Scott MacDonald the Broker, Owner and President of REMAX Gateway speaks on the importance of successful business model and practices for real estate agents. With over 25 years experience in the real estate market world, Scott offers his insight to agents. REMAX Gateway serves the Northern Virginia, Maryland, and DC Metro areas with locations in Chantilly, Brambleton (Ashburn), Lorton, and Gainesville. A 5th office location in Arlington, Virginia is scheduled for Spring of 2013. Contact Scott MacDonald (703) 652-5777 or follow along at scottymacsblog.com
Best business practices
Scott MacDonald the REMAX MacDaddy rockin the Northern Virginia Real Estate Market – Gangnam Style!
In the spirit of the Holiday Season, I decided to spread a little cheer… I hope you enjoy Scott MacDonald doing it ‘Gangnam Style’ and PLEASE send feed back so Scott knows you read his blog scottymacsblog.com and I don’t get fired!
Thank you, Ronya.
Business Planning for 2013: LEAP!
I’m excited that you have taken the big step in your career by investing your time, energy and effort to take your business to the next level.
The important thing to realize is showing up is not enough. You need to be engaged, focus and have a level of commitment to the plan your come up with this weekend.
In addition, you will need to change.
Change your approach to the business by adding accountability into your schedule.
Change the way you do business – perhaps developing a mobile strategy, online strategy, or including something else new.
Change how you view your business – become a visionary. Think about what is coming down the road and how you will need adjust your approach to the business.
Most importantly, you will have to take action – not just talk about it.
As time goes on, you will need to make adjustments. Just like a pilot, a plane is off 99% of the time while in the air because of turbulence, air stream, storms, etc. you will need to adjust throughout the year as well. How do you do this? get a mentor or a coach. We are hear to help.
You will need to take a leap of faith in your business and your plan. Try different things – client parties, popbys, coffees, write notes and most importantly, you will need to do it consistently. Join networking groups – get out there and be present while you are with them. The more things you try, the more likely you are to find something that works for you. Do it, fix it, try it again.
In addition, consider the law of momentum. Continually staying in motion will keep you moving towards your goals. Do something – everyday to move you closer to your goals. Embrace the self-discipline it will take to make it happen.
We have an agent Kay Woodard who has been getting up at 5:00AM and has been walking 5 miles. She has been getting up in all types of weather and temperatures to walk regardless of the conditions. She has done it whether she wants to or not. This means, you have to do it whether you want to or not to build your self discipline.
If you are taking on a new initiative, take the time to educate yourself on what it will take to be successful in that area. Meet with others who are successful in this area, read extensively about it, and then do it.
Also, analyze yourself – find out what is your “prime time” and get things done during this time – plan and prioritize around this time of day to get things done. Top performers pay now so they can play later – low performers do what is fun and easy versus what is hard and necessary. Commit to yourself today and everyday that you make the sacrifice and not play now and have to pay later. Get up a little earlier – become the Ninja inside of you to write your gratitudes down, do your affirmations and write those personal notes.
Think and speak positively – be an optimistic force in your own life so you can be a positive force in the lives of others. Optimism builds enthusiasm within you and gives you energy as well as gives you self esteem.
Lastly, be prepared – for your day, your appointments, your plan of action, and lastly your success so that you can build upon it, daily. Now, let’s begin!
Staff Sergeant Reminds Us
Yesterday I was at a meeting for Homes for Heroes and I heard a young Marine speak about his life and how it had changed after being injured in Afghanistan. His name is Staff Sergeant Joey Jones
Here are some notes I took and wanted to share with others – enjoy:
- Build a life on purpose – decide what you want and go get it…
Determine what your personality is and what serves you best for your skills- No “one” is better than the whole
- Make a decision to make a difference in someone’s life
- Decide – what are you gonna do now
- You control yourself and your destiny
- You hold the keys to drive your life – don’t give the keys to anyone else.
- Work hard
- Care about others
- Give back
- Make it happen
- What makes you happy? Figure it out and do it more…
- How can you be a hero to someone else today
- Determine your goals and aspirations and achieve them
- If you do anything – do it right
- Nothing worth doing is ever easy
- Be respectful to others at all times
- Read the book – Lone Survivor
- Check out the campaign www.bootcampaign.com and contribute
- Take time and practice then make the appropriate adjustments
- Commit to giving 100% at all times
These are things we have heard in the past at one time or another but it never hurts to be reminded of them to keep you focused.
