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In a classic Bawld Guy moment, Jeff Brown reminded us recently that hard work, not a magic formula nor even an ability to predict five out of six Power Ball numbers, is what makes a successful real estate career. All of the motivational seminars in the free world can not replace the experience of one real-life transaction. The fanciest widgets and the sexiest web site flash intros will never replace feet on the ground. Technological applications augment a solid business plan built on fundamentals; they do not replace it. We work in real estate, and there is a reason it is called “work.”

Jeff mentioned that he started his career converting For Sale By Owners (FSBOs). I always suspected we were twins. Just for fun, I thought I would share the story of my first transaction. We all remember our first - with a lot of fondness and more than a little humility. This is just a little walk down memory lane self-indulgence on my part but, if a few more people follow suit and share their “firsts,” we might start to connect the dots for the newer agents. I suspect we will see a common thread of tenacity and drive, stuff that can’t really be taught or learned.

Make no mistake. For the new agent wanting to jump-start a real estate career, this is a difficult market. But then, they all are. The first thing that will strike you is that your new career laughs in the face of the supply and demand laws of nature. There are more real estate agents than there are left-over casseroles needing a shave in my refrigerator right now, and certainly more agents than there are potential customers. This is survival of the fittest, and in the virtual Plinko game that is your office, within seconds of your arrival, every single one of your fellow agents will be plotting to throw you under a bus.

What distinguishes the working agent from the non-working agent is “work.”  A fundamental ingredient of this work is a “client” who wishes to buy or sell a home. Ideally, this “client” is not themselves a licensed real estate agent, which means that your potential customer base actually consists of twelve people in Your State.

So, your real work as an agent begins with your first customer. My first customer was Joe and Marge. (Actually, Joe and Marge were two people, but they lived in the same house, so I can only count them once. It’s a real estate thing.) This is a story of youthful exuberance, naiveté, misfortune, and unimaginable bravery in the face of adversity, but enough about Joe and Marge.

This is really the tale of how I weaseled my way into the home and hearts of an unsuspecting couple who needed to sell. I will begin at the end. I listed and eventually sold their home. The fact that my first transaction was a listing rather than a buyer sale was in itself unique. Listings are the Holy Grail of real estate, listings provide advertising opportunity, and listings breed more listings, kind of like bunnies. Buyers don’t generally allow you to place a sign in their front yard announcing, “Represented by Kris!!” Your only hope with buyers is that they will share your story with their friends, or, in some cases, your only hope is that they won’t. Sure, a buyer may become a seller some day, but you could be the day shift hostess at Walmart my then. Better to get the listings coming out of the gate.

What also made my first transaction unique was that Joe and Marge were initially FSBOs. FSBOs by their very nature are distrusting of agents. They like control, they firmly believe they can do the job themselves and better, and they will always know more than you do, even when they do not. Despite this, the Agent Needing to Eat can find some opportunity in the failed-FSBO-as-potential-client arena.

If I had possessed any formal training whatsoever, I would have never found myself at their kitchen table this weekday evening. I would have been holding an Open House for a successful Listing Agent, I would have been forcing my newly printed business cards into the clinched fists of my “Sphere of Influence” (formerly known as Friends), or I would have been addressing postcards with the much-anticipated Recipe of the Month to unsuspecting neighbors (October = Bologna Shapes with Mayonnaise Dipping Sauce). Yet, I was unshackled by the encumbrances of actual, practical knowledge. My two-week training program at the Rock Solid Brokerage corporate offices had not yet begun, but I needed to eat. So, I picked up the newspaper classified section. (In those days, we had things called “newspapers” which were made from paper stock of tree origin). It was the beginning of what would be a grueling day at the office. I made one phone call.

“Hello, this is Kris from Rock Solid Brokerage. I see your home is for sale. I specialize in Your Neighborhood (I think I sort of know where it is) and might have a buyer who is interested in Your Home (perhaps in August, 2015 if I am not working at Jamba Juice by then). Are you cooperating with agents who bring the buyer, and might I be able to stop by to preview the property?”

This is where the clouds parted and the angels sang, albeit off-key. “We are actually thinking about listing with an agent”, Marge confided. “Perfect!” I shouted, jumping through the phone and giving ol’ Marge a big bear hug. “Why don’t I come by and give you my Marketing Plan and preview your home at the same time? We could kill two birds with one stone!”

How prophetic. My birds agreed to meet with me.

Now, at this point in my long, illustrious career, it is important to remember that I have NO Marketing Plan. I have no plan at all. So, I fill my briefcase with a package of listing forms which are as familiar to me as the blueprints for Hubble Telescope, and I fill in the air space with random company promotional propaganda leaflets pulled from the shelves of the Rock Solid resource room, one of which undoubtedly involved step-by-step instructions for replacing the toner in the office copy machine. With my remaining free hand, I grab all arbitrary office items within reach (and which I believe included a two-hole punch and a desk lamp) so as not to look unprepared, and I head for the door.

With the help of my “stuff”, and much to the chagrin of Joe and Marge, I was able to stretch my visit into a painful, three-hour presentation. I spent two hours ogling over their most special of special homes, while I wisely devoted the remaining hour to discussing pricing, the reputation of my company, and the inherent dangers of continuing the photocopying process with a depleted toner supply. Stocking-clad limbs wrapped firmly around one leg of the casual dinette, I refused to budge. When their attempts at feigning death still failed to send me home, Joe and Marge, motivated by the need for dinner, oxygen and sleep, at last surrendered. “She seems like a nice enough girl, Joe, and I just don’t want to go through this again”. Ha! Put that in your testimonial book!

I returned to the office with a listing contract that looked like we had all prepared it with a box of crayons while wearing coordinating oven mitts. Perhaps that opposable thumb came in handy after all! Eventually, I had to return to rewrite the contract properly, but I had the job. I have since looked back and done the math; this first job resulted in eight subsequent transactions as a direct result of that one yard sign. And, don’t feel sorry for Joe and Marge. They got fabulous representation and results. I worked my hiney off. They were all I had, and I had nothing else to do.

If there is a moral to my story, it is this. If you are new in the business, go ahead and attend the classes. Learn the stuff in the office training manuals and get motivated. Then, get off your butt, and go find your Joe and Marge.

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My Big Bang Theory is about science colliding with religion, and a lot of noise.

My strike has been temporarily suspended. I got the same advance notice that so many others did of the BIG NEWS this week, but press releases are rarely conveniently timed around my real estate business schedule, so I will chime in late and with benefit of time to contemplate.

Redfin’s latest BIG NEWS was of course about the Second Coming, the first having occurred on 60 Minutes long, long ago. From their blog:

We only worry that the name we’ve given this initiative, “The Real Estate Scientist,” will open us to being mocked. And too, we hesitated to give consumers simple answers due to the complexity of the underlying data… We strove for conclusive answers because we have houses to sell every week, and customers who need straightforward guidance.

I am not in the business of mocking, as you have a pretty solid corner on that market. And that is precisely my objection, my only objection, to your business model - that it is predicated and dependent on convincing a public that your “different” approach is enlightened and studied where mine is one of fly by the seat of my pants, tell the consumer what they want to hear, and hit the streets with nothing but an opinion and a smile.

It is indeed troubling to give simple answers when the data is so complex, but it is much more convenient I suppose. Delivering and interpreting data to support your ongoing argument that every other real estate agent since the beginning of time is too uninformed, addle minded, lazy, or greedy to achieve your level of enlightenment would be so exhausting. That darn science can be just so confusing. Better to just suggest as much, over and over again. Preach long and loud enough, and the congregation will surely take it on faith.

