AREC 09 - Sneak Preview

Be prepared for top quality entertainment and exciting keynote speakers.  TRET is pleased to announce that AREC09's international guest will be none other than Dr John Gray of "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" fame. More exciting developments are underway daily so start checking our website regularly for program updates.

After a fantastic AREC08 program, we are busy at work trying to top last year's great speakers and topics to bring you the high standard of content you have come to expect from TRET. It's tough but we love scouring the planet (and locally too) for new talent!  Soon we will be off to the annual NAR conference (National Association of Realtors) to see what's hot and happening in the US to bring to the AREC stage. 

Dates for AREC09 are Sunday 31 May through to Tuesday 2 June at our regular venue, the Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre, Darling Harbour with the AREC09 Expo running on Sunday and Monday.

Day One features the international and keynote speakers for both sales and property management delegates - the topics are relevant for whatever area of real estate you work in and whatever your level of experience.  In addition to the funny and insightful Dr John Gray who will focus on interpersonal communication strategies, the Sunday program currently includes presentations from customer service guru Belinda Yabsley, success coach Darrell Weekes and film director, screenwriter and 2005 Young Australian of the Year Khoa Do.

Day Two will split into dedicated program sessions for sales and property management. Sales delegates can look forward to a jam-packed day focussing on tools to get you to the top with presentations from industry experts Peter Kakos, Stephen Devine, Heidi King, Dane Atherton, Haesly Cush and Jeremy O'Rourke.  For property management delegates expect a similarly jam-packed program with a special dedicated session from Dr John Gray on managing difficult people and topics focussed on rent roll growth, management skills and more.

The Day Three leadership program is exclusively for principals, sales managers, business unit managers and anyone who leads a team!  Presenters currently include superstar accountant Anthony Bell on turning activity into profitability, Victorian agency supremo Craig Stephens and change management expert Bradley Brown who was one of the highest rated speakers at the recent Principals' Workshop conference on Hayman Island.

An overwhelming 2,500 industry professionals attended AREC08, so make sure you are one of them in 2009.  As today's economic climate throws everyone new challenges regardless of the industry you are in, AREC09 will provide you with the perfect opportunity to examine how you do business and how you can seek out and leverage the opportunities tougher markets do present.  Give your competitors a run for their money and take advantage of the special early bird rates on offer!

The TRET Team

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      Bird Booking Form

For information on the AREC09 Expo
or to sponsor AREC09, please contact Helen Lowy on 02 9386 3122 or helenlowy@tret.com.au   

Leadership: How's Your Attitude 

Despite what most people think, markets aren't good or bad, they are just different.  There are always opportunities to be found in the troughs as well as the peaks of the market if you look for them.  Sydney real estate expert John McGrath shares with readers some ideas around this topic, plus suggests some thought-provoking articles. 

It's all about attitude - the market is between your ears

I just had a great session this week with some of our top performers to work on specific strategies and changes to significantly increase productivity in a changing market.  So in essence rather than waiting to see if conditions change/improve we took responsibility to get us there faster and worked out what we control and how we can leverage that.  I have listed below some of the great ideas and insights that came out of the meeting and recommend some thought-provoking articles that are worth reading.

• To increase market share you must first shift your internal perspective and decide you will grow your business.
  
  
• Shield yourself from the negative energy that may be pervading the market and community - your positive attitude is your #1 differentiator.
  
  
• Work more buyers - as simple as it seemsyou need to be working closely with twice the buyers you were working with last year to grow your business.
  
  
• Don'tcarry marketing campaigns - if you can't get a credit payment or cheque leave it alone - you don't need the stress and liability of doubtful debts hanging over your head.
  
  
• Realise you may have to factor in more drop-outs on offers and acceptances so don't panic or be surprised if it happens - it's just part of the change.
  
  
• In a sensitive market when the economy (especially the share market) can swing dramatically overnight reduce the time between offers and acceptances and exchange when possible by getting vendors and their solicitors to move swiftly.
  
  
• Don't withdraw any auctions - run them through. I've heard many examples over the past few weeks of properties that sold at auction when the agent was convinced there were no buyers the day before. Give it every chance - many buyers are playing down their interest leading into an auction - you never know who's intending to bid until the auction time.
  
  
• Create fresh energy around the listing - get excited again, take your colleagues through, spend some time at the property and ‘re-sell it to yourself'.
  
  
• This market and economy will likely be on the rise (and quite quickly when it does) in 2009 - the window of opportunity for buyers is open but it will close before you know it - now is the time to buy the property you love at its reduced level before things go back and beyond.
  
