Listings are the high-leverage, maximum-earning opportunity in our industry. Conventionally, your income from having a listing sell is no different than closing on a similarly priced home for a buyer. What separates the two is the amount of time necessary to work them. In our experience, a highly productive individual can personally obtain fifteen to twenty-five seller listings per month. The same agent would be hard-pressed to sell homes to seven or eight buyers a month for any prolonged period of time. With the right approach over time, you should be able to secure and sell as many as two to three listings for every buyer you could sell. So from the very start, by concentrating on listings first and foremost, you could potentially double or triple your gross income on the same amount of work. If this isn’t incentive enough, then consider how listings provide a lead-generation platform through direct mail, ads, signage, and open houses.
It is a fact that being in the listings business begets more business. Our research shows that one listing properly marketed should generate enough leads to produce a minimum of one closed buyer. At the end of the day, listings give you better control. They give you better control of your time, your marketplace, and your future. That’s why we affectionately call them the “Gift of the Real Estate Gods.”
We’ve all heard that time is money. Well, that simply isn’t true. In fact, it is one of the worst mental maps perpetrated on us by unknowledgeable people. The truth is that time does not always translate into money. Those who work the longest hours are not always those who make the most money. As businesspeople, we look at the time-money relationship in a different way. We’re continually trying to net the maximum amount of money for each hour of time invested. In the beginning of our careers we spend time to earn more
money.
Then we learn to work smarter and begin to earn more in the same amount of time. Just like in our discussion of ceilings of achievement, we’ve discovered that there are limits to our personal efficiency. The ultimate key to tilting the money/time ratio in your favor will be leverage. Leverage can be divided into three categories: people, systems, and tools. By far, the most important of these is people. While good systems and tools can help average performers consistently contribute more to the bottom line, nothing comes before hiring and keeping talent. If you’re like most salespeople, then designing and implementing systems and tools may not be your strong suit. The best way around this is to hire someone who is proficient at details and systems. That’s why we recommend hiring administrative support talent first.
When you’ve put in all the time you have or are willing to give and still want to increase your income, add leverage. The Three L’s of the Millionaire Real Estate Agent—Leads, Listings, and Leverage—are the pillars of any successful real estate sales business. I believe these are the core issues that drive massive sales volume. In fact, we made them the framework for our foundational model of The Millionaire Real Estate Agent.
Now that we’ve established the three cornerstones for your achievement model, it’s time to set out on the path to becoming a Millionaire Real Estate Agent. We’ve discovered there are four natural stages you’ll go through on your journey