Real Estate Etiquette: Raise The Bar on Your Business, Your Reputation and Your Income

By Catherine Richardson

Catherine Richardson has been a successful Realtor for over 22 years and now, along with her ONLINE COURSES, she is sharing her insights into how to be a polished and respected real estate agent. There's a right way to selling real estate and a wrong way - let Catherine show you the right way and impart the unwritten rules of the real estate industry. Fifteen chapters full of lessons you were not taught in real estate school. Bonus: read INTERVIEWS from TOP AGENTS willing to share their secrets to help you boost your real estate career!

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Dec 6, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543996920

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Preface

How You Should Use This Book

If you are a newly licensed real estate agent or a seasoned real estate agent, read this book with curiosity. After reading this book and working the Exercises, you will feel polished and confident as you start or continue your career. You will read the unwritten rules of real estate, what is expected of you and how to conduct yourself so that you will develop a pristine reputation and have no blemishes on your etiquette record.

Let’s face it, our reputation is not exactly stellar in today’s world although many agents think our reputation is improving (see in almost all the interviews in this book). What did we do to deserve this reputation? I guess I was pretty naïve when I got my real estate license in 1998. It wasn’t until I was in the business for several years that I realized that we are thought of as a greedy, money-hungry, ambulance-chasing, in-your-face, pushy, lying, back-stabbing group of people who would run their mother over to get a deal. In addition, we’ve been reputed as bored housewives with wealthy husbands who just started selling real estate as a way to get out of the house, buy fancy clothes and cars and socialize at open houses!

The general public thinks we have deep pockets, drive around in luxury cars and go out to three-hour (and two-martini) lunches every day and that we do the very minimum to earn our money. They also often believe that we personally pocket a hefty 6% commission on each and every deal. They don’t consider that the commission typically gets split four different ways or that we have to pay our broker fees, administrative fees, association fees, MLS fees, marketing and advertising fees, staging fees, sign fees, lockbox fees and gas fees – oh and Uncle Sam fees, which in many cases is at least 30% right off the top. As independent contractors we pay double FICA taxes and our own health insurance, disability insurance, life insurance. We do not get paid sick days, paid vacation time or have employer-sponsored matching 401(k) plans.

What we do have is flexibility and unlimited earning potential. If you were in the business during the boom of 2002-2007 you will remember that there actually were a lot of luxury cars in this business and a lot of three-hour, two-martini lunches. All I can say is……….those were the good ‘ol days! The market was hot, hot, hot! Everything was selling, usually before you even got the sign in the ground! Not to say that we real estate agents didn’t work hard – we absolutely did! But everyone was doing business, money was plentiful, bidding wars were more common than not and we all made a lot of money (homeowners included)!

Payback was, as they say, a bitch. The next five to ten years were brutal. Millions of people lost millions of dollars: real estate agents, homeowners, mortgage companies. Real estate agents were dropping out of the business and new ones were coming in because they were laid off from their real jobs. We all had to learn how to handle short sales and foreclosures and how to empathize with past and new clients who lost thousands and thousands of dollars, either in real money or certainly in home equity. Some parts of the country are still climbing out of that mess and maybe one day we will be whole again.

I have noticed an enormous difference in the real estate business since I started my career. Over the past five to ten years, the real estate sales industry has developed into a bona-fide business and has been enormously affected by the internet. I find that the younger agents who have come into this industry over the past five years have brought such talent and new approaches to the business. The baby boomers are now in the dinosaur age whereas the newbies bring a whole new perspective to not only finding clients, but also to how they run their real estate business. In my opinion, we have become an industry that commands respect stemming from a fresh approach that goes beyond fancy cars and social climbing. Real estate is serious business. New agents coming into the arena are starting teams, running businesses like companies, putting systems into place and making millions doing so.

Even though we command respect, there is still a widespread lack of respect for real estate agents. In order to raise the standards, the reputation and the status of being a licensed real estate agent, I believe there are fundamental aspects of our business that need honing and some common courtesies that everyone in our business needs to acknowledge, to sharpen and to practice every day in a joint effort to raise the bar on touting the title real estate agent. There is no reason to feel like a pseudo-professional. If you are a successful or aspiring real estate agent in today’s world, you already know that it takes time, dedication, focus, perseverance and constant education to keep on the cutting edge and to run a profitable business.

Have you ever had a client say to you, I don’t know how you do this!? It’s so stressful! I know my friends who are not in the business say it to me all the time!! Unless someone has bought or sold a home, they can’t really grasp what goes into the process. Sellers don’t think about the fact that when they list a house it always has to be kept in showing condition, or that agents make appointments and then cancel at the last minute (or just don’t show up at all!) because the buyers decide that they no longer want to see the house after they’ve pulled into the driveway. They don’t know that a buyer is going to try to buy their home, a place that holds so many precious memories, for as little as possible all the while pointing out what is wrong with the house and why it’s not worth nearly the price they are asking. They don’t foresee the possibility of accepting an offer and on the 30th day of the mortgage contingency date, the buyer loses his job and now they have to go back to square one (even though they’ve stopped making their beds every day)!

Every now and then we all get a nice transaction, one where everyone is fair and cooperative, mortgage is not a problem (or better yet, it’s a cash deal), inspection reports are glowing, the sellers leave the buyers a bottle of champagne and a list of the best pizza and sushi restaurants and everyone is happy! I believe that the real estate gods bless us with this kind of transaction once in a while just to keep us in the business! Otherwise, most of us would probably seek other employment. It’s not easy getting beat up day after day and still remain positive and not become cynical or completely fed up.

Most transactions are fraught with challenges. Negotiations on price can be tedious or the buyer asks for 43 items to be fixed or credited due to the results of the inspection or the mortgage contingency date gets pushed out three times or the property doesn’t appraise or other delays and any number of things that you simply cannot foresee. Typically, we have to be creative, flexible, compassionate and thick-skinned. How does one navigate all these qualities and emotions? I have found that having a sense of humor helps. Also, even though it may not be your pain directly, you should always do your best to empathize with your clients and their struggles in the home buying and selling process.

For example, if your newly divorced client with three children is selling her home due to financial reasons, you need to be able to recognize countless red flags. What if she is ready to decline an offer that is merely $1,000 less than the list price? The reason could have nothing to do with the $1,000. Instead, accepting the offer makes life real for her: her marriage is over, the lifestyle to which she’s become accustomed is over, her kids are unhappy about the move and the entire situation is painful as well as embarrassing in front of her family, friends and neighbors. As her real estate agent, you need to help her through the inevitable fact that she must sell her house. Perhaps you need to help her to understand that she may not get another offer as good as the one currently on the table or that a higher offer simply will not make this move any easier. Help her to look to her future as a new beginning. It may not be easy or your thing but that’s why we get paid the big bucks. You need to pay attention to these very important details.

I represented a seller once whose inspection report turned up a failed septic system. Mr. Lewin, age 84 said the young couple buying the house should buy it anyway because of the great views. Of course the young couple thought he was crazy and under no circumstances would they buy the house without a $40,000 credit for a new septic system. Mr. Lewin told me that he’d been in sales his whole life and he had negotiated hundreds of