  
• You only need one buyer - there seem fewer buyers around than a year ago but in the end you only need one to sell a property - don't get distracted by less activity - focus more on the activity you have.
  
  
• When discussing price with a vendor suggest they put on the buyer's hat on and think about what range they would pay for this property today if they were making the decision to purchase (this changes their paradigm and creates a better understanding of the other side).
  
  
• Stay the course - the model or system (of selling) isn't broken - it just needs more input and energy from you up front to deliver the results - keep moving every listing you have every day towards a sale.
  
  
• Use case studies - a specific story about a recent result highlighting your recommendation is worth more than 100 facts and figures.
  
  
• Good dialogue for buyers - It's difficult to over pay in this market. You are buying well at this price.
  
  
• Be consultative - don't just chat to your vendor - give specific recommendations that will help them achieve their outcome of selling their property - when they hired you they wanted a consultant not a best friend!
  
  
• When a buyer finds a home they love, they can't wait for the market to come back a little - they either buy it today and own it for the next ten years or they miss it as it won't be available in three months.
  
  
• Get creative - share interesting articles with vendors or buyers that sensibly suggest that the property market will again be rolling ahead strongly in the very near future.

I hope these help you close another sale or listing today and thanks to my team that helped generate them.   Also the recent rate decrease will be an enormous help in getting the property market back in the confidence zone, so make today the best day of your selling career! 

 John McGrath is CEO of Sydney-based McGrath Estate Agents.

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HOT OFFER: 50% off New DVD Training Series

We live in a world where reality TV dominates our screens.  We want to hear what real people are doing.  What better way to train your team of new and existing sales agents than to hear from real agents sharing their real stories, inspiration and systems for success. 

Get a 50% discount off the purchase price of TRET's hot new 8 DVD training product real... plus a free bonus book. 

Sometimes you have to look inside the box to find the people who think outside it.  The box you have to check out is a stylish white embossed one about the size of a CD case.  The people inside it are some of the best real estate industry practitioners and experts in Australasia.

For real... team training this year get TRET's 8 DVD series featuring over 12 hours of interviews covering 8 key areas of real estate:

1. Prospecting
2. Listing
3. Vendor Management
4. Buyer Management
5. Branding
6. Business Growth
7. Managing Your Team
8. Getting to #1

Each interview is relevant to every aspect of your core business and features training review points and summaries for each presenter.  This is an essential training tool for any real estate office.  The interviews are great to use in training sessions - they can be paused and the review points used as a guide to group discussion.  The summaries at the end of each interview can be used to generate action plans.  Take the DVDs home and review on your own.  real... provides weeks of high level training that can be revisited anytime.

Each DVD also includes bonus unplugged sessions with featured agents - personal and reflective stories of what makes them who they are.

HOT OFFER* valid to 22 December 2008

Book and pay for your AREC09 ticket/s by 22 December 2008 and not only get up to $295 off your ticket price but also receive an amazing 50% discount off the $795 purchase price of TRET's hot new real... 8 DVD training product plus a free Dirk Zeller book.

US real estate trainer Dirk Zeller was a keynote speaker at AREC08.  His popular book "The Champion Real Estate Agent" contains over 320 pages of strategies and tips - a great addition to any office training library.  Filled with insider tips, expert advice and real-world examples from Zeller's many years experience as an agent and trainer, it is written as a blueprint to success for agents who want to take their business to the next level.  Presented in four parts it includes practical tools and provides a comprehensive system for managing your business and time.

*To qualify for this extra special offer please return your real... order form with your AREC09 Early Bird booking form.

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Marketing: Are you tapping the power of 'Word of Mouth'? 

Studies done by the London School of Economics have found that ‘word of mouth' marketing in your business is a significant predictor of annual sales growth.  Steven Brett of Rockend, a respected industry trainer and former real estate principal shares here a few tried and tested methods for generating positive referral business.

The Value of the Happy Customer

In the modern business environment, the value of the ‘happy customer' is rising at an ever increasing rate.  The more recent use of the internet for third party opinions has added fuel to this fire. Studies done last year in the UK have shown that people are far more likely to believe the opinion of a third party source than advertising or marketing done by a business.  It seems to confirm what a lot of real estate agents may have known all along - that good old fashioned ‘word of mouth' or ‘referral' business is the key. We all know that a bad customer experience can lead to an unhappy customer who will go forth and tell others of their bad experience but it does not necessarily follow that the happy customer will go forth and tell others of their good experience.