Consumers who have read early drafts of the report overwhelmingly found our recommendations useful and effective. The industry reaction will likely be different. Some will argue that the report substantiates already well-understood tactics, while others will take the exact opposite position, refuting our points one by one.

That pretty much covers all bases, a clever preemptive strike to further the notion that you are a renegade and we  (”we” being “everyone else”) are still making fire with sticks. I, of course, could engage in both the “duh” and the “not so fast” arguments, but I don’t really believe it is “informed conversation” that is your goal. Dialogue can really mess up the cadence of a good sermon.

But the truth is that a discussion of how real estate brokerages can deliver better results, based on data rather than just opinion, is in everyone’s best interests. And the findings aren’t simply a prescription for how we’ll serve our customers, but the starting point for an informed conversation about pricing and marketing our listings.

And yet I can’t help talking in church. Is it science or religion that is the foundation of your model? I do have a little science of my own, and this science is based on actual field tests performed over the past decade, from whence those nasty “opinions” that I harbor were formed. Fridays are good for listing a home. Yep! The problem is that a going live in the MLS on Friday will often result in the property not being picked up by the dozens of sites that sweep once a day until after the weekend, not to mention that a mid- to late-day Friday entry will miss the eyes of so many agents who make their Saturday showing appointments on Friday mornings.

Vacant homes are more difficult to sell. Yep! But not always, in the case of the poorly maintained or cluttered home, in the case of the home with too many occupants including pets, or in the case of the tenant occupied home with difficult showing provisions. And not always for the reason you give (that buyers will perceive desperation). Vacant homes, absent careful and costly staging, simply do not speak to the buyer on the same emotional level.

The seller should be motivated. The home should be priced properly. The property should be advertised online. All that.

More science, then. At the risk of sounding blasphemous, Redfin didn’t invent the concept of online advertising. I don’t believe you even invented Craigslist. But I did notice that just two of your three active listings in San Diego are posted there. All of mine are. Did you know you need to refresh listings every seven days? I guess one of your clients got busy and forgot. We do that for our clients. And did you know you can post more than three pictures? Whoops! This one is vacant. Maybe it is better to not show so many photos.

More science. Sometimes it is very hard to practice what you preach. A softening market and unrealistic seller expectations are things we all have to deal with from time to time. I noticed that of  your 3 San Diego active listings and 1 pending sale, 4 have gone through a price reduction. I also noticed that one was listed on a Monday and another on a Wednesday, and that the average market time for these homes is 151 days. (Averaging numbers is a “science thing” and involves both addition and division, so I hope I haven’t oversimplified.) Don’t get me wrong, it happens to us all on occasion, since we don’t always have the luxury of dictating our seller’s listing terms. But my science doesn’t match your sermon. We advise, we counsel, and then we play the hand we are dealt to the best of our abilities.

My intent is not to ridicule or attack, Glenn. I like you a lot, and I adore Cynthia, your marketing guru. She deserves a raise, in fact. While I am resigned to delivering my “science” and my message on my website and my little blog and face-to-face with live consumers, you are praying for your deliverance and my demise from a pulpit on national television. And I just find your ongoing proselytizing tiring and dishonest. You are not a savior, and I am not Satan, nor is it the other way around. Science is good, but you have not engineered or even created anything revolutionary, except perhaps a new twist on the old collection plate. 

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Dear Internal Revenue Service:

I am responding to your challenge of my business expense write-off of $160 to Dick’s Last Resort on December 12, 2007. While I recognize that you necessarily take a hard line where entertainment expenses are concerned, we really did talk about real estate!

You see, we bloggers have this thing called a Social Network. It is important that, when presented with the opportunity, we connect with this network to improve our business skills and cultivate future referral business. This is what professionals do!

Granted, you alluded to Steve’s Smoking Gun, which you say suggests that the atmosphere lacked professionalism.

Let me just say for the record that Steve was in fact present, sitting opposite Brian Brady in this photo and, while he may deny this or even suggest he was eclipsed by Jonathan Dalton in the foreground, I will tell you that he was hiding under the table.

As for the others in attendance, Jeff “Bawld Guy” Brown is a highly regarded investment advisor. This much should be all too evident.

Brian Brady, of course, is a Mortgage Specialist Extraordinaire. Again, I state the obvious.

As for me, I discovered two things that will help my business in the coming year: I am not a “hat person”, and I really shouldn’t wear my hair pulled back in a clip, as it is simply not a good look for me.

Regarding the bill, I readily admit that my esteemed Social Network did toss random currency on the table at the conclusion of our Business Meeting. But, you know men. They have no concept of what anything actually costs. Trust me when I say that your assertion that I did not pay the entire bill is splitting hairs.

Might I suggest you look into the expense records on Jonathan Dalton’s tax return, as he was in town to attend a convention, or at least that is the story. And, if you see him taking any deductions for dinner at Dick’s Last Resort, you might want to question him on it.

Sincerely,

Kris Berg

P.S. Josh, Son of Bawld Guy, didn’t do anything wrong. Go easy on him.

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Do you have a “macro-niche within a niche“?

Do I need one?

It’s something to think about. No, not becoming a nudist Realtor® (thank goodness - that could get ugly), but finding your distinct value proposition. How about the music business? By combining your non-real estate expertise with your real estate knowledge, you can become the defacto specialist within a very small but lucrative sphere.

My non-real estate expertise… hum. Well, there is the really good Chicken Divan I made last night. “The Agent for People Who Like Do-Ahead Casseroles”. Nah, that doesn’t really speak to me. How about my prowess with a glue gun? “Your Crafty Realtor®!” On second thought, that probably wouldn’t work. Double-entandres can backfire.

Okay, then. I have given this proposition a lot of thought (a lot of thought = one cup of coffee) and have come up with an untapped yet potentially lucrative niche on which I will focus my efforts in 2008.

I am going to marry the concepts of making a living in representing people in the purchases and sales of homes and earning a living doing same. Earn a living? Crazy talk, you say. Isn’t it enough that I like floppy hats and the letter “E” (uppercase only), and you do too? This is a business of relationships!

Shticks are for those who seek unearned income. Gimmicks are for those don’t place much value in their actual services and are surprised when the consumers don’t value their services as a result. Stupid agent tricks are for stoopid agents who don’t respect their client base enough to know that the vast majority want the best person for the job at the best value. Attila the Hun would have market share today if he could demonstrate superior skills and a history of superior results. Although, I suppose the Huns could be considered a macro-niche within a pillaging, nomadic niche.

I think, I know, I am pretty good at what I do. I also know that after eleven years in the business, I don’t know everything, I haven’t seen everything, and I likely never will. I suspect even Russell Shaw would admit to as much. I do know that I spend arguably far too much time continuing to learn more, to offer more value, and to better my services. Can your “List with Me and Enter to Win a Free Pony” Neighborhood Specialist say the same thing? Maybe. Or, he could be a pillaging nomad who is trying to reach his unearned income goals for the year. Make him earn it.

So, my “niche” will be like-minded people who appreciate professional representation, a progressive and agressive approach to service, knowledge, ethics, honesty and dedication. I will continue to attempt to appeal to this niche through the quality of my website, my marketing of my listings, my service to all of my clients, and my thoughts expressed on this and my own blog. Perhaps this is too broad a target audience, but it is an audience which I see too few agents courting. Opportunity abounds!

