REAL ESTATE BUSINESS PLAN
For Cory Barbee
“Productivity is never an accident, it is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent
planning & focused effort!” Paul J. Meyer
Thank you for taking this most important step towards your success in the field of Real
Estate. Are you aware that less than five percent (5%) of all agents currently have a
formalized Business Plan? Just by completing this initial step you have already
differentiated yourself from ninety five percent (95%) of all real estate agents in the industry
today! At Keller Williams North County, we are committed to your success.
Here is what you will find in this report:
• Your goals/commitment based upon your input from the real estate Business Plan.
• The objectives outlined to become a successful Top Producing real estate agent.
Remember, this information is based upon your input information of your first year income
goal, your average area sale price and your commission program. If you would like to
modify your information or to complete a more in-depth and detailed business plan, please
contact us and we will help. We have complete Coaching and Training Programs that will
take you through each critical piece of the real estate matrix.
This report is divided under the following headings:
• Business Planning
• Exit Strategy
• Lead Generation
• Systems
• Training
• Coaching & Accountability
• Websites for Agents
• Database Marketing
• Farming Strategies
• Open House Strategies
• Listing Inventory
We know that with clearly defined objectives and strategies you will achieve the success
you want! Welcome to the Real Estate profession and Good Planning.
BUSINESS PLANNING
As previously stated, Business Planning is essential to real success in real estate. It’s sad
that over ninety five percent (95%) of all agents within the real estate industry never
complete or even attempt the business planning process. Why? Most either are unaware,
don’t have access to, or not held accountable nor taught by the broker or manager, or have
access to a competent business planning program!
The Pareto Principle, which is also the 80/20 rule, says that twenty percent (20%) of the
people produce eighty percent (80%) of the results or, eighty percent (80%) of your results
will result from twenty percent (20%) of your activity. In any case, the rule holds true …
except in real estate.
Statistically, in real estate, the end results are more drastic. Ninety five percent (95%) of the
results in real estate are produced by only five percent (5%) of the real estate agents. The
rhetorical question is … "how do you get into and remain in that five percent (5%) factor."
By taking this “critical step” in that process, by requesting this Business Plan, you will have
numerous decisions and actions to ensure your success. If you follow the steps in this plan,
we are confident you will succeed at any level you choose.
Let’s discuss the process. The first step is to determine your income "Commitment" for
your next year in real estate. There is no figure that is out of the question. It is entirely up to
you and your motivation. You have heard this before:
"Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it."
Goethe
Based upon your initial input form, you entered your next year's income, the average home
price in your area and your commission percentage. To review:
Your Commitment Income is $200,000
Your Average Home Sale Price is $350,000
Your Average Commission Rate is 3 percent
Please notice that we have labeled your income "Commitment Income" instead of a "Goal".
Goal is the most overused word in the business today! How many times have you heard
"set your goals high and see how close you get to it!" Or, "how close did you get to your
goal?" We hear it all the time. However, a "Commitment" is entirely different. You must
hit or accomplish a commitment. There are consequences when you commit to something
instead of just setting a goal!
The difference between a goal and a commitment is the results!
Now, based on your Commitment level to achieve an income of $200,000 with an average
sale price of $350,000. This table is broken down to indicate to you how many
Appointments, Contracts and Closings that you will need to complete on a monthly basis.
We have used various industry benchmarks and the results and those benchmarks will
change with your knowledge, practice and experience.
Transactions Total: 27
Listings Closed: 11
Buyers Closed: 16
LISTINGS
Listings Closed 11
Conversion Percentage 50.00%
Listings Taken 22
Listing Appointments @ % 50.00%
Listing Appointments needed 44
Leads converted to Appts % 10.00%
Listing Leads needed 440
BUYERS
Buyers closed 16
Conversion Percentage 80.00%
Buyer Offers Accepted 20
Buyers Shown who wrote-% 50.00%
Buyer Appts. Needed: 40
Lead conversion % 20.00%
Qualified Leads Needed 200
Based upon your input, you will need to generate the following in order to achieve your goal
of _______________ transactions. # Per Year Per Month Per Week Per Day
_____ Leads _________ _________ _________
_____ Appointments _________ _________ _________
These estimates are conservative estimates assuming only mediocre presentation and sales
skills. We would suggest you track your numbers and break them down into monthly,
weekly and daily numbers. They are smaller, more comprehensive, rather than looking at a
large annual number. Now, that doesn’t mean that you don’t track the yearly numbers
because you will.
