Today was my weekly motivational call with the boss. I admitted to him that I'm dealing with a lot of uncertainty about whether I'm doing the right things, making all the right steps, and progressing at the right pace. He swears to me that I'm feeling all the same fears that he has heard from every new agent he has ever mentored. While I'm still a little fearful, it really did help to hear I'm not going through anything unusual compared to almost every other person in my position. It lessons my sense of panic to know that I'm really not as behind the power curve as I thought I was. I did have a little disadvantage having just moved back here last year, and allowing myself the unwise indulgence of being a total hermit while we resettled. I probably shouldn't have. But I needed the quiet time to deal with myself first. Now I am playing catch-up, and only hoping that I'm building the network I need.
There are two main reasons that this feels so scary. First, it doesn't feel like any job most of us have ever done in our lives. We don't sit at a desk. We don't have set hours. We don't sit in a central location and wait for business to come to us. I feel like I'm playing hooky all the time. I find myself looking over my shoulder, thinking that I'm going to be reprimanded for not being on task, doing computer work, writing reports, or any other administrative task I've always had to do on a regular schedule. The second source of fear is the astronomical cost of getting set up. It was an even grand to go to school, not counting books, and almost half that to pay for the license. Testing cost money. Signing up for the MLS was a bundle, and it's a recurring monthly fee. There are a zillion expensive things to sign up for yet to come. And all of this before I have any hope of money coming back in. I don't have any pending contracts yet, so it will be months yet (at least one and a half, if a miracle happened tomorrow) before I can ever see any income. I'm traveling through our savings at light speed, and I can only hope that real business will come my way soon. My only consolation is that much of what I spent last year on all of this is tax deductible.
Yesterday before my fellow agents and I did a broker preview tour of houses, we met for brunch with a house inspector from the area. One of the things we are to do is keep a list of names of professionals to provide to our clients, to include inspectors, bankers, title companies, attorneys, electricians, and so on. We should have at least three of each to suggest, so there's no whiff of favoritism or the slightest suggestion of kickbacks, especially when it comes to bankers. This home inspector we met yesterday said that he has been in business for about three years, but we were the first brokerage to reach out and really get to know him and his methods in all that time. We got a chance to tell him a little about our own business model, particularly to tell him about our brokerage's commitment to volunteerism. He really perked up when we told him that we would be contacting him about joining us for our next volunteer project. Maybe that should be a lesson to me. When I'm freaking out about how to build my business, I should just focus instead on my first agent volunteer project. People like being asked to get involved with community building activities. It will be a whole lot more fun to build a network that way anyway.
And on that note, what did I see hanging on my daughter's wall today? See for yourself...
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