Summertime market…it’s gonna be fun!
The spring real estate market is hopping along as we enter the summertime “fun in the sun” buying and selling season. Our inventory levels remain very low for this time of year – we actually have seen inventory levels on the decline in recent weeks. Multiple contract situations are more the norm than the anomaly, which can be frustrating for buyers. Prices have stabilized but we need to see them increase to help out people in the area that are still underwater with their house values. Although we have people still underwater on their houses, distressed property inventory remains very low – only 11% of all inventory consists of short sales and foreclosures.
The big news this month seems to be the rise in consumer confidence in our area compared with the rest of the country. My feeling is people are becoming more optimistic in Northern Virginia because we have jobs and our housing market is strong. We have a 1.5 month’s supply of resale properties and a 1.1 month’s supply of rental properties. People are not only out looking at properties but they are actually buying houses. Agents are working hard and diligently working on listings and contracts. The environment around the office is fast paced and optimistic as the agents are busy helping our clients buy and sell houses. Our lenders and title partners are expressing a lot of the same sentiments with the market and its activity. In addition, there is a lot of “good” publicity surrounding the real estate market which is a welcomed reprieve from the last several years of nothing but negative news. All of this information will propel us into the summertime selling season so if you are looking at your options with real estate, give us a call.
Are you the 20%?
Have fun and make a difference! That was the premise of the speech I heard today from Doug Smith, compliments of Leslie Wish, McLean Mortgage Group. If you’re not having fun at your job, then why are you doing it? That was his lead into discussing the Paredo Principle and how we, as Realtors, fit into the rule.
The Paredo Principle is the rule of 80/20. Twenty percent of the Realtors are doing 80% of the work. The 20% are defined as professionally persistent and instinctively insistent. We’ve heard it all before, but asked us what was the difference between those that are in the 20%? What are the 20% of Realtors doing that the 80% Realtors aren’t doing? And once you figure out what those tasks are, how can you do more of them to make your days more productive?
Doug has put those differences into his 5 C’s for Success and differentiation from the rest of the pack. These are the things that the 80% lack and the 20% excel at…
1. Confidence: How do you answer the question “how’s the market?” What do you do when you walk into a room of people you don’t know? Confidence is an ability that many of us lack, simply because we are afraid of making mistakes and looking bad. Instead of saying that the market is great and that the numbers are this and that, say “It’s remarkable, I’ve never seen anything like it!”
2. Contacts: The opposite of contact is reluctance. Reluctance can be to pick up the phone and make that call. The more contacts you have in your sphere, the more contracts you will write. So who’s in your contact zone? Business partners, family, friends, transaction partners such as home inspectors, etc. Don’t be afraid to tell your friends and family that they have a friend in real estate. Many agents think they shouldn’t reach out to their friends in case the transaction goes bad and results in losing that friendship. That all goes back to a lack of confidence.
3. Control: Control of your business, your time, your career, your clients. Agents who have a plan, a written plan, have more control over their business. Those that take it a step further by having a plan each day, a to-do list; have even more control over their business. Agents who control or “drive” the conversation when speaking with clients, maintain more control of the transaction and get the job done! Doug spoke about Sales Speak. Here’s an example of Sales Speak presented by those in the 80% and those in the 20%…
80%: Did you think you might want to see a few houses this weekend?
20%: Let’s go see 3 or 4 houses this weekend. What day is better for you, Saturday or Sunday?
Or
80%: So, you like the house? Ok, great, do you think that maybe you might want to make an offer on it?
20%: What do you think? You like it, great. Let’s make an offer.
The difference in the two shows that the 20% agent is steering the client to move forward with the transaction because that’s what they hired the agent for. They didn’t hire the agent to make their own decisions. They hired him/her to help them make the best decision based upon the needs/requirements they expressed to the agent for their new home. Think about that next time you are on the phone with a client. You might just find out that all this time you’ve been using speech associated with the 80% and it might be time for a change.