What you are doing is creating a “daily work” schedule!
The following is also important to review consistently so as to measure your results and
manage your activities closely.
EXPENSES
Advertising 34,286 12.00%
Supplies 25,714 9.00%
Franchise Fees 22,857 8.00%
Auto 10,000 3.50%
Postage 5,714 2.00%
Professional Fees 4,286 1.50%
Miscellaneous 2,857 1.00%
The above numbers are the basics of your Business Plan. There are many other facets to the
plan that I would be happy to review with you individually. Give me a call and I will walk
you through the system so that you can become part of the “5%” instead of the “95%”.
The next part of your plan will be the strategies and tactics that you need to have in place to
accomplish your Commitment.
*Note: Assistants and/or employees have not been considered in the overall expenses due to
the disparity of compensation within the industry.
EXIT STRATEGY
How long do you see yourself wanting to sell Real Estate? What do you want to do when
you are tired of the real estate business or want to retire? Do you have an exit strategy? If
not, you should consider one!
Real Estate is an interesting business. Historically, the industry was built mostly on
part-time agents who were just trying it or using real estate to supplement the family
income. The issue here is that it shouldn’t be “part time” as it’s now one of the most
complicated and time consuming professions that anyone could be in.
Here are the critical pieces to developing a real exit strategy:
• Decide when you will get out of the real estate business
• Decide how much income or money you will need each year to live.
There are quite a few options and solutions for developing a strategy to stop day to day
selling.
BUILD A BUSINESS
Now, isn’t this what we’ve been talking about? How to “build” your business for success in
real estate? However, the truthful answer from most agents is “NO”! Well, you have just
taken a critical step to building a successful real estate business just by completing this
Business Plan. The next step is to take action on your business plan. Just having THE
PLAN is not enough … it’s the ACTION that produces the RESULTS!
Take Action and build a highly successful real estate business and you will have a
retirement vehicle that will let you live your dreams.
INVEST IN REAL ESTATE
Take a chance; have the ability to act on those deals. I am always amazed at the lack of
actual real estate investing completed by real estate agents. Here’s a suggestion: Get to
know your market and the current trend of that market area. Find the area that is
undervalued. This may change year to year or even month to month in some areas. Look for
the lowest to mid level homes in that area. Start making some offers. You make money
when you BUY property, NOT when you SELL that property!
Imagine this, if you were to buy one investment property per year for ten years, in that time
period you could be a millionaire with positive cash flow and terrific equity! As there are
various components to investing in real estate, you are in the BEST position … take
advantage of it.
BEGIN AN INVESTMENT PORTFOLIO
Real estate, as an industry, is made up of nearly all “Independent Contractors” and as such
not always with the benefits of other careers or “jobs”, we are … self employed. We are
responsible for our taxes, expenses, marketing, advertising, salaries, insurance and our own
retirement.
As an Independent Contractor we do have options and opportunities over a wide range of
investment types. Start the process as quickly as you can and reserve a portion of each fee
you earn to this process. Perhaps set a goal of ten percent of each commission check and
place it in some type of investment or retirement plan and in 10 years you will have a very
nice “nest egg!”
Please do not overlook the benefit of consulting with a tax advisor to determine your best
options for your portfolio.
Developing your personal retirement or “exit” strategy is an important part of your business
planning and building process. Unfortunately, it is at the top of the order of things
overlooked by many who come into the real estate business. Plan for it now and reduce your
stress later.
