This is one of my pet peeves. In fact, if I've heard it once, I've heard it a thousand times: "You have part-time agents." (spoken as if it were some dreaded curse, or as if those part-time agents were somehow deformed, retarded, or had leprosy). In my early days as a broker it used to really infuriate me -- you know, those other brokers looking down their nose at those part-time agents as if they were second-class citizens.
Then one day it struck me. What a great strategic advantage. In a moment I'm going to share it with you, but first, allow me to set the record straight as to part-time agents. What is so bad about someone who is working another job and wanting to improve their station in life by adding a second career? Many are trying to transition out of a dead-end job. Many more are wanting to work part-time before making the jump to a new career and finding it a mistake.
The fact is that I've had numerous part-time agents who have out-performed many of their full-time counterparts. In fact, most of those part-time agents work much harder than full-time agents. Let's face it: the average agent today is only doing seven transactions a year, so it's not as if they are exactly killing it all day, every day. The fact is that I've never seen an industry where full-time employees did as little in a given day.
So, yes, I love part-time agents. Partly because they are working two or more jobs. Partly because they have a teachable attitude and don't already "know it all". Partly because nobody else wants them. I say, send me all of them! I do want them. I don't care about my per-agent production stats. I care about hiring good agents. Here's why I like part-time agents.
Every single part-time agent will average 1-2 closings a year. It has been my experience that they work harder at doing things correctly and that they take the extra time to check with me when they are not sure about something. I would much rather solve a problem before it becomes a crisis than try to fix it after it has blown up into a major ordeal.
And those 1-2 closings every year will probably be at the highest company dollar because of the low volume of the agent. The part-time agent doesn't cost me anything to employ, doesn't gripe and complain, and consistently cranks out a few deals a year, on which we make a good return. Many part-time agents, given the right setting, will even go ahead and make the transition to full-time.
I'll give you three examples of great part-time agents. The first is Joe. When Joe came to us he was a full-time soldier and part-time agent. In less than a year of working part-time, Joe was doing over a deal a week and started growing his own team. Soon his part-time income far out paced his full-time military pay so he made the decision to get out of the military and do real estate full-time.
When his team had grown to about a dozen agents, we helped him open his own company, and now his company has over 30 agents and is one of the larger companies in our local market. Funny, Joe was turned down by several other companies before coming to join us. What a shame.
Or take Dave. Dave was a part-time agent and a full-time soldier at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and earlier this year he gave the ultimate sacrifice, when he was killed in action in Afghanistan.
Dave came to us one day looking for a way to make a few extra dollars and take the pressure off the family budget. We discussed the income possibilities of his doing real estate part-time, and I strongly encouraged him to give it a try. Well, to make a long story short, Dave signed up for the pre-license training, got his real estate license, and began working as a part-time agent with our company.
Unlike many agents, however, Dave actually did what we taught him to do. And you know what happened? He followed our plan, step-by-step, and by the end of his first year we'd paid him over $300,000 in commissions. I remember one month when I paid him over $50,000. I will always remember Dave. He was a great guy. He loved serving his country in the military, and he loved doing real estate.
And Dave was a perfect example of what a part-time agent can do given the right direction, the right tools, and the will to succeed. And Dave was never more than part-time. He had plans of opening his own office after retiring from the Army, but those plans were cut short by an enemy roadside bomb. But I'll take one part-time agent like that over a dozen full-time agents that sit on their butts and gripe.
Finally, there is Kevin. When I met Kevin, he was driving a truck full-time. He was a single father and had very limited financial resources- but he had desire. We gave him the tools and a little training, showed him the way, and watched while he turned his entire life around. For the first six months he was part-time and his income continued to build. Eventually, he made the transition to full-time.
Two short years later he's averaging a dozen deals a month, has bought a new 8,000 square foot home with an Olympic-sized pool in the back yard, a four car garage, with a detached office and apartment, a brand new truck, a new sports car and put away money for the future.
Kevin will earn well over half a million dollars this year, he's found a wonderful new wife (my personal assistant) and is living the American dream during the worst season of real estate in recent history. Funny, he was turned down by several other companies before joining ours. Again, what a shame for them.
I could go on to tell you about Julie or Dee or David or dozens of other part-time agents who have done well and who I am happy to have had with our company. As far as I'm concerned, those are the perfect agents to have in your company. Will they all do 10+ deals every month? Of course not. But many will actually outperform your full-time agents, and if they don't, so what?
I would much prefer to have my company's income based on the production of 50 part-time agents than only 10 full-time agents. In that scenario, if you lost a full-time agent, you just took a 10% hit. If you lost a part-time agent, you took a 2% hit. Add to that the fact that nobody is trying to recruit your part-timers while as soon as a full-timer starts doing much production, every broker in town is calling him.
I say hire every part-timer you get the chance to. In fact, I say focus on recruiting them. It costs you nothing to hire them and many will become your best agents. And because you will take a chance on them when many other firms will not, they'll be very loyal. An added bonus is that because their production is relatively low, they'll even pay you a bigger split. And that's Max-Bang!
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