By the way, I like the entire Jessica Simpson footwear line and the color Goldenrod.

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I found myself this morning checking out our blog traffic stats. I don’t know why I do this exactly - It’s idle curiosity, I suppose. I’ll know when my blog hits the big time. That will be the day when I am so busy meeting with clients and closing escrows that I won’t have time to visit our site’s back end.

We blog for sport, we blog for exposure, but mostly we blog for business. There - I said it. Anyone who says otherwise is not being honest. Oh, sure, it has become an addiction, and I sincerely believe that if I retired from my day job today, I would still be blogging tomorrow. It can have that kind of hold on you.

In the meantime, blogging needs to either be a hobby or a component of my business plan. As of press time, it is a little of both. Speaking to the business side of things, my Google-ability is generally of very little concern to me. “Blasphemy!” you say. Let me explain.

Unless the person stumbling on to my site through a search bar is looking to buy or sell a home in San Diego, they are of no value to me from a business perspective. Further, I am most interested in the person who is looking to buy or sell a home in San Diego and who actually lives in San Diego. Sure, there is the potential to attract the eyes and business of people relocating from Duluth, but relocation business is time intensive, needle-in-the-haystack work. We welcome the work, but it is a lower percentage play, much more difficult to cultivate and convert. So if you agree that the local audience is the audience for which you perform, why give a fig about SEO?

Everyone give a warm welcome to Panama!

Jay Thompson through one of his posts turned me on to Who’s Amung Us. They have a nifty little map widget that allows you to display current and past visitors to your site and their location. Here is what my visitor map for the San Diego Home Blog looks like:

(Note: The previously posted real-time map has now been replaced by a screen shot to account for the fact that the author is stupid. By embedding my map here and at my home blog, I was showing all of the Bloodhound’s traffic too. While this made me look much more influential back in San Diego, it really wasn’t fair. Alert husband knew that something was amiss when 20 stars were blinking back at him. With a readership of three, this is statistically not possible.)

This is a scary little feature, scary because I live in constant fear that my map will display only one visitor - me.  Yet, I find it has value. The value to me is that it serves as a constant reminder that people actually read my drivel posts. A few days without adding fresh content and a half-dozen blinking lights reminds me that I had better get typing. Beyond this, it is a sobering visual which suggests that the business versus hobby scale of my blogging may be leaning in the wrong direction if solvency is my goal.

The widget continuously updates, so you will have to take my word for it when I tell you that at 6:00 AM this morning I was delighted to find that Panama was in the room. This led me to my back end stats counter in search of The Truth (why in the heck is Panama on my blog?). Here is just a smattering of my most recent 100 visitors and the corresponding keywords that snagged their attention:

Panama - “Days left in summer” (None, by the way.)

Italy - “Saldana and Afghani” (Huh?)

Long Beach, California and Ankara, Turkey - “Girls volleyball” (Laurie? Is that you?)

Hayden, Alabama - “Houses rolled with toilet paper” (Sicko.)

Allendale, Michigan - “Too much fiber one” (Sorry - I’ll try to sweeten things.)

United States - “San Diego boat junk yard” (I’m not sure about the boat-thing, but I will generally give you that one.)

Los Angeles, California (CBS) - Leslie Appleton-Young (Uh-oh. I smell trouble Leslie Stahl.)

So, for the long-tail searches involving toilet paper, the changing of the seasons, a healthy diet, high school athletics and “Saldana and Afghani” (which, by the way, for some unknown reason led to an image I had posted of Spam on a plate), I rock. Obviously, the keywords I care about most, such as “San Diego Real Estate”, are nearly impossible to crack. And, ironically, I have unthinkingly typed the less popular term “Scripps Ranch” into articles so many times that I have given up on manicures, yet you won’t find me through Google that way unless you follow it with “blog”, “floor plans” or “toilet paper”.

Does this mean that blogging is for naught? Not. We get results, and we can point to many transactions which came as a direct or indirect result of blogging, but they were not related to searchability. Our success has been related to local promotion of the site as a complement to our other marketing undertakings. The visitors I care most about are the ones who intentionally find me by typing in the URL. They are the ones who I speak to and who are more inclined to return, stay, and ultimately hire me.

My detractors will say I am short-sighted and even flat-out wrong, but I think it is an enormous mistake to spend any measurable amount of time worrying about keywords and SEO. If you write frequently, if you write on topic, and if you write with style and passion, the visitors will follow. Over time, I suspect I just might find what I am not looking for, that elusive Google-ability. Until then, being overly concerned about SEO would just be chasing my, albeit long, tail.

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At our office meeting this past week, our manager shared this video with the troops. Our meeting, you see, happened to coincide with Halloween, and the intended nexus was a scary market and overcoming fears.

So, watch the video of the Crazy Man with a Death Wish (I dare you to take your eyes off of it), and we will have a short review and Q & A following the show.

Review

We all have fears, and to a real estate agent who enjoys the finer things in life, such as food, shelter, and the occasional trip to the Haircut Store, our current market can be quite frightening. These fears can be overcome, as demonstrated by Crazy Man with a Death Wish.

Simply think of your career as one big-ass challenge, one where you have been dropped at the top of a ginormous mountain with a snowboard. Think of your career as teetering on the head of a very tall pin. Executed with absolute precision and focus, you will reach your goals. Flawlessly navigate the moguls of misfortune, and you will quickly reach base camp from the pinnacle of self-doubt. Screw up, and every limb will be ripped from your fragile body in a single, excruciating moment of self-destruction, or worse. You might not get the Top Producer plaque at the year-end awards ceremony.

Q & A

Q. This is supposed to be metaphorical of my real estate career? Isn’t Crazy
Guy going downhill very, very fast?

A. Yes, and your point is?

Q. Wouldn’t a better metaphor be one where I am at the foot of the ginormous mountain of opportunity, and I must work very hard to scale same?

A. Just trying to keep it real here, but good point. Do you have a link to that video?

Q. Okay, so what if I am schlepping my pathetic unprepared self up that vertical slope toward solvency and see the oncoming avalanche of no-fear agents on their way down?

A. Make a snow cave.

Q. Can I fly the helicopter?

A. No.

Tomorrow we will watch a spooky video involving an agent who, while dropping notepads at random doorsteps, survives an attack by a pack of rabid Lhasa Apsos who had escaped their model-perfect, highly upgraded home through a non-permitted doggie access cut in the fire door. The really scary part is the code violation. 

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Dear Mr Shaw,

I am writing to inquiry about a position as Blogging Assistant. I am a fan of your work on the Bloodhound Blog; your piece on the bananas was pure genius. I believe I would add value to your blogging enterprise, and it would be an honor to work under your tutelage.

By way of background, I too used to contribute to the Bloodhound Blog. My tenure was cut short when some “Geno Petro” guy showed up. My spell checker says his name is really Genoa Petrol, but I don’t think that’s right. Anway, he knows books, he knows pop culture, and he can certainly turn a phrase. He even uses colons!

While I have no real writing training (I have admittedly never enjoyed formal instruction in the liberal arts beyond the requisite How to Write in Nearly Complete Sentences college course where, I am proud to say, I received a passing grade), I did take an English and American Literature class in high school. (Yes, my school combined the two; this allowed time in the schedule for Home Economics and Making Fire 101.) It was there that I was required to suffer through read Jane Eyre and the Grapes of Wrath. I finished both, although I found the latter unsettling and eerily biographical. Oh, and the Latin I know comes entirely from the back of a dollar bill.