LEAD GENERATION
Lead Generation is the foundation for your success. It is fair to say that if you have no leads
you will have no closings! Remember in previous comments we mentioned that
• FIVE (5%) percent of the agents do NINETY FIVE (95%) percent of the business.
• NINETY FIVE (95%) percent of the Agents do FIVE (5%) percent of the business.
First, what does this mean for you? Simply put, you need to contact as many people as you
can and add them and their information to your database continually and consistently! So
you need a “database” management system for all those people.
Secondly, what kind of SYSTEMS do you have in place to generate buyer and seller leads
and convert them into closings? You have a lot of options in Lead Generation and you will
hear a lot of advice. One critical error most agents make is to try to do too much without
researching the best system for them. In fact, a lot of managers, Brokers and trainers
suggest trying everything and seeing just what works. Bad advice.
Over the years we have trained many top agents and in tracking their business from start to
finish we have noted the quantification of their success. The results yielded one consistent
strategy … they focused on two primary sources of lead generation!
Regardless of whether you are a first year agent or an experienced agent, your FOCUS
should be on two primary methods/forms of lead generation.
“Success is the perfect execution of a basic fundamental”
Vince Lombardi
Have you ever tried to do too many things at once? Sure, we all have. The question is, How
well have you done what you’re doing? Not too well? The same applies to real estate …
but with more focus. It’s just highly important to be aware of areas that will bring you the
highest return for your time and investment.
Our industry can be very complicated and emotional … for your clients, customers and even
you! Choose one or two, stick with it, become an expert with it … focus on it and you will
have ultimate success – super income – great life!
Give me a call and I will counsel you as to which areas you should focus on whether it is
your first year or you are an experienced agent.
Your only struggle is to find answers!
The two major methods of Lead Generation are “Prospecting” and “Marketing”.
Here are a few tips to generate more buyer and seller leads – there is a process to selecting
which areas to focus on, call me, and I’ll help you with it.
PROSPECTING
Telemarketing
• Just Sold
• Just Listed
• Past Customers/Clients
• FSBOs
• Expireds
• Geographical Farm
• Banks/Savings & Loan REO
In Person
• Door to Door – Open Houses
• Networking events - Social
• Seminars
• Teaching & Speaking Events
• Booths at Events
• Chamber of Commerce
• Clubs & Organizations
MARKETING
Advertising
• Newspapers
• Billboards
• Yellow Pages
• Radio
• Television
• Magazines
• Grocery Carts
• Car washes
• Bus Stop Benches
Internet Websites/Marketing Direct Mail
• Postcard Campaigns
• Newsletter Campaigns
• Just Sold/Just Listed
• Quarterly Market Updates
Sponsorship
• Little League
• High School Sport Programs
• Local Charities
DECISION
So far, all of this can be overwhelming, however as you can see, part of the process is your
deciding which of the lead generation or conversion options is one in which you will
become the expert in. You should analyze each item as to the time commitment, financial
impact and more importantly the past success ratios and how it fits your personality. You
also need to recognize that in your selection is your willingness to perform and complete to
your best ability … your commitment!
Develop a spreadsheet based on the lead generation items. It should include the time and
costs required to start up, implement and complete. Once completed your decision will be
to select the best “two” for you.
You will also need to supplement your “Prospecting” & “Marketing” with the following:
• A Lead Management and Lead Follow-up System
• An Email Drip Campaign
• Excellent Telephone Skills with Scripts
• A Great “Listening” Presentation
• Market Data/Statistics and Neighborhood Information
As you can see, it is important to give ample consideration to a plan, a system and have a
complete understanding of what your commitment level and direction is. Please let us help
you with this very important process.
SYSTEMS
Not enough can be said about “Systems” – Buyer Systems, Seller Systems, Lead Generation
Systems, FSBO Systems, Expired Systems, Accounting, Business Sourcing and so on.
