This is the fourth episode of Jake's journey... To read previous episodes, start here.
Fast forward to year-end...
Jake was the rookie of the year in his rookie "class" of nearly 100 agents. He sold 25 homes; 22 with people he knew or people he met socially. His other three clients came from floor duty and an open house. All three of these people have since referred him to their friends and family.
Here's where Jake's first 25 sales came from:
Grandma - referral from his old boss's assistant
Jim and Patricia (2 sales) - Met a the wedding of a mutual friend
Kenny - wife's massage therapist
Paul (1 sale and 1 referral) - Patricia's brother
Steve - Met at the dog park
Amanda - referral from Jake's wife
Deanna - referral from Jake's wife
Mrs. Palmer - The mother-in-law of a vendor from Jake's past life, pre-real estate
Grandpa Palmer - The grandfather of the same vendor
Stan and Colleen - Referral from Amanda
Mary - Referral from Patricia
Frank (3 sales) - Referral from an agent Jake met in a GRI class
Don & Cindy (2 sales) - Met at an open house
Catherine - referral from Jake's insurance agent
Wayne - Met on floor duty; turns out they had a mutual friend
Joan & Marie (2 sales) - Referral from Frank
Rachel - the office receptionist at Jake's real estate office!
Cari - Met at a housewarming party for Stan and Colleen
Cindy - Referral from a new home on-site salesperson Jake met while showing homes to Deanna
Fast Forward two years...
Jake's real estate career is rocking. He was rookie of the year his first year, doubled his income the next, and is well on his way to doubling it again. Does he prospect to FSBO's and Expireds? Nah, not often.
Does he send out Just Listed! and Just Sold! cards to his farm area? Nope. Too much trouble.
Does he advertise in the newspaper or on bus benches? No. He tried it for a while, but quickly realized that he was throwing his money away.
No, Jake focuses on his ever-growing SOI. He's up to around 250 people, and adds more every week. The vast majority of his business comes directly or indirectly from his contact database, through the people he actually knows, or the people he meets through the people he knows or in the course of his daily travels.
Jake loves selling real estate. He's perplexed when he hears other agents complaining about disloyal buyers, unproductive open houses and deadly boring floor duty. He's really too busy to worry about such things.
He has an investor he works with who keeps him hopping. He was introduced to the investor toward the end of his rookie year by an out-of-town real estate agent he met at a GRI class. Over lunch, the out-of-town agent mentioned that he was working with an investor who was becoming increasingly frustrated with the market the agent specialized in. Jake jokingly offered to take the investor off the agent's hands and introduce him to the market in Jake's town.
Long story short, that's exactly what happened, and this investor (Frank) has turned into a gold mine of business and referrals for Jake. To date, Frank has bought 7 properties and listed and sold three of them. Frank is currently looking at multi-family apartment buildings to convert to condominiums for sale. We're talking Big Bucks here.
Frank has also referred three other people to Jake, one of whom has referred two more. During the course of listing one of Frank's properties, Jake met Danielle who owns an upscale construction company and has used Jake to market two of her $1M spec homes. She uses other agents too, sometimes, but Jake is her favorite.
A few weeks ago, Jake called Patricia just to say hello, as he does periodically with all of his social SOI. Patricia told Jake that she and Jim are splitting up, so they'll be putting their home on the market soon. Jake scheduled an appointment to meet with the unhappy couple and now has their home on the market. Both Jim and Patricia will be purchasing smaller replacement homes, and Jake will their buyer's agent.
Remember Kenny? The massage therapist who couldn't afford his dream neighborhood quite yet? Well, Kenny is getting married in a few months to a local celebrity and they'll be buying a home in an even BETTER neighborhood than the one Kenny was earlier priced out of! Not only that, but Kenny's current home has appreciated nicely and when Jake lists it for sale next summer, Kenny is gonna thank Jake for introducing him to his "affordable" neighborhood.
And, of course, continue to tell everyone he knows what an awesome guy Jake is.
We're not finished with Jake yet... tune in tomorrow.
Comments(12)