10 Great Gadgets for Real Estate Professionals

10 Great Gadgets for Real Estate Professionals



2015-SO COOL Tools for our business. Some I would use--some are too "tech" for me.

Have a 100% Day by Bliss Sawyer

Have a 100% Day



What a terrific example of how my business associate Bliss Sawyer works. She is organized in her business career that translates to my clients. She can prepare this same type of business model for your next home loan. I refer her daily. Take a read--

Dealing with a Last-Minute Boss by David Mayfield

Dealing with a Last-minute Boss
by David Maxfield

Please enjoy the article below or read it on our blog.

Dear Crucial Skills, 

My boss likes to leave things open for change until the last moment and this stresses me out completely. A few examples:
(1) We were presenting to senior management and had agreed to drop several items from the presentation based on specific logical reasons. Two hours before the presentation, he decided we needed to add those items back into the presentation without reason.
(2) We were launching a high-visibility product—from senior management’s perspective—and he tried to change the launch material that was already delayed going into production. If we had done as he wanted, we would have missed the launch deadline and faced huge embarrassment.
(3) We were in the middle of an event and he texted me asking to change the schedule during the event!

Situations like these are causing immense stress for me. I like to plan things well in advance and do not like surprises at the last moment. How can I successfully communicate this with him?

Sincerely,
Stressed Out

Dear Stressed Out, 

Great question! And thanks for sharing the detailed examples. Often we have to work back from our emotions to the story that drives them, and then to the facts behind our story. As I see it, you’re dealing with the following:

• Emotions: Stress and frustration.
• Story: “My boss likes to leave things open for change until the last moment.”
• Facts: The three incidents you describe.

Challenge your story. I want to begin by challenging your story just a bit. As humans, we often make what psychologists call "The Fundamental Attribution Error." We attribute others’ bad behavior to internal dispositions (as you do when you suggest, “My boss likes . . . "), and ignore external factors that might be influencing his or her behavior. Take a bit more time exploring why your boss might be leaving things open to the last minute. Here are a few possibilities:

• He is distracted by other tasks and doesn’t really attend to your priorities until the last minute. Then, when he finally gets his head in the game, he wants to make changes.
• Other leaders he must accommodate don’t pay attention to your priorities until the last minute. Then they demand changes, and your boss passes them along to you—as if they were his.
• Perhaps some situations are so fluid that they really do require last minute changes. (I’d be surprised if this last one is actually true, but it’s worth considering.)

A robust solution to your problem needs to address all of these influences. If you focus too narrowly on motivating him, without acknowledging the reasons for his last-minute meddling, he’s likely to feel attacked and become defensive.

Determine what you really want. Focus on what you want long-term for the organization, your boss, yourself, and for your working relationship. Take pains to avoid a self-focused perspective (such as when you say, “Situations like these are causing immense stress for me. I like to plan things well in advance and do not like surprises at the last moment.”) Instead, focus on the benefits you want to achieve.

Trust me. If you are feeling stress, then others are as well. And the organizational costs of these last-minute changes can be profound. I’ve seen organizations grind to a halt, as managers stop taking action and making decisions because they fear others will second-guess them at the last minute. If you can introduce greater predictability and stability, you will be helping your organization, your boss, and many others—including yourself.

Establish expectations that work for everyone. In our Crucial Accountability course we teach a skill called Describe the Gap. The gap is the difference between what you expect and what you’ve observed. In your case, the gap is between what you expect and what your boss and other stakeholders expect. Your conversation will succeed to the extent you can align these expectations.

I suggest using principles and terms from project management best practices to describe your expectations. A good process involves the right people (your boss and other stakeholders) at the right times, before decisions become last-minute.

Learn how project management is done in your organization and use what you discover in the conversation. Your goal will be to have your boss and other stakeholders commit to following a project management process that will make their lives easier, and improve the effectiveness of the organization.

Move important decisions forward in time. Since the problem is that your boss isn’t making decisions until they are urgent, a part of the solution is to create this urgency earlier. Project plans are supposed to do this by establishing checkpoints that involve people early in the process. However, this involvement only works if people take the plans seriously—if the checkpoints create a sense of urgency.

You need to make sure you are getting people’s mind share and serious involvement when you need it—early in the process. If you can’t get serious involvement early, then count on getting it at the last minute.

