let’s talk : I ACTIVATED MY REAL ESTATE LICENSE, NOW WHAT?!

Good morning!

Today’s blog post is a bit of a self help for me, but I am hoping it may help other new real estate agents out there as well!  Last week I announced that I joined eXp Realty and I am SO excited BUT it is one of those things where you do all of this work to take the classes, get your license, decide on an area you want to target, choose a brokerage, join an MLS and then when you have all of that done,  it’s like – voila you are a real estate agent! You are finally all set up and then it is almost like… now what?! So I did a TON of research – let’s talk about that.

So, as we do, let’s talk Real Estate, let’s talk I ACTIVATED MY REAL ESTATE LICENSE, NOW WHAT?!

Now before you start reading this please know that this is WHAT I HAVE FOUND and WHAT I AM DOING as we speak. It is not based upon my specific track record. All of this is trial and error and about learning what works best for you in your market. Now that that is out there we can move on. Let’s proceed…

DEVELOP & CONTINUE YOUR EDUCATION

Do as many training courses as you can! Luckily for me, at eXp there are A TON of free training courses I can take online. I am trying to take at least one, if not more, a day at the moment.

Don’t have access to affordable training?! Listen to Podcasts! Inman suggests Super Agents Live, Real Estate Uncensored, Real Estate Coaching Radio, Real Estate Rockstarand Master Mind Agent.

On top of these training courses and podcasts we might consider getting a designation. What are some of the designations I might look into!?As a newbie it seems as though our best bet may be to get our GRI. What is that?! Graduate Realtor Institute Designation. The GRI is three different four day courses broken up into finance, brokerage and marketing sections. Throughout these 12 course days you learn about how to apply your license, construct contracts, develop good business practices, etc – basically, everything you need to know to be a “good” agent. This course is not cheap though – in total you are looking at close to $1,000. That being said, if you plan to be a realtor for life, this may be something to look into as the GRI designation has no expiration and no annual dues – it is a lifetime title.

DEVELOP A MARKETING STRATEGY

We HAVE to TELL people we are licensed real estate agents, we cannot just expect people to know that we are. There are SO many ways to go about doing this! Some suggest, building a website, cold calling, networking, etc.  Me?! I am using my KVCore site given to me by eXp, writing about it here on LTRE, updating my LinkedIn, posting about it on my social media accounts, I may even download a calling app here in the beginning, and finally, I am really just telling everyone I know. I will keep you posted on what I think works best for me!

BUILD YOUR SPHERE OF INFLUENCE

Your sphere of influence is the group of people upon which you have some influence on simply because they know you. You can increase your sphere of influence by networking with relatives, friends, coworkers, lenders, insurance agents, OTHER realtors, your local real estate association, etc. One thing my eXp sponsor always tells us – never eat alone! She tries to have lunch with someone new every day thus helping to build her sphere of influence. Speaking of her…

FIND A MENTOR

SO IMPORTANT and I am incredibly lucky to say that I have three – ish!  

(1) I have a mentor that I was given through the eXp Realty mentorship program for new agents – I talked about that on last week’s post HERE.

(2) I have my eXp Sponsor. She is the reason I decided to join eXp and is super accessible and helpful with any questions that I may have. It also doesn’t hurt that she’s one of the nation’s top realtors!

(3) Finally, ON TOP OF THAT, I have access to network and learn from the rest of my sponsor’s agents. We all are in constant communication on social media and have weekly team Zoom calls where we can learn from and bounce ideas off of each other! I posted a question to our #teamgogo Facebook group on Monday morning – I had 3 responses from seasoned agents within 20 minutes!

HELP SEASONED AGENTS

We can learn SO much from the veterans in this industry. I have reached out to my mentor and offered to host open houses or help in any way that I can so that I can gain experience, learn from the best, network with potential buyers and in turn, help him out!

These are just a few of the methods I am currently working to implement. I would love to hear from new agents on what THEY are doing to put themselves out there AND from seasoned agents to hear what worked best for them!

Feel free to comment on the blog post HEREand let us know what YOU think!

Happy Wednesday!
Erin

p.s. we are getting more PERSONAL this year and now have a new Instagram handle – check us out at @erin.home.and.realestate