So, I am seeking a position with the potential for upward mobility, as I find I have none at my current position.  I believe that I can turn my “negatives” in to “positives”; unshackled as I am by the encumbrances of any real credentials or talent, I can quickly embrace new approaches. Since a truly original idea has never come within two quarks of my brain, I am adaptable. Finally, I have good problem solving skills.

I do not come to you without references. As a blogger, I have received much praise on my own blog which boasts a current readership of three:

“Since it doesn’t take much to be a Realtor, your pool is full of monkeys.” - - Eric Estrada

“Most Realtors are lazy and uneducated. They will go away like other brokers as the web makes them obsolete.” - - Don Doerna

“Lady, do you want to eat Ramen for the next two years? Haven’t you heard? There is a CRASH happening before our very eyes. Get out of this industry. Your kids will love you for it.” - - RayNLA

As you may have inferred from these testimonials, when I am not blogging, I also dabble in real estate. Sometimes, I sell a home or two. I hear you sell some houses too. Therefore, you may find my current Real Estate Business Plan to be an excellent example of how I might assist in elevating your reputation as a blogger, seeing as you like to use pictures a lot:

As a cautionary note, I may want to cut back on my hours once I have met my real estate goals. In the meantime, I look forward to hearing from you!

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Censorship has been on my mind. Not the definitive, prescribed and documented “heavy hand of authority” variety, and not the ”thou shalt not be mean to NAR” Memorandum of Paranoia allegedly being unveiled in November, but the worst and most pervasive kind.

What I find more concerning and most stifling is the triple-secret censorship. Unless you are a Broker Owner, with no one to answer to but your own inner voice of reason, you are being judged by what you write. Every word I click onto the page is subject to scrutiny, and I must choose each oh-so carefully while perched atop my podium of egg shells. Sometimes I fail and trash the whole dozen. Independent contractor? Not entirely independent, I’m afraid.

Many topics are safe. Statistics and trend analyses are the poster children of the benign blog entry. Pictures of pretty buildings, diatribes on transactional intricacies, and advice on “how to pick an agent” are all fair game. It’s black or it’s white, and no one can make a compelling argument to the contrary. Fielding questions on contracts leads us closer to the mine field, but if we preface each thought that hits the page with “I am not an attorney,” we mitigate the risk of having to rephrase our post for His Honor.

We can talk about technology. It either is or it isn’t, and my broker is probably not going to hunt me down like a dog for taking a bold stand challenging the site design of Terabitz, nor will he give much thought to my in-depth expose on the accuracy of the Zestimate. While I am cautiously treading water with my choice of topics, however, I am risking either offending the reader with the triviality of my content or boring him senseless.

This blog scares me, because I think it scares my broker. The tone is sometimes caustic, mostly serious, and always challenging of the status quo. I enjoy satire, and I like to laugh. Many things make me laugh, and so many of those are related to common, every day life, the life unrelated to the job. I weave those stories into my writing, too often I suppose, but you can only get away with so many “You won’t believe what my daughter stuffed up her nose today” stories on a business blog.

If one wishes to find humor in a business, there is none better than our business of real estate. Yet, I can’t tell the stories I want to tell. If I reveal the dumb agent tricks I am forced to witness daily, I offend. That’s not the image we want to portray. If I write about the hilarity that is the typical real estate office, I offend. I may tarnish a brand. Speaking negatively about a consumer experience is the ultimate offense. They may not want to work with me, not to mention that I may tarnish a brand.

I understand these triple-secret and unspoken rules, and I have had the pleasure of actually hearing them spoken. If I was in my broker’s britches (figuratively speaking), I would be telling the same secrets. But, this speaks to the conundrum that befalls the blogger over time. I would submit that anyone who has shown consistency and commitment to blogging, who has a measure of longevity communicating in this manner, has made a personal discovery along the way. They have discovered that they enjoy writing, maybe as much or more than they enjoy their real work. To be completely committed to one, however, you must show infidelity to the other. And, using the Ben Franklin approach, I have concluded that I still have bills to pay. Advantage broker.

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The business of real estate sales is a business unlike any other. The Real Estate Hybrid is neither energy nor cost efficient. Ours does not fit neatly under the Service Provider heading nor do we have a product to sell in the traditional sense. What we do have, however, is the goal universal to all commercial business ventures - profitability.

Why, then, is it so fashionable these days to portray the real estate agent as overpaid, and the profession in the broadest terms as engorged with greed? Several factors contribute: The consumer’s lack of understanding or their misconceptions of our business model, our inability to effectively communicate and demonstrate our value, and our tendency to carry on a public charade suggesting that our job is one big public service announcement. The latter, of course, is compensation for the former, with the real answer lying somewhere in the middle.

When did profit become a dirty word?

Just Take a Little Off the Top

A business consulting firm, Virtual Advisor Interactive, wrote this about the pure consulting or service-oriented business:

You may tend to think that pricing is not as complicated as product pricing, since what you are offering is less tangible, but appearances can be deceiving… Say you are a hair stylist, for example. Your raw costs will probably include the following: rent and utilities, equipment (including chairs, hair dryers, combs and brushes, sinks, mirrors, towels, washers and dryers, etc.), products (assorted shampoos, conditioners, hair spray and hair color), insurance, and staff salaries and benefits. Also, what about insurance, should a customer slip and fall? So while your service may be hair styling, you must carefully examine everything you will need… to perform that service. You must carefully and continuously list every expense. Once you have determined your raw costs, you can then set up an effective pricing model and figure how much you will need to charge for your service or time in order to break even and/or make a profit.

So, we aren’t hair stylists, but a very large component of our business is delivering service. I won’t offend the reader by listing the costs associated with fueling our business; if you are an agent, you already know, and if you are a consumer, you have a pretty good idea if you are honest with yourself.

One fundamental difference, if you compare Real Estate Sales to the traditional service business, is that we provide the service with no guarantee of compensation. In business speak, this is called a “loss.” And the magnitude of the losses associated with our work is never greater than in a slow market such as the one we find ourselves in today. Once your hair has been cut, I doubt you will feel at liberty to say, “I’ve changed my mind. I kind of liked it the old way, so I won’t be paying you for your time or services.” Yet, buyers and sellers do this all of the time, and we allow it through “right to cancel” clauses, through buyer representation on a handshake, and through fear of enforcement when payment is contractual, because we know our reputation and tomorrow’s business depends on it.

We only get paid once the County Recorder sings. And, this is where the “product” part comes into play.

The Return Policy

Most reputable companies with a product to sell have adopted liberal return policies. If the package is unopened, bring it back - No harm, no foul. After all, they can return it to the shelf and resell it.

This practice does not translate well to real estate sales, but we have willingly adopted the same practice. You see, when you return your listing to me, it has been opened and at great cost to my “company.” For instance, I now have a client who has suddenly decided that renting is a better option than selling. Fair enough, except this was a triple-secret Plan B that I wasn’t privy to when I spent $950 on a stager and staging materials, over $1000 on property brochures and a direct mail campaign, and close to $700 to date on open house advertisements. (I know open houses and open house ads don’t work, but she wanted them.) Almost $3000 later, she wants and will receive a full refund.

