Sacrifice
Balance and real estate do not typically go together. When I dove into my real estate career, I gave it everything I had. I worked endlessly, day and night, every weekend. I sacrificed a lot in order to make money for my girls in order to keep them safe and comfortable. At the time, I worked so much that when my daughter was graduating high school, I went on a listing appointment and cried at the sight of the kid’s photos on the wall. I felt guilty for not always being around for my girls. I had absolutely no balance.
They were nice enough to tell me, “Mom, you gave us a great work ethic, don't feel like that.” And “You always were there when we needed you.” But I felt bad about it. I felt this way until I learned the systems and the strategy.
Balance in Real Estate
I want you to know that anybody can achieve those kinds of results. Anybody can achieve selling a lot of real estate. But it's difficult to sell a lot of real estate and do it in a way that you aren't just absolutely just consumed with it. So I figured out a way to actually make it not be as hard. I want to share those strategies with you. And I'll tell you how I learned them. I remember when the market was starting to change, I kind of started to predict that it would change and so I started traveling around the world and picking up asset management companies and banks. In 2008, I had picked up 13 different asset management companies and 13 different banks that I worked for.
I worked for Wachovia and HUD and Green River Capital. And we had the Freddy Mac account and my best year I sold 169 homes. And that was not any other realtor, just me. I had a transaction coordinator and an assistant. It was crazy. I was doing really well and then the market crashed. All of a sudden I went from selling 169 homes to selling 12. Mind you, I had two little girls. I was the main provider and I had two team members and I was worried about taking care of them.
Now all the foreclosures went away and we went from selling all these foreclosures to selling 12. The asset management companies went away and the banks quit giving us foreclosures. So I went on a listing appointment, it was a regular listing appointment and I didn't get the listing. I then called him to ask him for some constructive feedback. And he said, “Krista, we liked you, but we hired the other person because the last guy that we interviewed called you the foreclosure queen.” And I remember thinking, oh my gosh, I am the foreclosure queen. Nobody knew who I was in real estate. I hadn't done any marketing. I wasn't doing anything online digitally. All I was doing was selling foreclosures and they were selling faster than we could even get them.
And so I had to completely change how I was doing business. And so what I started doing was I started looking at how the Fortune 500 companies were operating. How are they attracting clients? What were they doing? I started studying digital marketing, studying social media strategies and social media experts. And I figured out that they use content marketing.
Content Marketing
I realized that that's what I needed to do in real estate. So instead of me having to chase down people, I needed to become what I call a community market leader. I needed to become the mayor of my town. I needed people that anytime they thought about real estate or they thought about the community, I wanted to make sure that they thought about me.
Now, this is the case with any type of profession whether you're in real estate or you're a mortgage officer or financial advisor or a divorce attorney or expert. Any type of business can do this. And I started creating video content about my community. I talked about things that were up and coming, and I did market updates and national market updates. And I talked about things to do in the area and what was prolific about real estate. I talked about my day and I just became a reporter sometimes about things I would learn. Before I knew it, I was selling over a hundred homes a year and they were not short sales or foreclosures. They were normal types of homes.
Get Your Life Back
This tells you that even you can do it. I went from nobody knowing who I was to becoming a master digital marketer and engaging people. And I started creating content and it completely transformed my business. This gave me my life back. I didn't have to work weekends or nights anymore. I stopped working on Fridays at 4:30.
Finally I started being able to see my kids again. And I didn't have to do things like cold calling or door knocking or open houses. I haven't done those for years and years because I have been creating video content. And that's what I want to encourage you to do. Most agents are constantly working weekends, working nights. But we get into the business because we want financial freedom. It’s a rude awakening when you realize there is no balance whatsoever.
Balance Leads to Longevity
Did you know that the average agent only stays in business for five years? 87% of agents will leave the business within five years because they're not treating their business like a business. They're treating their business like an agent. Unfortunately they're taught to do things that quite frankly, just don't work. We're taught from our brokers to do open houses and to do sphere of influence. But let's face it. Those things are not the best use of our time. Yes, I get it. They can work. But you're marketing one to one, which is just not efficient. When you market one to many and you create video content that will work for you, you’re marketing one to many.This allows you to start attracting business. People start calling you, and you get your life back.
The strategies that I'm going to be teaching you are going to show you how to do that. You're going to learn how to be able to utilize what I've learned and take it into your own business so that you can have the life that you deserve with balance. I want to be able to show you how I've been able to get my life back and develop a really strong relationship with my new husband of 13 years and with my daughters and my family. So I want this for you too. I hope you're going to enjoy what you're seeing and I want to hear from you. So thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate it and I cannot wait just to add as much value to you as I can.