It is important then to build ‘word of mouth' and grow referrals yourself, but how can you do this? There are some mantras of customer service that say "under promise and over deliver" or "go beyond their expectations", and there are many more, but studies have shown that even the best customer service teams only generate advocacy in 15% of their clients.  How can you grow this in your business to get as many happy customers ‘working' for you as possible?

Here are a few tried and tested methods:

1. Identify or locate the ‘happy customers' in your business. They could be landlords, tenants, buyers, vendors or others. To find them, you need to look for them. Sometimes they will identify themselves, but often they are silently impressed with your services. You could use a client service questionnaire or customer survey.

2. Find out what triggers or triggered their contentment. It may be your team's professionalism or the systems you use in your office. It may be the quality of the information and reports you provide them. Whatever it is, identify it and quantify it as best you can. You can do this with a customer feedback session - essentially talk with your customers and get testimonials.

3. Amplify their feedback. They won't go out and tell everyone in your marketplace that your business has impressed them or made them a happy customer, so you have to do it for them. You can do this with the marketing tools already in your office - add global comments to your statement runs, mail merge to letters, bulk email and even SMS if your system accommodates this.

Knowing that there is a direct correlation between ‘word of mouth' marketing and annual sales growth should empower you to use all the systems and tools available to you in leveraging your happy customers and growing your business revenues.

With thanks to Steven Brett, National Sales Manager, Rockend.


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Compliance: Is an Audit Necessary? 

Without regular compliance checks your reputation and your business could one day be in the firing line as the Office of Fair Trading clamp down on the real estate industry.  Is it worth the risk not to have a compliance audit conducted on your business?  Kaplan Professional's Bill Robertson shares here what's involved.

A Compliance Audit - is it worth the risk not to have one?

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT), through their compliance enforcement officers in the field, continue to target real estate businesses throughout NSW. Their agenda is to close down the unethical and out-right dishonest operators. But unfortunately they do capture the good operators who make the odd, but expensive mistake. For serious offences, individuals could potentially face fines of $11,000, while for real estate business fines can double to $22,000 or more.

It can happen to anyone of us. Any business may be the next contacted by the OFT - whether it's the result of a consumer complaint, your ‘first time audit' or perhaps a ‘random audit'. Justifiably, there is an urgent need for every licensee-in-charge to either have their business become compliant and/or remain compliant under the Property Stock & Business Agents Act and Regulations, the Trade Practices Act, plus the very serious Occupational Health & Safety issues.

So how does all this affect you?

Take this example. What if a disgruntled prospective buyer, or under-bidder, has complained to the OFT that one of your sales-team had led them astray with a ‘price guide' for a property whether auction or private treaty, but you, as the effective person in charge, thought you had everything covered. So you'll need answers to the following: 

• Do you know how to respond to the OFT ‘show cause letter' within 14 days?
  
  
• Do you know how to respond to the OFT ‘letter of complaint'?
  
  
• Are you confident that, if they were not satisfied with your written response, you would survive an OFT audit of all your recent sales files?
  
  
• Do you have the compulsory, but simple procedures to put into place - as a precaution?
  
  
• Do you actually know what procedures must, by law, be in place?

How to Get Prepared and Be Compliant

A third party compliance coach can bring clarity to what you may perceive to be ‘grey areas' when it comes to what you can and can't do in your day-to-day business of real estate. The law is not grey - it is very black and white.

On average a small-to-medium sized business requires around 4 hours for a compliance audit to be conducted plus an on-site meeting to report findings.  In addition the hours of compliance coaching can translate into CPD points for all license and Certificate of Registration holders.

The compliance coach gives you simple friendly advice on-site on what the Commissioner for Fair Trading has made compulsory. In other words the audit reports on the ‘must have' documents in your sales and property management files. It's an exercise that makes good business sense.

With thanks to Bill Robertson. Kaplan Professional offers a compliant audit service, for information email compliance@kaplan.edu.au.

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Property Management: Ending a Tennancy Effectively

Ending a tenancy agreement should be a straightforward process but if not managed effectively it can lead to disputes and confrontation.  An argument with a tenant over the refund of bond monies is an ordeal we can all do without.  Licensed real estate agent Sharon Rowe shares below her tips for successfully handling the process. 

Getting it Right - How to End a Tenancy Effectively

Handling this process successfully comes down to the following key points: 

• Understanding and complying with residential tenancy and other related legislation
  
  
• Well documented policy and procedures including checklists
  
  
• Conducting quality entry condition reports and tenant sign up
  
  
• Conducting thorough vacate inspections
  
  
• Educating and communicating with landlords
  
  
• Educating and communicating with tenants

In this article, I'll be focusing on point 6 which I believe is a critical element for all property managers and real estate agents. Assuming that points 1-5 has been put in place, it is imperative that staff establish effective lines of communication with the tenant. If not, than we face a potentially unhappy customer which is never good for business.