So, when the customer decides to return the listing, his brochures, his staging, and his ads are of no use to me. It is fuel that has been spent. Spend less or insist up front that cancellation will require repayment of out-of-pocket costs, you may say? Well, in my business, it just doesn’t work that way.

Return Policy of Chain to Chain Competition was the title of a paper presented at a 2007 International Conference on Service Systems and Service Management. When I came across the abstract, I found some relevance in the central theme.

As the intensity of competition increases, the win-win range becomes more robust… In general, returns policies intensify the competition among retailers, however, within some range of demand uncertainty, returns policies mitigate the competition among manufacturers and otherwise, intensify the competition among manufacturers which leads to a decrease in wholesale price.

Granted, the preceding wasn’t a light, easy read, but the message relates to our field. Our field has become so overpopulated and so competitive, that it has lead to a decrease in wholesale price. In other words, you are getting more for my money. As a consumer, next time you whine that percentage fees haven’t changed as home prices have increased, consider that my “cost of goods and services” has increased dramatically due to the intensity of competition (and, yes, the cost of business fuel). You don’t see it, but I see it, and I feel it (painfully) in the bottom line.

The Restocking Fee

Those same reputable companies that have the liberal return policies also have restocking fees. They do this because returns of opened or otherwise damaged merchandise affect their bottom lines - unless they are able to recover the loss in order to keep costs and, therefore, prices down.

In an article on The PC Guide, they said this:

Restocking fees are a statement by the company that they feel the person who decides to return a non-defective item should pay for these costs. And I personally think this is perfectly fair, as long as restocking fees are only charged in cases where I return an item due to my making a bad buying decision. I don’t expect anyone else to pay for my mistakes.

Yet in real estate, we pay for the decisions of others every single day.

Your Mileage May Vary

This is not something that any consumer wants to hear, but you pay for the mistakes, for the changes of heart, and for the poor decisions of others. You pay the bill at the grocery store, where “shrinkage” losses are factored into the prices of perishables. You pay it at the drug store, where the price of your mascara includes a premium to account for theft loss, and you pay it at Nordstom to compensate for their generous return policies. Why would anyone think my business should be different?

For every three-grand “I didn’t mean it”, I have to make $3001 to turn a profit (forgetting time and non-property specific costs of doing business). A couple of those “oopsies”, and my next transaction is only a break-even event (at least, in Southern California). Were it not for the losses, lower fees would pencil out. In a sense, we all pay.

Back to the “public service announcement” I spoke of at the beginning. Please do not conclude that money is our only objective in this business of real estate. It is not, although it is our primary objective, as it is yours when you go to your job each day. You, on the other hand, enjoy company benefits like paid health coverage, paid vacation, and sponsored retirement accounts. I enjoy none of those things, yet I immensely enjoy the satisfaction of the very personal and meaningful work I do. And, first and foremost, I do it for a living, for profit. There is no shame in that.

Time for a Trade-In?

Does the reality beg for a different business model? I don’t think so, but many will argue otherwise. My intent here is not to change it or fix it, but to call it what it is - a hybrid. It is a business, and some days a real estate business can be a big, cumbersome, costly machine to run.

(Footnote: Quite obviously, all three Bloodhound Carnival winners inspired this post. For those of you who made it to the end of this, and I mean both of you, if you feel compelled to shoot them on sight, don’t. It’s not their fault.)

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You hear it here, you hear it there (there being here), and you know it in your heart. Real estate is so darn personal.

Ah, the personal touch! That is why I blog, and why I am very responsive to my emails and voicemail. That is why I love, and my clients love, the ability to electronically sign contracts and to view all contracts online from any Wi-Fi hotspot in the Delta Quadrant. Heck, what’s more personal than that daily auto-generated online update of home sales activity in your neighborhood… with MY PICTURE at bottom and YOUR NAME at the top?

I know what you are thinking - All that stuff is impersonal, but we are in a “people” business. Well, it depends on which “people” we are talking about. It’s a matter of communication, which we all know requires a sender and a receiver. When wearing the sender hat, I need to know in what form my client prefers to receive, which means I need to listen carefully to what my clients are telling me.

Times, they are a-changin’. That doesn’t mean that our business is becoming, can become, fully automated and physically detached. It simply means that our world is different now, and we are redefining “personal”. The ways in which we interact today are dramatically different than yesterday’s methods (smoke signals and dot-dot-dash). My children phone me from their bedrooms asking for the ETA of dinner, and they IM me from 100 feet removed to tell me that the Jonas Brothers are coming to town (to marry THEM!). I suspect they visit my home blog periodically to take a peak at the Trulia side bar widget of our active listings just to gauge the likelihood that I will be available to drive carpool to the movies on Friday.

As agents, we work with a wide cross-section of people and personalities. The key is to understand their definition of “personal”. My grandmother does not have a Meebo account, and you won’t find her on Facebook; she is the type of person who would prefer a phone call, a personal visit, and contracts in triplicate. My typical Qualcomm client, however, would be happy to never to lay eyes on me, and not because he has seen me in the mornings. His “personal” is my grandmother’s “impersonal”. Most clients fall somewhere in between, but the scales are rapidly tipping.

So, why do agents cling to antiquated practices? Because they are out of touch. Their dial is stuck on Talk Radio, while their clients are all hip-hop all day. Sure, your “music” speaks to you, but are you tuned into your clients?

Presenting the Offer IN PERSON

I am already bracing myself for the counter arguments, but personal presentation of the offer by the buyer’s agent is mostly a dumb idea in today’s environment. Fax machines and scanners have made this time-honored ritual about as contemporary as Wayne Newton. “But it gives me a chance to explain the nuances of the contract and to put a personal face on my clients”, you say. If you are listening to the sellers in today’s market, you will hear that they do not want to spend an hour at dinner time hearing your pitch. They have spent weeks or months being inconvenienced by the promenade of strangers through their home. They have their own agent whom they have entrusted to represent them, and who is fully capable (in theory) of presenting the offer on your behalf. To demand an audience when the audience doesn’t want to see the show does nothing to further your (or your client’s) agenda.

I recently had a listing agent insist that I present in person. I was happy to do so, but sitting across from his client at the table, it became instantly obvious to me that she, more than anything else at that moment, wanted one of us out of that room. The agent on the other hand, who was the textbook throwback with no website or email, was visibly puffed with pride that he had delivered a living, breathing member of his network to the negotiating table. Who were we really doing this for?

Then, as a listing agent, I have seen agents virtually assure that their buyers would never see an accepted offer. Through sloppy appearance, poorly chosen words or outright stupidity (”My clients like your home ‘OK’, but there is so much they would have to fix to make it habitable given their superior and distinguished tastes”), they alienated the sellers irreparably.

So, how do you convey emotion, sentiment, and other intangible influencing factors absent face time? The Sappy Cover Letter, of course.

The Sappy Cover Letter

Make no mistake, this is a powerful tool and should be used with great care. Every offer should include the sappy cover letter. Crafted well, not every seller will buy into it, but none will be put off. At a minimum, they will be amused by your ol’ college try, and with a little luck and creative writing skill, it just might work.

On a cautionary note, be careful what you write. We know your client wants to buy the home for pennies on the dollar, and we know that you want to be the one responsible for hammering out the smoking deal, but insults and threats have no place in the sappy cover letter. I received two recently which serve as ideal examples of bad letters happening to good people, and I suspect the agent’s clients were unaware of the lobbying taking place on their behalf.

