|
The third time a buyer ghosted me, I realized I was making a classic new agent mistake: I spent too much time pitching myself and not enough time listening to my buyer’s hopes, dreams, and needs. A simple buyer questionnaire that asked the right questions—followed by a meeting to discuss it—would have quickly built the trust and rapport I needed to keep them.
[Read more…] about The Buyer Questionnaire Top Agents Use to Build Rapport & Trust (+ PDF)
|
Top Producer is a real estate customer relationship management (CRM) tool designed to help agents, teams, and brokers take their business to the next level. Their oft-repeated promise? “You get to decide how to use your CRM.” While viewing hours of video in their learning library to research this review, I heard this motto a lot.
Does Top Producer offer the options and power-ups to make this true? In this review, we’ll take you on an all-access video walk-through of the platform and Top Producer experience. We’ll examine each of the Top Producer packages, their major components, and package costs to help you decide if Top Producer is the right real estate CRM for your business. [Read more…] about Top Producer CRM Review + Video Walk-through
|
All photos courtesy of the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR)
Real estate professionals from across the country and around the world came together in sunny San Diego, California, last week for NAR’s 2021 REALTORS® Annual Conference & Expo. More than 10,000 people took part in the festivities, though attendance was (as expected) a bit lower than in years past.
While there were many highlights from the long weekend, Drew Brees’ keynote discussion with NAR President Charlie Oppler topped our list. The interview was rich with takeaways all real estate professionals will be keen to hear. Here are six of our favorites.
[Read more…] about 6 Things Realtors Can Learn From Super Bowl MVP Drew Brees
|
If you’re like me, you spent much of the pandemic in leggings and cozy sweatshirts. Many women now have what InStyle has deemed “Post-Pandemic Wardrobe Anxiety.” Yet, as the world starts to re-emerge from our quarantine cocoons of comfort clothes and Netflix, maintaining a professional appearance is important.
And while I’m never in the business of telling people what they can or cannot do, the fact is that real estate is a very client-facing industry. And psychological studies at Princeton, NYU, and Dartmouth have found that people judge you in a matter of milliseconds after meeting you.
[Read more…] about 13 Things to Never, Ever Wear to Work as a Realtor
|
As a realtor, everyone you meet is judging you. And yes, that means your clothes too. Like it or not, what you wear to work matters a lot more than you think. If you want to be judged favorably and land more wealthy, picky clients, we put together this in-depth guide on what male realtors should never, ever wear to work.
[Read more…] about 27 Things Male Realtors Should Never, Ever, Wear to Work
|
For many new listing agents, descriptive real estate words like “cozy” or “sun soaked” are right up there with the maroon blazer—outdated, cheesy realtor cliches they think they can ignore. That would be a huge mistake. Almost all top listing agents pepper their listing descriptions with “cliche” real estate words. Why? Simple. They help sell homes.
To help you get over your writer’s block and find the perfect real estate words for your listing description, we put together this swipe file of 732 words that top listing agents use to market their properties.
[Read more…] about 723 Descriptive Real Estate Words Top Listing Agents Use to Sell Homes
|
It was 3:00 a.m. before I realized how badly I had screwed up. It was my first month as an agent in Manhattan and there I was, desperately trying to scrub a coffee stain out of my ONLY white dress shirt. Years later, I learned how to fill my closet with the professional clothes that all realtors should wear without spending a ton of money.
Whether you’re a new or experienced agent who wants to save a few bucks, check out this guide to building a professional wardrobe on a budget. We also cover how to buy clothes that will last and be stylish for years, not months.
[Read more…] about Affordable Men’s Fashion for Real Estate: The Ultimate Guide for 2022
|
Photo courtesy of AJ Canaria, MoxiWorks, and Inman Connect
Las Vegas, the city of neon lights and late nights, was temporarily transformed into the center of the real estate universe with the return of Inman Connect 2021, the first major in-person conference event of the year.
Our team at The Close has attended many Inman events over the years, and this one definitely didn’t disappoint. I donned a mask, mixed it up on the expo floor, and sat through hours of presentations. These are my top 10 takeaways from our week in Sin City.
[Read more…] about 10 Unexpected Takeaways From Inman Connect Las Vegas 2021
|
If you’re a realtor trying to get press coverage to build your brand, you’ll soon learn that pitching journalists is harder than pitching homeowners. However, the benefit of earned media coverage is that, unlike your paid marketing efforts, it can provide free exposure for you and your business. Here at The Close, we receive pitches every day from companies who want to get in front of our audience of 400,000 monthly readers. 99.9% of them fail.
That’s why today I am going to share with you five PR strategies that any agent can use to successfully pitch journalists and garner free press coverage in 2022. I’ll also share some email scripts you can use to get the attention of busy editors by sending newsworthy pitches that position you as a real estate expert.
[Read more…] about 5 PR Strategies Any Agent Can Use to Get Free Press in 2022
|
Zillow shuttered its iBuying program Zillow Offers this week—citing market volatility, a lack of necessary human resources, and a $420 million Q3 loss among the reasons for its decision. Zillow Offers represents an uncharacteristic failure for this industry giant known for free and easy access to nearly every real estate listing in the country, its ubiquitous Zestimate, and its love-it-or-hate-it Zillow Premier Agent program.
For many inside the real estate industry, however, the sudden dissolution of Zillow Offers was an abrupt surprise but not a shock. The writing has been on the wall for a long time that the iBuying model, specifically the one Zillow was using, was destined to fail. Why did this particular house of cards finally come crashing down? Here are five reasons.
[Read more…] about Destined to Fail: 5 Reasons Why Zillow Offers Didn’t Succeed