If I had to pick one defining moment in the history of Keller Williams Realty, it would have to be a conversation that I had with a consultant back in 1994, when I was trying to map out a strategy for expanding our company outside of Texas. He said, “You know, I’ve looked at your goals; I’ve looked at your organization, and it’s going to take about 14 or 15 people for you to hit your goals.”

At the time, I thought it was going to take about 60,000 people, and when I told him that, he drew an organizational chart that showed me how I could make it happen with the right 14 people who would hire and empower their own teams of people and so on. He was right, and he’s still a consultant for us.

This was more than a pivotal lesson in hiring. It was the conversation that sparked our company’s whole philosophy of succeeding through others, as well as our understanding that the people we surround ourselves with, make all the difference in our success or failure. Without exception, I find that the most successful people in real estate and in life are those who are very intentional about seeking out and surrounding themselves with the very best.

I often think back to that turning point in our company’s history during conversations with mega achievers, so it’s no surprise that it came up when I had the pleasure of visiting with Greg Harrelson, founder of The Century 21 Harrelson Group in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

In 2010, The Harrelson Group’s 18-person team closed more than 700 deals. Even though Greg says he now functions as more of a coach for his team than as a real estate agent, he personally closed more than 100 of those deals. At the age of 40, he’s clearly doing a lot of things right and has been very focused on surrounding himself with the right people. His passion at this point in his career is simply to fuel the success of those in his inner circle.

Here are some of the highlights of our conversation:

On standing on the shoulders of giants

At the age of 27, after four years of working for his Dad’s real estate team, which was doing about 120 deals a year, Greg says “The ego was kicking in and I started seeing that there was a lot of upside in me becoming the No. 1 decision-maker on the team. My Dad agreed and the next thing you know, we are doing 160 deals a year, 180 deals a year, 240 deals a year, 300 deals a year, 330 deals, all the way up to 484, which is the number of deals we closed in 2004, the year my Dad retired.  And that was my mission – a secure retirement for him and my Mom. I recognized that he brought me into this business and he guided me and trusted me and supported me when I was going in all of these different directions. He was my No. 1 team man and we did it together to 484 deals. My next goal was to build a team with the highest per-person production in our market.”

On leverage

“Tony DiCello was my coach when he was with The Mike Ferry Organization and one day we divided my day into income-generating activities and income-servicing activities. Once I looked that list I declared that I would never do income servicing activities again, and that concept now carries through my entire team. Income generators do nothing but generate and income services do nothing but service. Our current teams consists of eight listing agents, six buyers agents, a closing coordinator who takes over once the contract is signed, a listing coordinator who is currently handling 550 active listings, a broker/manager, and an executive assistant.  ”

Continue reading ‘Are You Surrounded by the Best?’

 Are your clients ever stuck on one piece of information – one statistic, one headline, or one anecdote – that threatens to get in the way of taking positive action and moving forward?

The culprit might be a recent headline suggesting that home prices are going to continue to drop, or a conviction that this is a bad time to sell, or a story about a friend or family member who got burnt on a recent real estate transaction. 

The shifted market has given rise to some raw emotions and difficult conversations as clients try and make sense of the market and get a handle on what to do next.  Our job is to help them to see the big picture, and decide within the context of all the facts how they are going to move forward. That’s what separates good agents from awesome agents and there is only one way to get there: spend some time with the numbers.  

Early in my career, I made a commitment to digging beneath the surface and understanding the critical interactions that drive the real estate market. I’ve never lost my fascination for the facts behind the headlines, and today I believe that Keller Williams Realty’s sharp focus on research and an understanding of the big picture is central to what sets us apart as a company. It was also our motivation behind the creation of the KW Market Navigator.  In one volume we have interpreted a year’s worth of KW Research findings for both the United States and Canada, and combined it with the data from my annual Vision Speech – in a graphically compelling format that’s actually fun to read.

When clients come to the table with concerns and opinions, you need to be in position to move the conversation forward with facts – facts on subjects such as how to beat the odds in a buyers’ market, the degree to which “green” features enhance the value of a home, staging strategies, and the prevalence of distressed properties in the current market.

 If you haven’t already done so, I strongly urge you to order a copy today – at the bargain price of $5 for KW Associates – and keep a few extras on hand to share with your sphere.

More so than ever before, our clients are looking to us for knowledge, expertise and reassurance.

The 2011 KW Market Navigator offers a wealth of all three, and it’s the fastest way I know for real estate professionals to get briefed on the big picture.

 ONWARD …

Home affordability in the United States is nothing short of amazing. Even though current price trends for the United States and Canada are considerably different, the same principle applies in both cases: clients need perspective and they need to look beneath surface statistics before making informed decisions

The first chart below dramatically illustrates the impact of lower interest rates on housing costs, and the relative affordability of housing in the United States. The cost of a loaf of bread and a gallon of gas has more than tripled since 1989, and car prices have nearly doubled. While the median price of a new home has increased by 70 percent, mortgage interest rates, which stood at 10 percent back in 1989, are less than half of what they were back then. The impact of rock-bottom interest rates is that the monthly mortgage payment on a median priced home in the United States has increased by a mere $4 since 1989.

Unless a buyer is paying cash, the monthly payment tends to be a far more relevant number than the home’s actual purchase price. So for buyers who are waiting for home prices to hit the floor, before buying it’s important to point out that the possibility of a slight drop in the price of a home will have very little impact on the monthly payment, while even a slight rise in interest rates (a far more likely scenario) will have a significant impact.

Continue reading ‘Do your clients get it?’

I learned long ago that being steeped in the business of real estate does not necessarily translate into grasping the big picture. So I made a commitment to digging beneath the surface and understanding the critical interactions that drive the real estate market. As I did so, I realized how hungry my clients were for solid information.

I’ve never lost my fascination for the facts behind the headlines, and today, I believe that Keller Williams Realty’s sharp focus on research is central to what sets us apart as a company.

Continue reading ‘The Big Picture and YOU’