Now more than ever you as a REALTOR are being asked by clients to show your value in a transaction. You should have a compelling argument because they still desperately need you to guide them through the real estate transaction. However in a very short span of years that role has dramatically changed from simple keeper of the information to guide through the myriad of data. They need your expertise to sort through, comprehend and advise and council them to protect them from making mistakes in some of the biggest financial decisions of most of their lives.
It was only 18 years ago when the very first listings were being put on the World Wide Web as it was called, and that was only the very early adapters who were online them. Keep in mind the Internet was not available for public, consumer and commercial uses until 1995. Back then we got MLS books each week with current listings available. So REALTORS saw their value in the marketplace tied to being the keeper of information. They are the only ones who knew what was on the market other than by seeing a sign in the yard. As information became readily available to the consumer those agents who failed to adapt and provide deeper and more valuable services fell away into history like those weekly books.
Before the MLS and those books each Broker kept a file of their offices listings, and as an agent you had to go to their office to see what they had in inventory. So the value Brokers provided to agents was a place to find and market their inventory. The Broker was the Information Depository, and the agent was entrusted to market that information. We have all seen the panic that rumbles through our industry every time a new way information slips out of our protection to the public without us, that old information paradigm runs deep in many of our DNAs. Please understand it is your expertise and ability to guide, not your data that gives you value.
As you continue to be asked to explain your value, have you ever thought to ask your Broker to explain theirs to you? Have they evolved into a new service industry serving your business needs, or are they operating the same basic business model they were twenty years ago with just a web presence added? As an agent it is likely that your single largest expense per year is what you pay your broker in splits and fees, likely more than you are paying for your house, your taxes, or any other expense. What are you receiving for your investment?
Last week I was meeting with a very sharp young agent who just got his license and suggested a couple of other Brokers to begin his career since we do not accept brand new agents. He was sitting in our Carmel office and was in love with the culture and excitement he saw all around him and asked who was most like us, and I had to tell him no one. That all the others were in a different business than we. That there are many excellent companies and successful business models out there, but they are all in the Real Estate business, and we are in the Top Producing REALTOR business, it's our clients (our agents) who are in the Real Estate business. Our business is serving them so they can be more effective serving their own clients.
So once again, what business is your Broker in, and what value do they bring to your ever changing world current to today's world? Are they relevant, or are they doing the same things they were during the Mad Men days?
