One of the biggest advantages of being a Real Estate salesperson is that we are deemed to be what we all refer to as “Independent Contractors.” A good majority of all the people going into Real Estate enjoy this status to its highest level, even though in a high percentage of individual cases, it’s actually to the agent’s detriment.
The freedom to do what you want … when you want … or if you want. The freedom to say to a prospect or client whatever you want to say … in whatever method or manner you want to deliver your message. The freedom to be highly productive … just make a living …or not do anything at all ... are all options you have available as an Independent Contractor.
What we see today is an enormous division in terms of productivity. By division, I mean, we used to have a tremendous number of people that I would deem to call the middle class of Real Estate. They were doing that 12-15 transactions a year in terms of productivity, then we had a small but profitable group of top producers and we had a reasonable sized group of people that were new to the business and never seemed to get themselves going in this particular sales field.
Today the production world seems to have changed with the primary reason being the average sales price has dropped anywhere from 30% to 50% depending on the market. Therefore, the average income of an agent has dropped at the same level. This being said, an agent has two choices. First, cut their expenses, and lower their standard of living to meet this new era of income they are experiencing, or second, dramatically improve their productivity so they can maintain their standard of living and the income they had developed and gotten used to.
Question for all of us to think about … if we were employees of an organization and the income and productivity of a salesperson dropped dramatically, would the employer take any one of a dozen steps to improve the productivity of that salesperson? I think we can all be assured the answer is yes. In Real Estate, because we’re Independent Contractors, not only is “the boss” somewhat prohibited from demanding higher levels of productivity and higher standards, but is also in a position where they can’t make training/coaching/accountability mandatory in the business.
So is being an Independent Contractor the answer, or is the answer each of us removing that label from our forehead and taking on the daily patterns of so many of the top producers who simply look for good advice and then do what they’re told. Something to think about, isn’t it?
Mike Ferry
CEO - The Mike Ferry Organization
800-448-0647
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