My clients and I believe that we are currently in a Buyer’s Market. We also believe that the bathrooms could use some updating.

Nice. What they just told my clients was that they are in charge and that the (8-year-old) bathrooms suck. The sellers like their bathrooms, and now they don’t like the buyers. The agent killed his own offer dead.

Our clients have narrowed their search down to their top two favorites and have decided to write an offer on both. The other property is actually their first choice.

Just in case we might have missed the point, they proceeded to list all of the ways in which they found my client’s home inferior to their first choice. What the sellers heard: “I am but a pawn in your negotiating game, and you do not like my home nor do you have any real intention of buying it.” Another offer killed at the hands of the procuring cause.

Here would be an example of a good sappy letter:

“Mr. and Mrs. Captcha are Ph.Ds in the biotech field, their life work being the search for a cure for cancer. While they enjoy extensive travel abroad in connection with their third-world missionary obligations, they look forward to making their permanent residence in this, the most desirable neighborhood in this great land of freedom we call America. They welcome the opportunity to raise their young quintuplets in the magnificent home you have made and would be honored if you would allow them to continue your legacy of love and family values. Oh, and they really adore the 14th Century motif, and won’t be changing a thing! Please tell us the gargoyles convey!”

I double-dare you to deliver a powerful message like that in person! Then you can beat them up on price. After all, the bathrooms are hideous! 

Not Your Grandmother’s “Personal”

The key to providing exceptional representation is giving the client what they want, how they want it, which means you have to listen. As I type, Steve is meeting with a client to get contracts signed in the client’s home. Steve knows this is the client’s preference, his definition of service. Others would find this an intrusion, and would rather meet at the office, while still others want ”just the fax, ma’am”. To be an effective agent today, you need to embrace the new while every so often dusting off the old. If you are representing my grandmother, don’t rely on email. But, if you want to talk to my children, you need to be their Facebook friend, and it’s my children and yours who will be buying and selling the homes of tomorrow.

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I think I forgot to put the cat out. But, I’m still curious - Who did set fire to her? My personal thermostat is broken. I now spend my days alternating between down jackets and ice packs. If there is a way to simultaneous run the furnace and the air conditioner, I am determined to find it. My total 20 minutes of sleep last night involved dreams of dorm rooms, escrows and Russell Shaw. (Don’t get excited, Mr. Shaw. It was the “You are a Failure of Epic Proportions” post that slipped into my subconscious. I have since determined that I am destined for moderate success, since the last thing I wanted to do yesterday was read a 2,000 word blog post on how much I suck. I skimmed).

It is so much fun getting old. Happy birthday to me.

Years ago, the children in my daughter’s second grade class each had to give a presentation on an exotic animal. The question and answer periods were more fun than my third time watching Weekend at Bernie’s. This is where classmates would toss out random questions about the featured animal, thus allowing the presenter to demonstrate their command of the subject. One girl mentioned that the okapi was threatened by the jackal. “What’s a jackal?” one child asked. “Oh, (pause) a rabbit.” Everyone was quite satisfied.

You see, if your audience is clueless, you can say just about anything and get away with it. If you only think in these terms, if you forget that your readers might know a thing or two, or if you forget along the way that people actually may be reading what you write, then you may only think you can get away with it.

On the heels of Inman’s Top 25 Most Influential Bloggers award, I am reminded that there are many (at least 25) writers who blog with passion and with credibility - with something to say. I am also reminded of how competitive is this business, and how competitive this business of blogging is becoming.

Blogging takes two forms. The blogger either has information or has opinions to share. Philosophical opinions, opinions of “what if”, can be debated, but they can never be wrong. Whether I believe in a Supreme Being (because, who else could have conceived of the White Chocolate Mocha?), or I think Redfin will soon be acquired by Warren Buffet (because I think he likes their future upside potential), my opinion is valid because it is mine. You may not like it and you may not agree, but for the time being, at least, you can’t prove me wrong. The “greats” debate with respect, and may ultimately agree to disagree. Too many others just hollar to be heard.

Professing authority on facts, on the other hand, can prove embarrassing if you are a Pretender. The “greats” have something of value to offer, and have the credentials of age and experience to justify their platform. They do not blog for ego, blog for acceptance, or blog just to blog. So many others seem to have fallen into the “say anything” trap just to get noticed.  ”A jackal is a rabbit. Call me for all of your real estate needs!”

So, on this, my two-score-and-eight-years birthday, I am going to come clean. I am a working real estate agent. I am not a lending expert, I do not fully understand micro- or macro-economics, I can not write two lines of code without my “Dummies” book, I have not read Machiavelli, and in my eleven years in the trenches I have not learned everything there is to know about my business of real estate. I do have opinions, however, which I enjoy sharing and I learn volumes every day by swapping opinions with others.

And I know a jackal isn’t a rabbit. All jokes aside, I will never be among the most influential. I am not one of the “greats”. I do not possess that higher level of expertise that warrants the recognition, and it is not important to me, to my clients or to my business that I pull out all the stops to be heard above the din at any cost. Age brings some wisdom. I know only what I know, and this is what I write about. Everything else I will leave to everyone else.

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I suppose I should care more than I do about the failed ransacking acquisition of Active Rain by Move.com. What’s less than zero? (Big-shot math geniuses should desist from an argument involving negative numbers).

From my overly-simplistic corner, this seems not so much like big news, but like more of the same. It is human nature. Carpetbagging capitalism is enjoying a feeding frenzy in the online real estate world right now. Meanwhile, forward thinking agents and their (reluctant) brokers are eagering jumping at every new opportunity to demonstrate their technical prowess in an attempt to stay relevant. We can’t give our stuff away fast enough. For zero.

Unless an Internet venture wants to do the real work, and this applies equally to the brave new start-up and to an established, money-making web giant like Move.com who has their taser set on world domination, they have three choices: Do nothing but charge less and characterize it as something; offer something for nothing which you can someday sell to someone for a fortune so that they can monetize it silly; or, wait for someone else to do the work and then swallow their platform and their intellectual property whole.

For the entrepreneurial, real estate-minded, all angles would have been killer had the Internet explosion not coincided with what is shaping up to be the worst real estate market in a more than a decade. Just how hard our landing will be in historical terms is yet to be seen. The fact remains; the timing sucks. Yet, those with strength and staying power will ultimately prevail.

Had one well-know rebate company made their big push seven years ago, their ranking on the Success-O-Meter might have been more impressive: More impressive than zero. Russell Shaw spoke to this brilliantly. Their target was (is) the consumer, and it seems that it is the consumer who is ultimately being courted by all of the online portals. Sure, the pay-to-play vendors geared toward the agent population, offering business tools, marketing platforms, lead generation and a paralyzing abundance of other opportunities to achieve untold riches (we are told), are out in force. But, their long-term success is dependent on generating consumer eyes, and they too are feeling the effects of unfortunate timing. Their pitches would have been far more compelling had they not picked this market slump to hawk their wares. Agents are starting to recognize that they need to value engineer their web presence today just like they did they print presence yesterday.

For agents, there is no joy in Mudville. The profile of yesterday’s average American family (two and one-half children, two-car garage, two licensed real estate agents) is changing. Otherwise solid, hard-working agents are dropping from the business faster than home prices, while every day forty-seven new opportunities are born for the agent to improve their online presence. Last year, we all took each new toy for at least a test spin. Today, more agents are running out of gas. Where does the savvy agent direct his marketing budget when that budget reaches zero?

