Consider these statistics:
- There are over 2.4 million licensed real estate agents in the United States.
- Approximately 1.3 million are members of the National Association of Realtors (NAR) known as “REALTORS”.
- According to recent NAR statistics, 5.3 million homes sell annually (nationwide).
- On average, that's 441,667 homes per month.
- That means there are 3-4 Realtors for every home sold.
- And since the best-of-the-best Realtors (the R.A.R.E. Agents) sell 4-5 homes per month, there are literally tens of thousands of licensed Realtors who sell ZERO homes every month!
- Zero homes sold times 3% commission equals…..ZERO INCOME.
That's not just a math problem...that's a career mismatch problem! We are either falling short on our ability to sell homes or there are too many of us out there!
Welcome to the incredibly painful and very real “I-don’t-know-where-my-next-commission-check-will-come-from” world of the average real estate agent.
My home state has 70,000+ licensed Real Estate agents and my home city has about 30,000 Realtors and sometimes it seems like the majority of them live in my neighborhood!
Most of the time, it’s every Realtor for themselves.
What does all of this mean? Why does it matter? If you really want to know, you have to start with the definitions of two important words:
The words RARE and COMMODITY.
Let's see what the dictionary has to say:
RARE is defined as something uncommon, superlative and unusually good.
COMMODITY is defined as a service that buyers can no longer distinguish between competing brands and purchase decisions are based on the lowest price (i.e. who has the lowest commission).
Do you want to be a RARE AGENT or a COMMODITY AGENT?
When you compare the number of Real Estate agents with the number of homes that sell each year, it becomes crystal clear that the business of being a real estate agent is a highly competitive, cut-throat, dog-eat-dog business where success is reserved for the strong and mighty.
And it's reserved for Really Awesome Real Estate Agents.
If you are going to have a long and prosperous career in the real estate business, you are going to have to learn:
- How to market yourself so that the public does not view you as a commodity.
- How to generate new leads who want to work with YOU.
- How to become a strong listing agent.
- How to work effectively with home buyers.
- How to negotiate on behalf of your client.
- How to use technology and tools to become more efficient with your time.
- How to leverage your past clients to develop referrals for future business.
- How to stay up-to-date with your local market and the overall industry trends.
- How to develop a business mindset.
- How to manage your day (your schedule) and build a support team to assist you.
There’s much more to it than this…but the 10 items above are a good place to start.
I invite you to sign up for RARE Tips, my free daily email subscription. It's the best way I know to help you on your journey to becoming one of the best agents in the real estate business. Each daily email is packed with teaching, training and coaching.
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