
Keep taking listings.

What does “priced right” mean?  It means the price that, with normal marketing, will sell the property in three weeks or less.  The only exception is the house that is truly unique. 
But wait, what if houses were selling last month for $350,000 all over the neighborhood but this month they are not selling.  Does that mean they are now overpriced?  The answer is yes.  Will they come back to the $350,000 price range next month or in the spring?  Maybe, but for this market this month, it’s not “priced right.” 
In this economy it’s possible that next month or in the spring the price could be less. 
An Agent that I coach had sold seven homes in a neighborhood for prices between $620,000 and $720,000 right up until the summer of 2010.  Between the fall of 2010 and the spring of 2011 she had five others on the market.  None were selling.  She lost one listing to a bank foreclosure.  The bank put it on the market for $549,000.  It sold in a week.  This year four others have sold in the neighborhood; all for less than $600,000. 
It hurt her to see her Clients sell for less than they bought.  For too long she was saying that the houses were worth more and that they were priced right when they weren’t selling.  Her heart is in the right place.  This is not easy for Agents or Sellers.
But let’s be honest and professional about pricing.  Let’s learn the skills, approach, and language required to help Sellers make the best decisions even when they are difficult decisions.

Arnold is launching an Internet Company.  It is a terrific idea.  He has a partner.  He contacted me for advice.  He said that he called an important new Client yesterday.  It turned out that his partner spoke with the same Client earlier in the day about the same topic.  And they didn’t present the same information.  They didn’t contradict each other.  They didn’t support each other either.  It is not the impression they want to make.  And it is a sign that he and his partner are not communicating regularly.

I told him to do what Chava and I do every day.  Meet.  His partner is in Florida.  He is in New York.  No problem, speak on the phone.  Use e-mail, text messaging, GoToMeeting, Skype, and any number of other simple tools to conduct the meeting the same way as you would conduct it in person.

Schedule it for just 15 minutes so that it is not a burden.  Take longer if needed.  Schedule longer only when necessary.  Make it at the same time each weekday.  Have a simple agenda/outline of topics to cover so that there is consistent structure to it.  This structure stimulates creative thought.

If you miss it, no biggie, recommit and make it the next day.  If you miss it for a week or weeks at a time, no biggie, stay committed to it.  Eventually, it is so much the right thing that you will do it consistently and right.

WAIT!!!  No biggie if you miss it for weeks at a time, but that sucks.  That’s mediocre.  That lacks integrity.  It is also perfectly normal for a human when you are building a new habit, even a very valuable important habit before it takes hold.

My life and my work continue to teach me that when you berate or belittle yourself you will stay stuck.  But, when you stay positive and committed, you advance more quickly, correctly and creatively.

The decisions that Real Estate Agents make about their business today and this week, shape the next several months.

There is one basic decision.  Get active, get busy.  Or be passive.

Getting busy ensures both a strong finish to 2011 and a strong start to 2012.  Being passive risks a weak finish to 2011 which means suffering low income and a slow start to 2012.

Get busy following up on your leads, prospecting, marketing, blogging, networking, communicating with people.

What you communicate and how you communicate it is important.

Communicate the opportunities in the market, low rates, soft prices, and the fact that this will not last forever.  When it changes, and it will; just a 1% rise in interest rates can mean having to buy less house in a less desirable neighborhood.

And communicate it positively.

When an Agent communicates the difficulties in the market with a discouraged tone of voice then the message to the listener is that this Agent lacks confidence in the market and their ability to succeed within it.  Some Agents say to me, “But Rich, I don’t have confidence in the market or my ability to succeed in it.”

I say to them, “Then get another job.  Or better yet, let’s talk so you can realize that there is tremendous opportunity for the people who are able to buy in this market or sell and buy in this market.  It’s scary.  It’s difficult.  It’s frustrating.  And those that succeed through this market will be the most successful, extraordinarily successful as we eventually emerge from it. And we will.”

When an Agent communicates positively with confidence, the listener notices.  It haunts them.  It sticks with them.  It spreads your reputation as the person to go to and refer to get the job done even in this challenging market.

Be honest.  It’s not easy.  And be confident.  If it can be done, you find a way to do it.  And you are constantly looking for the opportunities.

A Coaching Client recently sent me this in an e-mail.

