I am still in my first year as an agent. I have been doing real estate for a little over 6 months and I have been enjoying it. During this time I have learned a great deal and have changed the way that I do business as a whole. I started out as someone afraid to pick up the phone and call my clients which made it very hard to close a deal with any client. I was also one that generally did not answer my phone unless I knew the person calling. This meant that I had no contact with a client other than through email. I was also very timid about going door to door to hand out fliers or anything. I was afraid that I would be rejected or worse yet that someone would get upset with me and try to get me into a confrontation of some sort. I just did not want to do hardly anything that would get me into an interaction with someone while that I was trying to conduct business. Needless to say that I did not sell any homes. I was lucky enough to get a few rentals but even that was complicated when that I was not willing to have interaction. I have had to force myself to overcome this.
One thing that I did to overcome my fears is to start hosting duties with a club that I belonged to. The club is called Events and Adventures and is a great club for singles. The events coordinator gave me a chance to try hosting even though he knew that I did not do well with interacting. He forced me into positions where that I had no choice but to interact with others. By doing this he was a big help in my being able to overcome this problem. Now it is nothing for me to go up to a group of people and just jump into the middle of the conversation.
Another thing that I did was to develop a neighborhood newsletter and take it door to door. At first I feared that someone would not like the newsletter and that I would have problems with someone because I was putting it on their door. Despite this, I forced myself to get out in the morning and go deliver the newsletter. I started getting many compliments on how well thought out that the newsletter was and how professional it looked. This has given me the inspiration to keep putting out the newsletter monthly. I currently deliver at least 500 newsletters monthly to my subdivision and I have never had anyone say that they did not like it.
I have also forced myself to make calls to clients and follow up with them as well as to force myself to answer the phone when people call. I was afraid that I would come off as someone that was new and that people would ridicule me for my lack of knowledge. Now I don't think much of picking up the phone and calling people and answering when they call me. It is really no big deal once you get used to doing that and your chances of picking up business is much better when you show that you are available and willing to go the extra mile. Besides that, if they do ridicule you or something it is easy just to hang up. It is the best form of communication for that very reason.
I know that I still have a great deal to learn about this business and that there are many hurdles that I will have to still overcome but it is amazing what that I have already learned by conducting the business that I have done. It is also amazing what kind of fears that I have overcome. I started into the business with more education than the majority of agents that are out there. My education includes a Master Degree in Business, a Master Degree in Accounting, and two years of law school. Many people have asked why that I choose to come into real estate with so much education. My simple answer is that I have always had an interest in real estate and that I use my education to help me out. My even simpler answer is because that is where the Lord wanted me to go and he has taught me a great deal since I came into real estate. For the first time in years I can truly say that I love my job.
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