Dominating the real estate industry can be achieved in 3 simple steps:
Step 1 - Get a real estate license
Step 2 - Build an incredible team
Step 3 - Sign up for a reality TV show, make boatloads of money and bless others with your droplets of wisdom through high-paid speaking engagements
Unfortunately, more than 95% of real estate professionals don’t make it to Step 2. And of the 5% that do, nearly every one won’t make it to Step 3. But building a team is easier than you think, as long as you start out building a team the right way.
Many books have been written specifically on this topic, such as “The Millionaire Real Estate Agent” by Gary Keller, founder of Keller Williams Intl. The idea of compartmentalizing your business into specific roles like listing specialist, buyer agent, marketing director, personal assistant, client success manager, and others, equates to not only a large presence in the industry, but also to a more balanced life and reliable income.
Of the 2,000,000 licensed real estate professionals in the US, only 35,000-50,000 are estimated to operate as a “team” according to Tom Ferry. And of those 50,000 teams, most are 2-person teams made up of 2 real estate agents working “together”.
So why is it so difficult to make the leap from an individual agent to an actual team? There are 2 main reasons.
Reason 1: They tried but made the wrong hire
Busy agents can quickly burn out from having to be in so many places at once. They get tired of spending their weekends and evenings working with clients and feel that having another salesperson, who is also capable of generating income, is the logical first hire for their future team.
However, adding a second salesperson doesn’t help an agent to round out their service offerings. There are administrative activities that still need to take place but are still being handled by each agent themselves. With two salespeople sharing leads, there will come to be resentment over commission splits, as one party may be a harder worker than the other and feel taken advantage of. The partnership will eventually dissolve and forming another “team” for both agents is unlikely to ever happen again.
What every agent really needs are team members with different skill sets than their own, who can come together to run an efficient business while providing the best real estate experience possible for clients.
Reason 2: They don’t know how to be a boss
Building a real estate team is hard and comes with its share of risks and challenges. Finding, motivating, training and inspiring such a vastly different group of people, on top of being a full time real estate agent, is not for the faint of heart. Here are the Top 5 obstacles that real estate agents experience when building their first team.
- Accountability - once you make a hire, you are accountable to ensure that they are productive each day. The best leaders will lead by example. As a result, the flexible schedule that real estate agents may have come to love will need to morph into a more traditional 9-5 style of job. If an agent expects their team members to show up on time and be productive each hour, the team leader should be setting the standard themselves.
- Ability to handle risk - team members don’t work for free, so being able to risk paying your team before income is earned is a major fear for a lot of agents. The risk of spending your time and energy building your business instead of closing sales to produce revenue is another significant adjustment.
- Start Up Capital - even if you have a high tolerance for risk, you may not have the funds available to pay for the tools, branding and other resources necessary to start and grow a team.
- Organization - the best agents typically have the messiest desks. The execution necessary to start and grow a team requires significant organization.
- Training - a lot of agents aren’t confident enough in their own skills and capabilities to take on the responsibility of training and developing those within their organization.
SOLUTION: Start with a Transaction Coordinator (TC) as your very first hire
Hiring a virtual Transaction Coordinator is a safe, half-way step to hiring your first employee. Your relationship with your TC will help you to overcome the 5 obstacles noted above, while still keeping you on your path to transform into a high performing team.
- Little Accountability - TCs work from home and while handling a portion of your business, they do not require you to dictate their workload throughout the day or week.
- No Financial Risk - TCs collect their fee (typically between $350-$600) at the time of closing, the same time that you earn a commission, removing any financial risk.
- No Start Up Capital Needed - hiring a TC is less about building a brand and more about freeing up your time to generate more sales and provide a better client experience. In turn, you should earn more money that can be earmarked for brand development and your first in-person hire.
- Organization Done For You - a good Real Estate Transaction Coordinator will help keep your closing organized but a great TC will force you to become better organized along the way. Organization is a crucial step to being a leader, so use this relationship to begin improving your organizational skills while learning how to work alongside another professional.
- Little Training Needed - TCs are already experts in their job, so they will train you more than you will train them. And as for training future team members, authority will come from experience. As you close more transactions, you will naturally gain confidence and earn the success that causes others to want to join your team. Your increased success combined with your experience using a TC will make it easier to train and develop future team members.
A lot of Nekst users are Real Estate Transaction Coordinators. We are actively working to develop a way to better connect our amazing group of users with those seeking their first hire. Signing up for Nekst is a great first step to getting your business organized, whether you use it as an individual agent, within your team or as a Real Estate Transaction Coordinator.
