Real Estate Coaching Questions: Answered by Claudio Encina

Real estate coach, keynote speaker and mentor Claudio Encina returns to answer your questions – this time in the areas of energy, balance and focus.

Q. Sometimes I feel like real estate just takes and takes from me. How can I avoid burnout? – Patrick Cosgrove, Raine & Horne Bondi Beach
First, set some boundaries around work and life balance. Setting clear goals makes life so much easier, because you know where you are going and can control how to get there. Without clear goals you can experience feelings of confusion and frustration which can drain your energy and decrease your productivity.

Your work/personal balance is all about flexibility, but to have flexibility you need a solid structure around you – both at work and at home. Structure is important because it brings certainty to the world; you know what’s going to happen and why it’s going to happen. Without structure, life is a bit more chaotic. You then find that you use both physical and emotional energy to bring meaning and clarity to different situations.

Practise good time management by doing the right thing, in the right way, at the right time and for the right length of time. To be able to do this, it’s necessary to establish your priorities and then focus only on those tasks that advance important goals – those goals that will bring in high payoff results. It’s important to aim for excellence, but not necessarily for perfection. When you aim for excellence you will achieve an excellent result, but when you aim for perfection you may never quite get there.

A good time management technique is to make appointments – ‘morning’ is proactive, such as prospecting on the phone, and the afternoon ‘reactive’. And the best time management technique is to not think about it but to simply get started.

Real estate is a journey, and with every journey it’s more rewarding if you enjoy every stage. Enjoy the sales and listings, the people and the opportunities. To enhance your work/life balance it is very important to enjoy what you do: play level 10 – work hard and play hard!

Q. How do you deal with vampire, energy-sucking vendors? – Matt Marano, Oxford Real Estate Darlinghurst
Some people can be difficult, including vendors, but if you have empathy you will be able to put yourself in your client’s shoes.

Empathy is one of the key ingredients of top salespeople. Vendor empathy is a differentiator; it builds credibility, trust and helps you develop a long-lasting relationship.

Empathy allows a salesperson to view the world from the prospect’s eyes to see where the problem is. But there are other reasons why empathy is important to the entire sales process.

It builds trust. Successful sales agents will tell you it is absolutely necessary to build lasting relationships. Empathy shows that you care about the client and you want to help them. The more you show empathy towards their plight, the more trust you will build. Don’t underestimate the power of empathy in this regard.

It’s a differentiator. Being empathetic will help you stand out from the other dozen salespeople that the prospect has already met. This is because you are showing them from the very beginning that you are here to help, not make a sale. Many agents use the heavy and aggressive vendor style management of bashing them down on price, which can leave a stale experience. Remember, it’s how you make the vendor feel, not what you say!

It builds credibility. Showing empathy ensures that you take the time to listen and understand before offering a solution to their problem.

Lastly, I would say you want to be aware of your own emotions on the matter. Do you want to make this sale? Yes, absolutely. But that is short-term thinking. Long term would be helping the client and building a lasting relationship. Your emotions can distract you from the real reason you are there: to help them. Be mindful of that and you should be fine.

Q. In my marketplace there are low levels of listings compared to other years. What should I focus on? – Sam Green, Forsyth Real Estate Willoughby
One area you should concentrate on in this market is working the buyers. The market is definitely seeing a positive shift. People are tired of sitting on their hands and are prepared to sell or buy; but they remain cautious, expect great value and will punish any agent who waits for business to come to them. This is the perfect market; there are enough buyers to create the urgency you need, attract the right range of buyers and elevate the listing well above a growing level of competition.

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