Success with EXP while working full-time in other field?

[Aaron Rowzee]

I've just recently gotten my Texas real estate license and joined up with my local realtor board, as well as, EXP as my brokerage. I love their independent nature and the cloud based technology, but I've got to say: as impressed I am with all of their programs and technology, I am completely overwhelmed! 

Would any of you experienced EXP agents be willing to give me some tips and tricks or advice on how to be successful? I'm struggling to know really where to start with all of the training and don't have a lot of time each day or night. I work full time as a project manager and invest on the side, but it seems like I could very easily be a great success with all of the lead generation tools and constant need for good realtors in my area. Thoughts?

[Russell Holmes]

@Aaron Rowzee some good info has been shared here.  Like Charlie mentioned your mentor will be your go-to in figuring out the EXP specifics and helping to tailor a plan to you. However, like (the other) Russell said, it truly works best as a full time agent and making that leap is anything but easy (at least for me it wasn't).  I still don't know if I made the jump at the 'right' time, but I also should have done it sooner in a sense.  When I got licensed in February '18, I was burning the candle at both ends.  I was running a service business I had started in 2007 and was working 8-12 hour days 6-7 days a week.  My story might be different since I was my own boss and made my own hours, but that's a double edged sword.

  I carved out a few afternoons and weekends that I'd work lighter so that I had some time to devote to real estate. I gave up on getting the amount of sleep I used to and would plug in to both EXP material and BP forums until 2-3am every night, waking up at 6:30-7 the next day to get kids off to school and go to work. I'd sweat working physically in the morning, come home to shower and change, and show properties for a few hours in the afternoon.  I had the benefit of being able to drop whatever I was doing during the day to answer or return calls, emails, etc.  Without that I don't know how I would have managed doing both. Real Estate clients didn't know I had another business and all my service business clients knew I was starting my RE journey. I sort of played to the advantage of both as much as I could.

  I was lucky enough to be placed with a mentor that was an independent broker before joining EXP (and has since left to go Independent again) who was great at helping new agents figure out what worked for them, not just with the brokerage, but with the business in general.  I hustled hard for 9 months before I sold a house.  Lots of showings of the wrong types of properties, sometimes to the wrong people while still putting in 50-60+ hour work weeks, it was downright grueling.  Lots of weak offers submitted that I learned from.  From February to late November 2018 I learned a ton and sold nothing.  Then I sold one in late November and one in December.  Hustled some more, more offers, more service business hours, and sold a third in April of this year that was a larger commission than the two before it combined and was more than I made in a month of my service business.  I mentally 'allowed myself' to buy out 1-2 days per week to not work in my service business at all (with a lot of encouragement from my wife to do so!), and that was the 'beginning of the end' of my commitment to that business. I sold another in May and it was driving me nuts to keep working my service business so I initiated my exit. I felt that by working in my service business it was costing me more future dollars in RE than what I was making in labor.  I decided to close up shop and jump in with both feet in June since it took me a month to 'wrap up' final appointments for all my regulars. I still get calls and texts from old customers begging me to open back up which I politely decline and remind them I'm available for their RE needs.  I sold two more in July, one in August, one in September, and just closed my 9th in October. So far it's been 3 listing sides and the rest buyer (one double ended).  It'll even out some more with the next few listings in escrow and on market.  I'm still scraping by financially as I build more momentum, but I did what I had to do, I couldn't work for service business and put in the time I felt I needed to put into Real Estate. 

I've got two listings in escrow to close in November and Early December, one being my largest transaction yet. I have active buyers, a nearly completed rehab for a client listed and a JV flip I've been working on with a cash partner I met through BP that is ready to list this week, plus a house on acreage for my in-laws to list soon. It's all about keeping the pipeline full and doing what it takes, which is a lot of time input on the front end to get closings coming out the back side months later. I know my point of needing to jump in with both feet came before I had a conservative savings built up. I've always done things bass ackwards and figured it out once I'm neck deep, its just sort of the way I'm wired :). I set a goal at my first closing to sell 12 properties in 12 months and I'm just about there, which is pretty good for being part time for the first six months of that. After these next two close I'll have sold about $2.5 million in property, not huge but not insignificant either. I'll double it to 24 sales and $5-6mil as a goal over the next 12 months with a couple flips and BRRRRs in the mix, now that I've got my feet wet there as well. If I were still working my service business I likely would have missed out on the vast majority of this year's sales and I know I wouldn't be able to show properties to my active buyers as quickly as I do now. I was also always worried I'd miss an important contract date or deadline while doing both so I'd set redundant reminders in my calendar to remind me for days before something important. It's much easier now that I've let go of the old business. I'm still building momentum and I'm not where I want to be yet, but I'm just getting started still.

There's nothing wrong with starting part time while you learn, it is definitely drinking from a fire hose to start. There will definitely come a point where you feel the need to make the leap, and it likely will have to be before you've built the stable transaction volume since it takes full time effort to do so.  The best advice I got early on from my mentor was to avoid paid 'marketing' and coaching services like the plague since they'll suck you dry, and to focus on only 2-3 marketing strategies that work well with your personality.  She explained it like spokes on a wheel.  There are likely 50-100 different methods that successful Realtors use to get leads, but most successful Realtors get all of their business from focusing on 2-3 of those, maybe 4-5 max. I don't know Russell Brazil personally, but I bet as a top agent he could count on one hand the lead gen methods he uses and rocks at. And they may be completely different from another top agent who is equally successful.  Take some time to explore different avenues, but don't feel that you have to master them all.  A wheel with 1 spoke doesn't work very well, but you also don't need 100.  After taking some time to learn some different approaches you can use, pick 3 that seem to fit your personality and scheduling abilities.  Focus on getting good at those three. Things like cold calling work great for some, but felt like total hell to me.  I'm much more of a networking and people person than I am a phone sales guy.  But I know a phone sales type that almost exclusively cold calls and sold 19 properties his first year.  

Try not to get overwhelmed, but keep an open mind to adapting the business to your personality and your schedule to the business!