They’re critical to the industry and to agents. We say you should be working ON your
business, not IN your business. System-Documentation-Quantification & Accountability is
needed in order to operate your business so that it thrives and survives in spite of you, not
because of you. Please take note of the following:
Buyer Systems
• Interview Process
• Showing System
• Offer Process
• Contract to Close
Seller Systems
• Pre-Listing System
• Seller Interview
• CMA System
• Marketing System
• Offer process
• Contract to Close
• Open Houses
Administrative
• Contract to Close
• Inbound Calls
• Sourcing/Tracking
• Contract to Close
• Accounting
• Advertising
• Marketing
It will take some time to develop these systems from your initial start but EXTREMELY
worthwhile.
TRAINING
Training should never stop. Training in the real estate industry has become an overused and
often over - promised reality – basic real estate training should also reflect the current
market conditions so that you are able to PRESENT, CLOSE, and HANDLE OBJECTIONS
and develop successful BUSINESS SYTEMS!
Therefore, in its most basic form training should include contracts, buyer and seller
representation, lead generation, business planning and contract management. The course of
information should never be presented by people who haven’t actively sold real estate in
twenty years, if ever!
“If you want to be successful, find someone who has achieved the results you want
and copy what they do and you’ll achieve the same results.”
Anthony Robbins
Additionally, find and take classes on Internet, Sales & Listing Techniques, Customer
Service and Computer Skills. You will be amazed at what you can learn and will transfer
into your business and pocket book. Make an effort to find it and implement it. Just one or
two ideas will be compelling!
COACHING WORKS
Professional athletes Michael Jordan, John Elway, David Beckham, Wayne Gretsky and
Tiger Woods all had a couple of things in common, a COACH! You could easily say that
the best in the world may even have multiple coaches. This is an essential element to
YOUR success in real estate.
This business is really no different. When your looking for that “perfect” coach who is
going to guide your career and training you will probably do an evaluation before making
that huge decision. Here is what you might look for.
Knowledge – Please remember, any perfect coach may not know the answer to “ALL” of
your questions, but can guide you to find the right answer. They should be able to help you
develop that inter-dependence in real estate and at the same time not be dependent upon
them for your success – that part is up to you.
Systems – the right coach will have access to the right systems that will help you build
your business and sell more real estate. Look for a coach that can guide you and direct your
progress as a real estate professional – not one that needs to hold your hand or solve all of
your issues.
BEING ACCOUNTABLE
It’s fair to say that most of us don’t want to be held accountable! And it’s also fair to say,
most people got into the real estate business because they want to be their own boss! The
truth and reality of the situation is that without accountability the percentages of you in the
NINETY FIVE (95%) group instead of the FIVE (5%) group is enormous.
The easiest way to look at ACCOUNTABILITY is that it’s a method to keep you on track
with your commitments. Most of the time it’s a reality check and your partner would speak
from a non-judgmental point of view. Your partner (who could also be your Coach) will
help you make the right decisions and guide you to those decisions thru a self-discovery
process.
WEBSITES FOR AGENTS
Do you currently have a website? Do you currently have an online marketing strategy? If
so, what kind of results are you getting? Do you realize that ninety percent (90%) of buyers
and sellers are now starting to do research one to five years before they actually make a
purchase decision or contact an agent! Most of them have been actively looking on the
internet and compiling their research.
Here are listed some of the compelling elements of a productive website:
• Property Information
• Property Photos
• Neighborhood/Community Information
• Financial Calculators
• Market Statistics
• Testimonials
• Interactive Content
• Free Reports for Buyers and Sellers
• Benefits to the Visitor
• Auto Responders
• Drip Campaigns
Have you given any thought as to what you want your website to do for you? What about
the following as examples and how to incorporate them into your website:
• Generate Leads
• Provide Valuable Information
• Engage the Consumer
• Capture Leads
• Cultivate Leads
• Convert Leads
Today’s most common mistake for agents is a website that is “all about” the agent! Please
be on notice that your website should be all about the consumer and providing them with
priceless information.
