The Reason Why Realtors Don't Get to a Million Dollars (And What to Do About It)

Breaking the million-dollar threshold isn't an easy job. But if you're trying to do it by yourself, it becomes straight-up impossible. Here's what you need to change to rocket your business.

As a realtor, you might share the belief that most people in the industry have: that your clients want to do business with you alone and no one else.

Realtors often get this idea in their mind that their client is there because of them personally. And if the same thing's going through your mind, you probably can't imagine your clients ever wanting to work with other people on your team.

However, this is a paradigm. And a wrong one at that.

Worse, it could be the reason real estate agents like you can't reach a million dollars with their business. If you're convinced that you have to do everything on your own, you'll have a tough time scaling.

The good news is that you can change that paradigm.?

You can learn to delegate work. Best of all, it will transform your business if you do so.?

How do I know?

It’s because that's precisely what happened to me.

How Hiring Help Changed My Life

Back in 2016, I was closing about 40 transactions a year on my own. I was wearing all of the hats in my business - doing transaction coordination, the paperwork, appointment listing, ordering signs and photography, showing buyers, and writing contracts.?

As you might expect, I finally got to my breaking point. I've burned the candle on both ends and got overwhelmed.

I knew it was time to hire help.

Luckily, I'd just closed a transaction with Dana. We were communicating great and she had a lot of fun doing the transaction. More importantly, she was always on top of things when going through the whole deal

With that in mind, I decided to talk to her and mention how I needed help. Now, this isn't how you usually hire people - there's a proper, great structure to it. But in this case, I just got lucky.

Dana and I agreed that she could work part-time from home. So, she started helping me with coordinating transactions, doing paperwork, and all of the things that I took care of myself.

The difference was huge!

My business got to thrive, the work was no longer overwhelming, and even my personal life improved as a result.

That's how much hiring help meant to me.

And it can do the same for you!

Don't Be Afraid to Hire

Given how much I needed help, you might ask why I didn't hire someone earlier.?

The reason is simple:?

I was scared to hand over the reins.?

You see, I was living from one commission check to the other, not sure when the next check would come in. And in that situation, I was nervous about paying someone $20 an hour to do tasks.

If that sounds all too familiar, I can tell you that breaking out of that fear really paid out.

When you put the right people in the right seats, everything changes for the better. You can duplicate services by having those people implement a good system. Dana did just that for my business.

In fact, she was able to provide a better service for my clients than I did!

And after some time, I realized that I needed to build a reliable system that would help with future onboarding. You see, systems are just a roadmap or a set of instructions that new team members can easily repeat and duplicate. And I wanted that for my business because I wanted to keep scaling it.

Of course, Dana helped me with that, too.?

So now, I have systems that I can teach every new person I hire. They learn how to call a lead back and conduct an initial buyer presentation or a listing presentation.?

To understand how that works, let me use the experience of Kiona, one of my agents, as an example.?

When she got on my team, Kiona was new to real estate. However, her DISC profiling said that she would be great at listing homes, so I quickly took her under my wing.

I took Kiona out and showed her a few listing presentations. Also, I showed her how I did things, what the system was, and what the presentation was like. She immediately managed to copy and duplicate that system.

And before I knew it, Kiona went on listing appointments - even having an equal or greater chance of getting it signed than me!

But those were the early days. Today, Kiona's better because I don't do listing appointments enough and she does it all the time.

As I’ve said, hiring new people turned out to be the best decision I've made. My business would've never turned up if I didn't overcome the fear that was holding me back.?

What Happens When You Get This Right

When you start hiring, you want to have some systems already in place that you can teach to the people who join you. However, there'll still be systems that other people will need to build. And those who will create the additional systems will be your team members who know the level of service that you expect.

That's when your team culture comes into play.?

You start defining your core values and get clarity on your mission statement. With a clear vision, you can attract more of the right people to service your clients at high standards.

Finally, the team culture established will create customer satisfaction, making your business grow even further.

Put the Right People in the Right Places

If you want to become a million-dollar agent and have a multimillion-dollar real estate business like me, you'll need to remember one rule:

Always actively look to hire great people and always train them.?

You'll never reach your highest potential on your own. But when you bring quality people to your business, what ends up happening will blow your mind.