Consider the following scenario. The tenant gives notice to vacate the premises and hands the keys in on the nominated day (eg. a Friday). The tenant chooses not to attend the vacate inspection. After a thorough inspection of the property you notice there are a couple of items that need attention. When you return to the office, you ring the tenant to advise them of the items that you would like cleaned.

However, they don't answer their mobile phone as it has run out of battery and they are still trying to find the charger as they unpack at their new residence. You then try the number on file for their place of work and either find out these details are out-of-date or they have the day off due to moving. As you have new tenants scheduled to move in, you go ahead and organise the cleaning of the premises.  

The following week, the tenant calls expecting to receive their full bond refund. You explain how you were unable to contact them and advise of the amount to be deducted from their bond.

As you can imagine, the tenant is not happy and starts arguing with you over the phone. And so the ordeal begins.

You may not be able to change the behaviour of the tenant but you can certainly change the way in which you work with them. As the property manager, it is your responsibility to openly communicate and educate all parties about the necessary procedures when vacating the premises. If the tenant is not fully aware of your processes and timeframes, then how can they ever meet your expectations?

Stick to the Guidelines

Always review your Vacating Guidelines sheet to ensure it includes everything from handing over possession of the property to receiving the bond refund. In many States/Territories there is a requirement to give the tenant a reasonable opportunity to attend the vacate inspection if they wish. Information regarding how this option works should also be included in the guidelines.

It is naive to just assume the tenant knows the procedure as this may be their first experience. The Vacating Guidelines will outline to tenants the steps following the final inspection and explain how long it will take for them to get the bond refund form signed.

For many tenants the bond may be critical to their cash flow at moving time and can make people quite emotional. Ensure that when the standard vacate letters are sent to the tenant that the Vacating Guidelines sheet, Cleaning Guide and Exit Condition Report are also included. This should leave the tenant in no doubt as to the expectations of your agency.

Evaluating Procedures and Up-Skilling Staff

When was the last time your team reviewed the exit procedures and attended some professional training? Have you considered conducting a survey on your vacating tenants? This may be a difficult task the first time around, but you may be surprised by what you find.

By collating the information, you are able to evaluate it more objectively to improve your team's overall communication and service. Break it down into: 

• Task-orientated items
  
  
• People skills/communication items

For starters, assess the task-orientated activities and see where they can be added to your vacate procedures, correspondence and checklists. In reviewing the people skills activities, are the appropriate staff speaking with the tenant - is it the property manager or is it a message passed via the receptionist? What areas of communication do your staff need up-skilling in - general communication (both oral and written), negotiation or conflict resolution?

It is a good idea to design a training program for staff on how to improve their skills in these key areas. This will have a two-fold effect:

• Improving general communication so as to minimise the need for conflict resolution skills and improve communication prior to a problem.
  
  
• Give staff more confidence in dealing with difficult people.

Ending a Tenancy the Right Way

Consider this more amicable scenario. The tenant gives notice. Not only do you provide the tenant with a Cleaning Guide and Exit Condition Report but also a detailed Vacating Guide. 

You explain to the tenant upfront that each office has its own way of exiting tenants from the premises so you outline clearly how your business operates to avoid confusion. The tenant hands in the keys and opts out of attending the vacant inspection, so you confirm with them all their contact numbers. You also refer to the expected timeframe for the vacate inspection, discuss the likely time it will take to receive communication of the result and explain why any outstanding items may need to be addressed. 

As a result, the tenant leaves the office with a clear roadmap of procedures and timeframe for the exit process. In cases where the tenant cannot receive your call, always arrange for them to call you at a set time.

Once the inspection is complete and any outstanding items are identified, you are now able to phone a more educated tenant to discuss the requirements needed to obtain their full bond refund. Even if you have some concerns with the tenant, you would expect the whole process, due to clear communication of expectation, to be much smoother.

Over a period of time, you'll find the surveys will start to come back with improved feedback on your service and vacating procedures. Staff will be less stressed and tenants will leave with a better sense of satisfaction and a willingness to refer future business to your agency.

With less problems at the end of the tenancy everyone wins - the client, customer, property manager and licensee.

With thanks to Sharon Rowe, Qld Real Estate Product Manager, Kaplan Professional.

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