To build an online presence to generate leads, call me and I will be happy to help you
evaluate your goals or offer ideas concerning your current website.
DATABASE MARKETING & MANAGEMENT
For anyone in the service industry from real estate, accounting, legal or investments, your
most valuable asset is your book of business …. yes, your database! This is all of your
customers that have done business with you, will do business or will refer others to do
business with you.
How are you managing this database? Do you have a system? Having a system in place
that manages your database (customers, etc.) allows your business will grow exponentially!
Here are some of the elements of a database management and marketing system.
• Integrated Email to Contacts
• Calendaring System to Remind You of Action Steps Daily
• Action Plans for Each Person
• Email Newsletters
• Integrated Drip Campaign
• Integrated with Your Public Website
• Documentation - Conversations, Emails, Email Tracking of Deliveries and Newsletters.
FARMING STRATEGIES
Farming is a system that requires consistency. Are you getting the desired results with direct
mail? Do you have a strategy in place for your geographical farm?
Farming, like anything else has a system and strategy, and is just as critical in detail as your
“online” marketing, but is only successful when done correctly.
Here are the steps to creating a productive farming strategy:
• Pick a neighborhood with a high turnover; use your MLS statistics.
• Pick a neighborhood that is not dominated by one agent or company.
• Mail postcards one time per month.
• Design your mailer with community information and statistics.
• Have a call to action on each postcard - something for FREE!
• Preview all new inventory.
• Visit every FSBO in the neighborhood.
• Contact every Expired listing in your farm.
• Hold Open Houses consistently when you get a listing in your farm.
• Hold another agent’s listing open in your farm if they will allow it and you don’t
have any listings.
Again, farming is an activity that requires consistency and a monthly financial commitment.
If you would like to review or get a productive farming system in place, call me and we can
talk.
PRODUCTIVE OPEN HOUSE
Agents can hold an Open House or agents can hold a “Productive” Open House; most agents
don’t seem to be that successful … is there a reason? An open house is only as productive as
you are and it all starts with preparation. A successful Open House begins with a specific
plan that starts the Monday before the open house. Why do productive agents hold an Open
House? To get appointments.
HOW TO INCREASE YOUR LISTING INVENTORY
Question: What are the differences between working with buyers and working with sellers?
• When you have a listing, everyone in the area knows you are selling the house
because they see the sign. When you’re working with buyers, very few people
know.
• When you’re working with buyers you are working for all the agents in the area
to sell their listings. When you’re working with sellers all the agents are working
for you to sell your listings.
• Buyers take more time and sellers take less time.
• Listings generate sign calls, and we turn them into leads and appointments.
• You can be out of town and sell a listing. With buyers you have to be there to
make the sale!
It is a conclusion that to get more listing inventory you have to do more prospecting. So
let's assume that you’re prospecting on a consistent basis, but need assistance with your
presentation.
Here are some strategies for you to consider:
• Be the best marketer with great marketing skills, negotiation skills and home
staging skills.
• Stop doing listing presentations and start doing “Listening Presentations”.
• Don’t tell the seller how you work, ask them what they expect you to do to get the
home sold.
• Verbalize your value proposition based on the expectations.
• Don’t sell … SERVE! Be truthful and committed to what you do to get homes sold
and let them know what you don’t do and why – especially if they feel it is
important. Be on the same page!
• Don’t set the price; guide the seller to discover the price to set!
• Have a complete marketing plan that is inclusive of what you will do and when.
• Have a scheduled time that you will communicate progress consistently.
• Don’t talk commission until they have agreed to market their property with you.
When was the last time you role-played your “Listening Presentation”? Are there areas in
need of improvement? Do you have a pricing strategy that gets your listings priced right?
A Business Plan is not a destination but a journey; an outline to your success! Start today by
committing yourself to excellence through intelligent planning and focused effort!
“I’ve worked too hard and too long to let anything stand in the way of my goals. I will not
let my teammates down and I will not let myself down!”
Mia Hamm
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