4. Consistency: Extraordinary people are not truly extraordinary; they just do it with ridiculous consistency! Those who are consistent see more results than those that do things from time to time. Doug mentioned 3 things you can do daily to generate 13-15 sales per year and add 1,440 contacts to your database per year and those are (1) handing out 1 business card a day, (2) use some form of correspondence 2 times per day either through email or snail mail, and (3) make 3 calls per day to anyone…past clients, lender, agent, friend, etc. The more you do things consistently, the more it becomes a habit and you will find yourself doing them instinctively while receiving more business.
5. Courage: Courage hides behind the things we fear the most. Courage is acting in the presence of fear. In cases such as these, we need to change our focus, take responsibility for ourselves and expect more of ourselves. We can do it and should remind ourselves everyday either through affirmations or changing your focus and mindset. It takes courage to do a lot of things, but once you start to do those things the easier they will become.
Doug ended the session with a great quote by Mary Kay-Ash, “Most people truly have no idea what they are capable of. It’s so much more than we think.” This rings true with the 20%. They have the 5 C’s, they have more sales, they know more people, they make more phone calls, and they work more hours than those in the 80%. Implementing the 5 C’s in your life will help you move (if you’re there) in to the 20%. Based upon the number of agents in the United States (965,000) and the projected number of transactions that will take place this year (4,400,000), agents in the 20% will average 18-19 sales this year. Wouldn’t you like to be in that top 20% of all Realtors in the United States? Stick to the 5 C’s and best of luck! Now go sell something!
The Power of 5
When it comes to social media, remember the power of 5…
1. Become a member of 5 social networks. Don’t worry about being a member of them all! Concentrate on the basics, twitter, facebook, linkedin, youtube, and a blog. Keep it simple, link them together for more efficiency and be active on them.
2. Post 5 times per day on any of your social media sites. Valuable content can be found in newspapers, friend’s posts, blog feeds, etc. Find something to post just 5 times a day. Use a program like hootsuite to schedule your posts. 10 mins in the morning and you’re done with your posts throughout the day.
3. Read 5 articles or blogs a day. Getting into the habit of reading will give you the knowledge you need to speak with others about the market, post on sites about it and might even inspire a blog post. You know you can post articles that you read on your blog…write a brief comment about it and link it back to the article’s source…it can be that easy.
4. Upload 5 videos per week. These videos can be ones that you take personally or videos that you “favorite” on youtube. Subscribe to video channels, simply click on the favorite button if you like a video and it will appear on your channel. Share it with Facebook and you’re done! Videos should be quick and informative, so interview your sellers, your buyers, your fellow agents, etc. Get creative and post it!
5. Post 5 blogs a month. Blogging can be intimidating where you think it takes a long time to put it together. It doesn’t have to be a long article. It could be a quick 2 paragraph post discussing something you heard today. Don’t stress yourself by feeling that you have to write a very meaningful and motivational piece. Simply write in your own voice…your readers will appreciate that. They want to hear from you and are interested in what you have to say. So let them hear it!
So this is what Deja Vu feels like!
The real estate market reminds me of the Bill Murray movie Ground Hog’s Day because I continue to say very similar things each month. We have very low inventory of houses, fewer than 4,800 in all of Northern Virginia. It has been this low for over 5 weeks and we haven’t seen inventory levels this consistently low since 2005. Interest rates remain at historic lows and it appears as if they are going to stay this low through 2014 unless something unforeseen happens in the economy. Lastly, we continue to see a drastic decrease in distressed property inventory in Northern Virginia and the onslaught of foreclosures will not happen locally. We have just 592 short sales and 290 foreclosures on the market and Notice of Trustee sales are only averaging 2 pages per day. Short sales and Notice of Trustee sales lead to foreclosures and if we don’t have them, we won’t see them.
The one thing that we typically don’t see this time of year is the number of attendees at open houses we are currently seeing. It is more typical than not to hear our agents having 20-40 people attend an open house and receiving multiple contracts as a result. This type of activity is more likely to happen in the spring but warm weather and consumer confidence building has helped spur this activity. As I have said in the past, if sellers properly price their properties, have it in prime condition and have it staged, they are receiving multiple offers because buyers are buying.
