Use this “Secret” to get “Lucky” in your real estate career.

My title rep just stopped in and we had a conversation about business and the current headwinds that our industry faces. You know them all, interest rates, lack of inventory, insurance issues, and now the lawsuit against NAR. Yep, there certainly is some negativity in our industry right now!

Of course, we also discussed the bad old days of 2008-2011. I know, I know, you folks that weren’t in the business back then are tired of hearing us old-timers talk about how bad it was. But my rep and I weren’t commiserating or swapping war stories from the past, instead, we talked about how that experience actually made us stronger. Having been through those struggles made us better businesspeople. It made us realize that we must expand our business, diversify, and never expect that our phone will ring just because it did in the past.

These hard-fought lessons are the core of what I try to teach my coaching clients who are struggling right now. Rather than feel sorry for ourselves or bury our heads in the sand and ignore the facts, we must be determined to succeed in any market. We must figure out ways to make that phone ring, we must expand to different areas of our industry to ensure it will ring in all markets.

Look, our industry is broad, it includes many ways to make a living. Residential sales, commercial sales, and property management are the main categories that we operate in. But within those categories, there are many subcategories that we can expand into to diversify our income. Commercial has many subcategories that you can expand into when your specialty is down. Retail, office, multi-family, industrial, and the list goes on.  Property Management can also be expanded from single-family to multi-family or even one or more of the commercial specialties. Residential agents also have a vast amount of diversity. Probate, divorce, resort properties, investment properties, vacation properties, new homes, and so on.

No matter which specialty you are currently in, you need to expand your business in slow times. Diversify your business so you have multiple avenues that make the phone ring. Now is the time to do your research and find those niches that sell in all markets. Once you determine which direction to expand your business, take these steps to ensure you are successful.

-Make A Written Plan- Stats show that written plans have a 42% higher rate of success than unwritten.
                -Don’t worry about SMART or any other acronym, just get a damn plan written!
-Execute The Plan-Get it done! Don’t procrastinate, don’t make excuses, get it done!
                -This is where most agents fail. You must execute your plan!
-Evaluate Results- Measure the results, track your leads, and determine what worked and what didn’t.
                -A big weak point in most plans is the lack of tracking results.
-Make Changes- Tweak the plan until it works as intended.
                -No plan is perfect, you must continually tweak any plan to perfect it.
-Rinse and Repeat- Once you have a successful segment of business, expand on it over and over.
                -Successful agents know that once they find a winning system they need to expand on it.

These are the steps to expanding your business, but there are three things that I say are the SECRET, the SILVER BULLET, The MAGIC POTION, to success in real estate:

Consistency
Determination
Perseverance

Without these three things, you will never be successful in the long run. You may have short bursts of success, especially in boom times, but longevity in this business only comes when these three things are applied.

You must be consistent in your message to establish yourself as the expert for your sphere, niche, and prospects.

You must be determined to overcome any challenges that come your way, you cannot let negativity rule your business.

You must persevere through challenges and setbacks. Every successful agent has been through setbacks, they have just learned how to move past those setbacks, learn from them, and use them as fuel to keep going!

Yes, we have headwinds in our industry right now. Yes, it’s a challenging time to survive for some agents. Yes, it seems like the good times are a long way down the road. But if you take the steps now to expand your business, go into areas that you have never gone, and pursue those ideas that you had but were too afraid to execute, you will come out of this stronger than ever. You will look back at this time and think how “lucky” you were to survive. But, as with most success stories, it won’t be luck that made you successful.