Maybe he blogs. The price is right: Zero. I have never participated on Active Rain, but the thousands who do have seemed to enjoy the agent social network there. While I too find value in agent social networking, I have always perceived more value in attempting to connect with the consumer directly, because that is how I make a living. Isn’t this Move.com’s angle? Sure, their revenue is derived from industry advertising, but absent a consumer audience, the advertising dollar will migrate.

So, I must presume that the value in Active Rain is the chum: The agents who provide the content for the voyeuristic or information-hungry consumer. The goal is that the agent fishies, when reintroduced in a new pool, will bring with them their checkbooks and their competitive spirit for points, page rank and recognition. Social networking becomes peer pressure, and peer pressure is viral. Just maybe Move.com realized that, rather than pay the restocking fee, they could actually do the real work, the work of attracting large numbers of agents serving to give tacit endorsement to their business proposition, and accomplish their goal. For zero.

It’s a vicious cycle. The online sites need large consumer audiences to attract the agents and their money. The agents and their listings are needed to attract a large consumer audience. The question is, do you build it or buy it? And, how do you sustain “it” in an environment where the participants’ numbers are waning and their checking accounts depleted? Ultimately, the answer will be in attracting the deep pocket advertising dollars (the brokers) or in successfully harnessing the power of thousands of individuals to find strength in numbers (Active Rain). Active Rain accomplished this, but where they failed was to convert the collective power into cash-flow. In either case, the individual agents are but bit players in the larger money-making game. They were invited to the party so that they would bring the food. So what if they just want me for my onion dip? Everyone’s going to be there!

Don’t get me wrong. Some of my “best friends” are Active Rainers, and I do feel for the Active Rain members who didn’t think through the something for nothing process. Of course, the most prominent participants also, and primarily, maintain their own blogs with their own content. Hurray for them! So many more, however, have only now come to realize that they sold their words, their intellectual property, and their souls. For zero.

This is much like we have all sold our listings to the world, and for the same price, but at enormous cost. We are all in some respect guilty of falling victim to peer pressure and the herd mentality. Individually, we have freely given of our “property” in an our attempts to be progressive, provide better service, gain exposure, or simply not miss out on the party, until our property is no longer in fact our own.

So, I suppose my intended “who cares” message has morphed into another. We should all care. Individually, we can hope to have little influence over the direction of our profession. Collectively, we wield power, as evidenced by the trouble Move.com went through in our pursuit. Unpopular as this next statement will be, this is where NAR comes in. While you may argue that they are mismanaged or misguided or even at times clueless, a collective voice, which NAR is at least in the position to provide, is needed - Our own voice speaking on our own behalf. The problem is that when we operate individually, relinquishing control and simply following the crowd, others will continue to capitalize on the real work that we have done. And we will be left with zero.

(Reprint or retransmission of this blog post is prohibited without the express, written consent of Greg Swann, who retains all ownership and copyrights. In other words, I’m screwed.)

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I don’t pretend to understand the half of what Greg is trying to convey. This much, however, I will confess. Government is necessary, coalitions have value, and social responsibility is incumbent on all of us.

Slam zoning laws if you must, but if, as a homeowner, you suddenly find yourself sharing responsibility for maintenance of your side yard fence with the owners of the strip club next door, you will undoubtedly see some benefit in government intervention. I did time in Houston; I know of what I speak. If you loathe the union that professes to defend your profession and your livelihood, consider that you have choices. These choices may include speaking from a pulpit of change and reform while all the while paying your member dues or, alternatively, resigning and declaring free agent status. And if you detest government intervention in any form, consider that it is necessary for an orderly, progressive, sustainable society.

Who is not to blame for the mortgage mess? Take one step back. As lenders, money was flowing from the spigot like there was no tomorrow. As mortgage brokers, there was money to be made by cranking the faucet, and it was a foot race to see who could get to the sink first. As agents, we sang the “Houses are expensive, but money is cheap” refrain until we were blue in the face. And, as for the consumer, it really doesn’t matter in the final analysis whether they were motivated by necessity, opportunity or unadulterated greed.  We all helped make this bed in which we now must lie.

Kudos to the Feds for being reactive if not proactive. Without a decisive response to our current situation, water under the bridge be damned, many innocent and not so innocent citizens would continue to suffer. Libertarianism is just ducky, ducky, that is, until the basic fundamentals are violated. The human condition all but guarantees that our unchecked actions will affect those around us.

Government regulation does not, did not, result in loan fraud or financial overcommitment. Government regulation can not be fingered for the shortcomings of the lending or real estate professions. Government intervention is neither the cause nor the solution, but elimination of organized oversight is not the panacea.

To condemn the Feds for our present pickle and then to condemn them further for trying to address the predicament is to argue on false premise. “I don’t have a dog, so my dog couldn’t have been the brown dog that bit you. Besides, my dog is black.”

Let’s bring it back home. We have a client who wanted to be a land baron. Our client, a single parent, had the American Dream in their cross hairs. Against our emphatic warnings, our client bought homes (plural) that they couldn’t afford but for which they could get the financing. This was Summer of 2005, our market’s peak. Greed? Bad judgement? Desire to succeed? All of the above. Today, it doesn’t matter what the original motivation or intent was; it just sucks, and there are tens of thousands more just like our client. Shame on them, shame on us, or should we takes notes and move ahead?

And, then, I can’t leave this rant without coming full-circle to the subject of eliminating licensing requirements for real estate agents. It’s not entirely unrelated. The success of anarchy in any trusted (or distrusted) profession is wholly reliant on the ability of the masses to make studied and informed decisions. If the current state of the state of home lending is any indication, it can be extremely difficult to distinguish the snake oil from the cure. Lax licensing requirements may do little to differentiate the carnies at the midway, but absence of standards, however ridiculously lame, will just result in more customers tossing their cookies on the Tilt-O-Whirl. (In deference to Greg, I confess to having come full circle myself on this issue several times over, but I am certain my feet are now on solid ground).

Greg - I think you are right, and I think you are wrong. Reform is necessary. Reform is always necessary, as perfection is but a dream sequence. Capitalism should be celebrated - You will get no argument here. But, communism is not a synonym for social responsibility. We are complex creatures living in an increasingly complex world, and we will always need a camp counselor. That is what makes absolute freedom a true paradox.

 
More viewpoints, pro and con, on supplanting the NAR:

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April Groves shared her thoughts on how mundane tasks often tend to produce seemingly unrelated benefits. I love this post - Whether, as April suggests, it is the ordinary act of house cleaning (okay, not so ordinary in my house) which inspires healthy eating or the simple ritual of applying make-up which increases productivity, random tasks can work to produce surprising results. (I can’t leave this last “make-up thing” without warning April that when her odometer nears a significant roll-over milestone as mine is, the task of “putting on one’s face” becomes about as simple as engineering a space station).

April is right, though - We needn’t surrender our lives and our work to a constant state of entropy. And yes, you naysayers, there is a real estate connection in all of this. I think it is safe to say that we all from time to time find ourselves either on a low boil or losing steam. We all periodically risk burn-out.  Let’s call it Business Block, and sometimes the answer isn’t to do more of what got you into this place, but to recognize your motivating triggers. I have my own mechanisms for harnessing the energy to refocus.  I make chicken soup - Using the Suzuki method. No defined recipe, but just a lot of seemingly unrelated stuff from the pantry which sounds good and I intuitively know will make me hungry again.