What are we reading in the news about the rest of the country and the market that will indirectly affect us? While delinquencies and defaults slowly improve in the housing economy as a whole, FHA’s portfolio has not had the same good fortune. The woes of FHA are creating increased pressure on the agency to reduce risk and increase costs to its borrowers, most of whom are first time buyers. In December, about one of every 10 FHA mortgages or 9.73 percent, were seriously delinquent, or more than 90 days past due. Compare that to all mortgages, whose seriously delinquent rate fell to 7.3% in December from 7.8 a year earlier. For nine straight months, FHA delinquencies have risen while mortgages in general have improved. We will keep an eye on this for you and let you know when the costs increase. On a positive note for those going through short sales and loan modifications, President Obama Proposes Extending Tax Waiver on Mortgage Debt Forgiveness that is due to expire at the end of this year. The Act ensures that homeowners who received principal reductions or other forms of debt forgiveness on their primary residence do not have to pay taxes on the amount forgiven. In addition to this, some banks are paying people to aid in their short sales. JP Morgan Chase went national with short-sale incentive offers last year, paying up to $35,000 in some cases. Bank of America is testing incentives from $5,000 to $25,000 in Florida to see if they should be expanding to more states. Wells Fargo’s incentive offers range of less than $3,000 to $20,000. Short sales, even with incentive payments to borrowers, can save lenders money compared with the expenses involved in completing foreclosures. Let us know if you need our assistance with either of these scenarios.
If you have questions about your personal situation, please feel free to call us. We are here to help you with all of your real estate needs.
Real estate normal?
What is the new normal in real estate:
Today I am going to share with you a few ideas that are going to help you get on to a successful year in 2012 – you will also hear a few ideas from other agents that they have planned to make this their best year ever as well. The important thing to remember is to only adapt 6 of the strategies. If you try to do too many, you will be overwhelmed and not do any. I recommend starting with 6 things you are not doing today and incorporate them into your business. Once you have mastered 6 add another one in until mastered and then add another and so on. In addition, it is important to set strategies for accomplishing what you set out to do and review them regularly. You are in business for yourself but not by yourself so partner with someone in the room and hold each other accountable – meet before or after training, before or after a real estate exchange – make it easy for you but the big thing is to just do it.
When looking at the strategies you are going to put in place, you need to be clear and specific about what you want to accomplish and write them down. Know what roadblocks and obstacles you will need to overcome to achieve what you want to do and then how you will overcome them. What will you need to do to develop the skills and instill the discipline within yourself to make them happen. You will need deadlines, detailed plans of action – 5 or so for each action item, and have them where you can review them regularly. Lastly, think about and visualize your end result and what it will be like when you have accomplished what you have set out to do.
• Be positive – have the right attitude and eliminate complaining from your life • I like the “theme” of the day – will you do it?
• You are going to have to work more focused and be more intentional
• You are going to have to sell yourself passively and aggressively – explain
• Training is going to be paramount – especially in financing – increase your skills by attending seminars, getting a designation, going to REIX, office trainings, you need to be good at what you do to build referrals
• Video is going to be important – Casey Anthony is doing video diaries – video houses, your listings, neighborhoods, how’s the market, etc.
• Networking is going to be critical – find a group, start a group, join a chamber, Rotary club, coach kids in sports, join a PTA, get involved in a charity, become involved in something
• Learning and interpreting market trends – you have to know your numbers such as inventory levels and types of inventory, prices, DOM, people love to hear this
• Stay on top of values by previewing – especially new homes as they will continue to have an impact on the market – this is a great way to start with video. Video your house of the week, your bargain of the week, or whatever you want to call it.
• Read blogs for more information, see what others are saying about the market. You have to know what your competition is up to and what better way to learn than to read about their thoughts
• Start a blog and of course add video. Write about neighborhoods, your listings, interactions with agents, clients, trends, your services, how’s the market?
• Set your personal business standard and stick to it. Write the personal notes, make the phone calls, stop by and visit your past clients or meet new ones and track your daily conversations.
• Hold open houses on the right houses
• Track your business, determine what gives you the best results and do more of it.
Scott's Motivation and Real Estate Market Updates 