Combining buyer agency and mortgage

David McDonnough (Weichert, Realtors - The Freedom Group) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:05:25 -0700

I'm curious if any buyer agents have put a mortgage license together with their buyer agency business. The SC Supreme Court has ruled in favor of it, and the regulators are fine with it in SC. But I'd love to get some practical commentary on the subject. Thanks!

A Fresh Look At Recruiting

David McDonnough (Weichert, Realtors - The Freedom Group) — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 20:53:46 -0700

What a difference a week makes. Last week I didn't realize how important recruiting was. That says a lot because in 14 years of sales management I have recruited hundreds of sales persons, and have always believed that recruiting was an extremely important and essential part of a manager's job. Today I am absolutely convinced there is nothing more important than recruiting; not training, sales, compliance, bookkeeping, or any other part of a manager's job. If you're not a great recruiter, everything you do as a manager will fail. Recruit well, and everything you do is on the path to success.

When I say the word fail, I mean to fall short. How short depends on how poorly we recruit. I don't mean that a bad recruiting decision dooms your business to complete failure. But at best, bad recruiting starts your business down the path to failure. Now let's focus on doing it right.

First, find out about the first hiring job you did; yourself. I recommend investing in a personality profile inventory like the DISC profile or Charles Clarke's BOLT profile. Both of these can be Googled, and will tell you what type of personality you are. Whatever you are, you're probably less likely to hire outside of your personality type. High "I" DISC or Tiger BOLT personalities are ebullient, expressive, never-met-a-stranger types that think they are the center of attention and will try to make themselves such. They usually make great salespeople, and usually rotten bookkeepers depending on the level of I or Tiger they have. They also tend to run off the "C"or Owl types with their messy, emotional, overflowing ways. And C/Owls tend to run off I/Tigers because I/Tigers tend to drive C/Owls crazy with their happy-go-lucky messy paperwork. So I recommend you learn what you are for at least two reasons: #1) You need to look beyond your own personality type to hire a great team from all 4 personality types, and #2) you need to make sure you know what you are hiring so you don't set good potential salespeople up to fail because you don't know how to manage outside your personality type. Make a conscious effort to hire outside your personality type, and learn to manage yourself in relation to the 4 other personality types.

Next, do your due diligence but don't overdo do it. D/Bull personalities tend to be decisive risk takers, and this can effect their credit history. While the credit bureau report you pull on a new D/Bull recruit may have a low score, they may simply be a victim of their own ambition. As long as there aren't legals hanging out there that could hurt your business, that D/Bull could become a top producer and a loyal asset because you took the time to learn your way to a good hiring decision. And the I/Tiger that shows up looking great in a new red Mustang for the interview might be the picture of success, only to bring an ugly scene in your parking lot in front of clients when the snatch truck comes to pick up the 'Stang. Do your due diligence, but don't overdo it.

Probe your prospective recruit with open ended questions throughout the interview process. Then have another trusted associate of a different personality type than yourself do a second interview interspersed with similar questions. Compare notes and perspectives afterward. You will be amazed at what your personality type overlooked. You'll also be amazed how you listened to what your recruit was saying.

Recruit everywhere, all the time. Everyone you hire is going to leave your company; it is simply a question of when. You need to continually grow and improve your present staff. And you need to be prepared for when you discover you've made a bad hiring decision. If you're not continually preparing yourself to improve your staff, you're holding back your business' potential and failing your employees in supplying them with co-workers that strive to excel and inspire to greater accomplishments. A great team is almost always a team that is in the process of gaining and losing members. Always be ready to add good people to the team.

And finally, maximize your facility. If you have grown beyond the capacity of your facility, then move into a facility that will allow your growing team room to grow. Plan ahead, and don't let your team suffer because your box is too small. Get a bigger box with better stuff for your team, train them, motivate them and supervise them. And recruit as hard and smart as you can to outgrow it in a few years. And did I mention, give your team better training, motivating and supervising and better stuff so they can grow their business and your business?

So why this blog entry right now? We started a mom & pop shop less than 3 years ago with the greenest team in town, and grew it to a top 10 team out of 76 companies in the Florence, SC market. The biggest mistakes that we made were in recruiting and hiring, still we maxed out what could be done with a mom & pop. Then we joined Weichert Real Estate Affiliates, and we got off the plane from the Manager Academy Tuesday night and started implementing the recruiting and training systems immediately. The most critical thing we learned was the Weichert recruiting system. What I describe in this blog is an combination of their system and my recruiting style. It shows every promise of helping us get up the next nine steps on the ladder. I'll keep you posted.

Take care and Godspeed.

David

Getting started on the right foot

David McDonnough (Weichert, Realtors - The Freedom Group) — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 05:56:38 -0700

What a difference 2 3/4years makes. We opened Freedom Real estate in September of 2005, and in such a short time went from non-existent to #9 out of 76 companies in the market and growing. I attribute that to great ownership and great people. And now, with the addition of our Weichert Franchise, the future is so bright I gotta wear shades. We just completed our RELO affiliation this week and started adding our agents to the Weichert Lead Network. The mortgage company is seeing steady growth, and our Realtor/Originators are enjoying the benefits of being able to offer both, real estate and mortgage services. It's just simply amazing to see how our clients and prospective clients respond to getting so many services in one place. Everybody wins!

So that's the introduction. And on the subject of introductions, Barry, Brett & Andrea, and I just got back from the Weichert Management Academy at the headquarters in Morristown, New Jersey. What a fantastic trip it was. I guess we had about 40 other managers from throughout the country there with us trying to, as our instructor Kirk Miller put it, "sip water from a fire hose". We learned volumes about building, educating, training and managing our team. And immediately we've put the new stuff into action. It's all about Core Values, S.U.C.C.E.S.S. and activities.

I hope this gets read by prospective agents and clients. There's a lot going on at Weichert, Realtors - The Freedom Group. We're off on the right foot. And please be assured that the owners and I are carefully watching and working to serve each and every client and agent. The support is in place. We're confident in knowing we have the best team, and that team and the clients have the best of everything. It's an honor to serve you.

Thanks for checking out my blog. Much more to come.

David McDonnough, ABR

Recruiter - Sales Manager

Weichert, Realtors - The Freedom Group

David McDonnough's Blog

Combining buyer agency and mortgage

A Fresh Look At Recruiting

Getting started on the right foot