It’s been another long while and another long slog. I’ve been quiet on the blog lately, bc I joined a new coaching program in November and was spending a lot of energy ramping that up. I was hopeful and excited for a new wave of learning— skills, strategies, and mastery… but three months later, it’s been a rocky road. I know, story of my life and story of working in this industry.
The coaching program focuses a lot on lead generation through direct response marketing which involves print as well as internet ads. Initially, things were amazing. I was getting lots of leads and making calls several times a day. I was having conversations with people about real estate! The path of course is to call the leads, set appointments from the calls, and then convert the prospects at the appointments into clients. So yeah, many steps even before they sign on to work with me.
But I was actually reaching people on the phone and to my surprise, I got meetings booked! Then, people began to flake. Or they’d want to buy mobile homes…
One lady signed on with me and was so pleasant to work with. I busted my ass working with her for three weeks, and I was so thrilled to get her into contract. Yeah, we beat out 14 other offers and then she couldn’t deliver the damn deposit. And as all of this unraveled, I put two and two together, ultimately coming to the realization that she was being scammed. Yes, no joke, she was a victim of elder financial fraud where someone had convinced her that she had inherited some insane amount of money from overseas. I had to involve the legal team, my managing broker, the contracts guy… EVERYone wanted to know what was going on and what was to happen next. I swear, it was like I was in a real estate soap opera, if there were such a thing. I wanted to get the FBI involved, but bc of my fiduciary role, I could not report anything without her permission. Meanwhile, she insisted that her funds were legit AND that she knew where her money came from. I mean, I won’t go into all the details but none of this was a straight line. She was battling walking pneumonia the whole time, I was having to drive to doctors’ offices and the hospital to meet her to discuss the next steps in the transaction, and she would go dark hours at a time being totally unreachable. It’s over now, but I lost three weeks of my life and the extreme stress of uncovering something so predatory and sinister and having my hands tied (she refused to acknowledge she was a victim) triggered extreme abdominal pains. Not to mention the mental anguish of being the poster child of shit going wrong in a real estate transaction…
Around the same time, I also found out that the couple that had dumped me before Thanksgiving closed on an expensive home that paid 3% buyer side commission. Fuckers. They kept insisting their budget was $1.5m max and they didn’t want to be “too burdened” by a high mortgage, yada, yada. They bought at $1.7m. I still get so roiled up about it. I wasted three months covering an insane area and then they finally decided to be decisive and buy after 2 weeks with a new agent.
Needless to say, another shit start to a new year. Is it even surprising that I got diagnosed with GERD for the first time in my life (the pain was so intense, I thought I had stones), and I had a meltdown at the office yesterday?
Despite the numerous setbacks, I know I am mentally strong. I still believe I’m a careful and thorough agent. I still believe my values of advocacy, education, and care benefit the people I serve. It’s freaking disheartening and demoralizing trudging through all the sludge just to get to the sweet spot. People say to remember all of the good things in your life. I do and I am so grateful for the blessing that I have. But they almost make me feel unworthy. I just want to be successful. I just want to be a winner. I know these things require work. And I’m willing to do things that are not easy. I’m willing to put myself out there. I’m willing to face rejection and rude, disrespectful people every day. And yet, I am stuck.
All activity, no results. It’s frustrating and it’s painful. But I cannot wallow in the disappointment. Bc I know no matter my level of despair, millions of people are out there fighting bigger battles without the resources, support, and privileges that I have. So I don’t want to complain, and I don’t want to dwell in self-pity. Life moves on.
My next steps are to keep plugging away at the activities and use them as a way to improve my skills. I am also reaching out to more experienced agents to seek their insights and to see if I can establish new partnerships and exchanges.
Oh man, I had a buyer appointment scheduled for today at 12:30 pm. A Taiwanese lady was referred to me by another agent who does not speak Mandarin. The prospect lost her keys, so now the appointment is canceled. What can you do but try to reschedule and move on to the next challenge. Shrug. I really cannot make this shit up.