Dress for Success

I remember my elementary school dress code. Skirts or dresses for the girls were required. The argument was that we would be more inclined to learn if we dressed the part; sloppy appearances would translate to sloppy attitudes and shorter attention spans. Today, many light years later, this is just silly. Blue jeans don’t symbolize a day off - Ask any Microsoft employee. For me, they symbolize “no appointments” and therefore a “back office day”. My most productive back office days come courtesy of Abercrombie and Fitch. Unfortunately, Steve’s “back office day” uniform involves a pair of hideous day-glo orange shorts which, ironically, work the same magic for me. They send me running for the office.

Blogging

Some days there is just no wind in my sails. I suspect even Steve Jobs has a day now and then when he just isn’t feeling the love for the iJob. For me, finishing a great post or, in this case, a stupid-introspective-nobody-really-cares-but-I-enjoyed-it post, lights a fierce fire under my b-hiney. For some strange reason, hitting that publish button leaves me with desire to move on to overthrowing a smallish third-world government or, at the very least, go about doing some serious real estate business. I think the reason is that blogging forces the brain to engage, and writing even the Dumbest Post of the Week (Greg should consider adding this category to his Carnival - for me) requires some deliberate thought. Granted, sometimes this deliberate thought is along the lines of, “How long will Greg allow me to contribute this drivel to his otherwise deep-thinking blog?”, but, hey, it’s something. So far (knock wood), I’m still here.

Eavesdrop

Spending time at the feed reader always leaves me feeling inspired, inspired to do more and be better. It’s soul food. Ideas spawn ideas, and an hour spent playing Snoop Dogg on others’ sites is worth a U-Haul of motivational or educational seminars. Whether it is the really bad post that reminds me I can do better (take this one, for instance), or the amazingly exceptional article that reminds me that I am being outclassed and outperformed by others in the profession, immersing myself in the brains and business of others can’t help but force me to reconsider and reevaluate my approach to my business. A morning at the feed reader nearly always results in renewed enthusiasm for my work and gets me caring about real estate again.

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When I want to shake things up, I immediately set about blowing up my website. Or my blog. Or, in the broader sense, my entire hard drive. I love to tinker, and while I am not a certified, qualified, fully-licensed Geek, I know enough to leave some serious wreckage in my wake. At any given moment, I have a million “great ideas” on the back burner for improving our online content and presentation. Nine times out of ten, my great idea du jour ends in my devoting the remainder of the day undoing my mess, often with the help of my good friends at Best Buy. One of the most frequently shouted phrases in my home, second only to “What’s for dinner?”, is “Where did my sidebar go?” Sometimes, however, through divine intervention or dumb luck, I end up with a new mash-up, a new widget, or other new feature which actually (miracle of miracles) works. Whatever the outcome, it gets my head back in the game, and I find that I am once again thinking in terms of business and betterment and success. When I am feeling less industrious, I just repeatedly add and remove that stupid MyBlogLog widget from my Blog, a simple act I have repeated about 94 times in the past month alone. It is empowering; that much I know how to do in my sleep and without breaking anything.

Belly Laughs

Laughter can bring things back into perspective quickly. My daughter, the one we call our American Idiom, usually fills this role. Most recently, she told us how she needed to take a copy of her “inebriation record” to school. We think she meant her inoculation record, but we still aren’t entirely sure about this. Unfortunately, I can’t always count on Emily to be “on”. This is where the MLS comes in. This morning’s nuggets included “Poen space!”, “Beautiful kirchen”, and ”Rod iron”. The language of the MLS is a mysterious one, and is sure to put the laugh-track back into your life. If that doesn’t work, I will loan you Emily.

Brisket

This is about as random as it gets. It’s just that after 20 years of serving my family beef disguised as a large dog’s chew toy, I have finally mastered the art of cooking the perfect low-life roast. It makes me happy, and I think this is what this post boils down to.

Success in real estate, in any business for that matter, is mostly mental. Doing things you enjoy bring focus, inspire and motivate. We all find ourselves in the deep-blue funk occasionally (and more than occasionally this is because you ate my brisket), but taking a step back and trying those tangential, seemingly unproductive acts which you know ultimate produce results may be just the recipe. Whether your pot boileth over or the flame has gone out, tapping into the things that bring you joy may be chicken soup for your business.

Now, I am ready to get back to work.

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Greg had asked me to follow up on some particulars of the twilight photos we recently commissioned for one of our seller’s homes and, specifically, how these shots translated into our brochures. Here goes.

As a foreword, I just love this whole conversation because it debunks the argument that all agents hold the tools in their marketing box as safely guarded secrets lest “the competition” figure it out. This is transparency at its best. The reality is, and my position has always been, that nothing I do is secret. If other agents don’t know what Steve and I are doing for our clients today, then they will tomorrow. None of us has a copyright on good ideas; we only own them to the extent that others are unwilling to invest the time and money to see our efforts and raise us one.

Many agents, of course, and many of them in my market will “borrow” my ideas over time, which will inspire me to do better yet,  keeping our little poker game going. In the end, everyone wins.

First, it took me awhile to admit that, while my better-than-most camera with wide-angle capability is pretty nifty, and while I consider myself having a keen eye for the shot, having produced about 4 gazillion flyers and brochures over the years, the professionals can do it better. Perhaps the biggest benefit to me, and Mr. Shaw will appreciate my newfound appreciation for delegation, is the time savings that I am realizing, which more than offsets any cost of privatizing the photography.

While I still have to be physically present during the shoot (and, in the case of twilight photography, this is a two to three hour event), the photos are delivered to me within 24 hours. I receive two zipped files, one containing the full-resolution photos and the other the photos resized for the web. Now I do not have to spend an afternoon throwing out the bad and adjusting the lighting on the good, nor do I have to resize the ones I will be using on the Internet. And, the photos are mine to do with as I please at this point. In other words, it is a one-time cost. As an added bonus, the service I use creates the virtual tour for me, which is again delivered within 24-hours.

The photos are worthless unless you know what to do with them afterwards. Clearly, they are used on all of our online advertising for the home and in the MLS. About a year ago, we also starting producing bifold brochures as a matter of routine. These brochures are done for every listing (with a few exceptions, since occasionally we will just have a home which cannot fill a brochure, no matter how we might try). From one-bedroom townhome to million-dollar estate, all of our sellers’ homes benefit. They are glossy, full-color, full-bleed card stock which are placed both inside and outside the home.

Inside, I have two pages to not only display photos but practice the Greg Swann art of poetic description. I have had people tell me that the brochures really “put them in the home”, which is the intent.

The big finish is when we have the printer zap our little stand-up photos and tag line from the back cover and insert the mailing labels. These brochures then become our (very expensive) Just Listed notices. We mail them to a sizeable surrounding homes crowd and to our list of clients and past clients. Not only does this generate enthusiasm from the neighbors and keep us in the minds of our past clients, but it generates showings, which is ultimately the goal.

Greg asked me if the flyers in the flyer boxes outside the home “get wet”. I thought this was funny, given that I live in San Diego where our average rainfall could fill shot glass. We do occasionally get the rain, however, and it has never been a problem. We use the cheaper plastic flyer holders which surprisingly do an excellent job of insulating from above. The sprinklers from below tend to be our greatest adversary, so we just hang the pouch a little higher on the sign. And, the reality is that the flyers don’t usually last long enough to get throttled by the elements.

Now, I just showed my hand. Fold or raise me?

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