Every failure is a learning opportunity but ...
may I skip the lesson this week, please?
Getting a membership in ActiveRain changed my RE business completely. Forever - F O R E V E R - Before AR, my clients were all folks I knew. They knew my business model and they worked with me or not -- and I existed in a lovely world of trust and commitment - in both directions.
ActiveRain - my beloved ActiveRain - positioned me in a different world. I entered cyber-space in February 2011 and nothing will be the same ever again! I received contacts from folks looking for homes that I didn't know. I still acted the same, perhaps a bit naively. I thought if someone asked me to help find a house, they would respect my time and efforts. I learned differently.
An example? Well, all pretty much the same behavior in different clothing - lack of commitment and lack of respect. "I don't want to get mortgage-qualified - I just want to look at houses first." OR "Oh, I found another agent that would look for me without proof of employment." OR "My cousin's brother's nephew's friend's sister already wrote up a contract for me on that house you showed to us when we were out with her last night."
Perhaps it is the anonymity of the web? Perhaps it is the lack of understanding of our work? However, here we are looking for "something [I] could have done differently that would have changed the outcome"of a certain situation.
I began to realize that I had stepped into a different world, a completely different world. So I did begin to do something differently. I did the initial work to get started with a new contact. Then I discussed that our firm works only with Clients under the standard Georgia Association of Realtors Buyer's Agreement. I no longer worked more than a couple of hours if a Client person was unwilling to sign the GAR Buyer's agreement. In fact. I also added a Deposit on the line of the Buyer's Agreement that was put there for just that purpose. I decided to announce clearly up front: "Hey world - I am a professional who gets paid for time spent ..."
I love the Glenn Freezman cartoon that illustrates this point.
The contest asks "what ultimately happened?" What happened is that I detailed new policy and a new direction for my real estate firm. Not one specific incident but a series of incidents led me to establish office policy that will make ODAT Realty Services, Inc. more strong as the company faces the future. Thanks for the chance to reflect on the evolution!
Have a happy day -
Lynn
Thanks for commenting! 
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