“I don’t believe that if I do put in the effort that I can see the financial results.  Because of that I hesitate to initiate the work.  Even the most successful agents are struggling today. ”

There are a number of major, and I mean major problems with this statement.  Obviously, if an Agent does not believe his or her effort will produce results that belief immobilizes the Agent.  Second, hesitation shows up as a lack of confidence to the prospects or Clients.  The Clients feel like there is something wrong.  So it slows down or stops their decision making.  Finally, the last statement isn’t true.  The most successful are doing just fine.  Many are succeeding and having best years ever.  I have many coaching Clients who are having their best years ever.

This is a deep seated belief.  I asked the Client if he experienced that sense of disbelief in other areas of his life, with his marriage, his children, his hobbies, etc.  Sure enough, in some areas like personal relationships it didn’t seem apparent, thank goodness.  In others, it was the same, a belief that his effort would not produce results.

Now, I am not a psychologist but it shows up that way sometimes.  I asked him to describe the careers of his mother and father.  Sure enough, he described his parents as working very hard and being extremely frustrated with their results.

This will take a truly monumental effort on his part to overcome.  He will have to battle emotions that show up as fatigue, frustration, fear and more.  It will require him to keep doing the right things, calling leads, conducting presentations, marketing and more despite those limiting beliefs and negative emotions.  As he slogs through the work, and it will feel that way to him at first, he also needs to consciously put his body and his mind into a positive state.  That will cause his emotions to follow.

If he does it, his Real Estate career will turn out to be the catalyst for a life with greater fulfillment and satisfaction than he can now imagine.

As a coach, these are the Clients that you think of when you go to bed and when you wake up.  Their success is what drives my world.

Every day on our Free Webinars (www.FreeCoachingWebinars.com) we reinforce four things that lead Agents to survive and succeed in this market.

1. Remind yourself every day, at the beginning of the day, what you want your Real Estate career to do for your life; and why you want it.
2. With that in mind, consciously and intentionally put yourself in an empowering attitude, a positive mental and emotional state by using the triad of your physiology, your focus, and your self-talk. In its simplest form stand up, stomach in, shoulders back, chest out, and smile. Focus on what would make it the best possible day. For the self talk, use affirmation, expressions of gratitude, prayer, or whatever leaves you feeling good and strong.
3. With that positive mindset look at your numbers. Look at your weekly, monthly and year to date goals. This is tough sometimes. That is why you want to establish that empowered state before you look at your where you stand in relation to your goals. (On the daily webinars we teach you how to set those goals in the simplest and most effective way.)
4. Then with your focus on what you need to accomplish to reach your goals open your calendar to organize and prioritize your day. We recommend some consistent priorities for specific days, prospecting, marketing, technology, service, skill building, and planning.

These four steps will take as little as ten minutes; up to thirty if you really get into it. This daily habit gets you motivated, focused and into action. At the same time it gives you the perspective to not get caught up in petty distractions, stay focused on your goals, and build greater confidence in every action and every decision.

Sorry about the tone, I wanted to get your attention, particularly those of you who know that your listing presentation needs help.

An Agent with three years experience just started coaching with me.  She did her listing presentation for me.  It was clear that she had never had professional help on it.

A few keys, she was doing a two step approach.  Many good Agents do a two step.  The first step is just looking at the property and having an informal rapport building conversation with the owner in which you also subtly probe for motivation and urgency.  This Agent was sitting down and presenting her entire marketing plan, then coming back the second step for pricing the house.  This is a bad approach for a lot of reasons.  The point is that she didn’t know better.

There were almost no questions.  She talked on and on without asking a question and without checking in to confirm the level of attention and understanding.

Presentation is really the wrong word for a listing presentation.  It really needs to be called a Listing Consultation or better yet a Seller Consultation.  A consultant is continuously asking questions to understand the need of the client and their particular situation.  Then as he or she presents, they offer possible solutions, a consultant continues to ask questions for two reasons.  One is to ensure attention and agreement.  The other is to create positive (yes) momentum.

As she was discussing her marketing plan for the property she reviewed the listing contract, and then at the end presented pricing.  This structure is very weak.  There is a simple strong structure for a listing presentation; build rapport, present marketing plan, present pricing and value, review Seller’s expenses and net, review paperwork and ask for a decision.

The point of all this for you is this.  Do you have confidence in your listing presentation?  If you don’t, get with your Broker, Manager, a Trainer, a Coach, or work with a successful Agent.  Get professional help.  Even if you think your presentation is good but you don’t have real confidence in it.  Work on it with someone that will be really honest with you about it and who can help you make it as strong as possible.  Don’t let this weakness persist.  It will erode your integrity and your confidence.