Get permission to hold people accountable to the project plan.Your first test will come when your boss and others skip project checkpoints or arrive unprepared. Talk with them in advance about this potential. If they don’t get their heads into the project on time—as called for in the project plan—then the whole planning process will break down, and you’ll be back to last-minute changes.

Some organizations even introduce a shorthand way of referring to the negative cycle. One I work with calls it “Skipping the D” and “Hijacking the D” (meaning “Skipping the Decision” and “Hijacking the Decision”). Everyone knows what these phrases mean and they use them as reminders to hold each other accountable.

I hope that some of these suggestions will work for you. Let me know how it goes.

David

Reveal to Your Clients the ‘Ugly Truths’ When Staging

Here you go! The real reason GREAT REALTORS are respected in the industry. Staging sells home!

Take a moment and read this article about why. GREAT READ.

Reveal to Your Clients the ‘Ugly Truths’ When Staging

Dated Kitchens Get Long Overdue Makeovers

Dated Kitchens Get Long Overdue Makeovers

Consider this--Safety for Realtors

Calif. Agent Kidnapped During Showing

DAILY REAL ESTATE NEWS | FRIDAY, JANUARY 09, 2015 

Real estate professionals in the Sacramento area are on an alert after reports that an armed man kidnapped a real estate agent who was showing him a model home Thursday afternoon. The agent escaped and the suspect fled the scene.

REALTOR® Safety:

• The 10 Commandments to Agent Safety
• Make Safety a Brokerage Priority
• 4 Safety Essentials Every Agent Needs to Know
• Brokers Launch Pledge for Agent Safety
• 'Safety Lessons That Saved My Life ...'
• More REALTOR® Safety Resources From NAR

Police continue to search the area for the man who allegedly pulled a gun on a real estate professional and handcuffed her shortly after she met him for a 3:30 p.m. appointment to show a home for-sale in Elk Grove, Calif.

The woman had an appointment to show the man a KB model home. But shortly after meeting, the victim says the man held her at gunpoint in the home for about 50 minutes, moving her from room to room. He later removed her handcuffs and when he stepped out of the model home, the agent was able to lock him out, police reported. The man fled in a red pickup truck.

The agent was then able to get the attention of a patrolling security guard, who then escorted her to a nearby store to contact police.

Police say the real estate agent was shaken but otherwise unharmed.

The search continues for the suspect, who has only been described by police as a black or Hispanic male in his 50s who is armed with a handgun.

Source: “Police: Real Estate Agent Kidnapped, Escapes in Elk Grove; Abductor Sought,” News10/KXTV (California) (Jan. 9, 2015) and “Elk Grove Real Estate Agent Reportedly Kidnapped, Released While Showing Home,” The Sacramento Bee (Jan. 8, 2015)

Advice from National Assoc of Realtors--Lawrence Yun--2015

In this video, NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun talks about the outlook for the 2015 housing market. He expects existing-home sales to rise about 7 percent in 2015 behind a strengthening economy, solid job gains and a healthy increase in home prices.

Read the news release about the video.

See an infographic containing information from Lawrence Yun's forecast video.

Productivity an issue--2015 can be better

Stay on Track With Productivity Plans

Posted in Book Reviews, by Meg White on January 7, 2015

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If you made a resolution this year to be more productive, there’s a new book out from the company that practically defined “productive people.” Three Franklin Covey staffers share the bill on The 5 Choices: The Path to Extraordinary Productivity, which promises to supply a “renewed sense of engagement and accomplishment.”

It’s only January. You shouldn’t be at the end of your rope already!
Photo credit: imelenchon, 2012/Morguefile.

Back before any of us were thinking about “inbox management,” I always kind of felt like the Franklin Covey library existed mostly to sell leather-bound day planners. But I was actually somewhat impressed with this book. It’s certainly not revolutionary, but it does contain some solid methods for evaluating one’s performance in a variety of roles in both personal and professional life, and contains ideas for how to balance obligations and streamline complex processes.

Several chapters begin with a character speeding haplessly through their day without really being able to be productive. I’m not sure if all the Franklin Covey books follow this pattern, but I found it surprisingly effective and true-to-life. Self-help type books often try this tactic, but it usually comes across as cheesy for anyone who’s used to reading decent fiction. Though it does peter out to shorter snippets as the book grinds on, the initial narratives read almost as if they hired a ghostwriter to handle the creative end, with little details that make you believe the characters are at least somewhat real.

The writers also appear to have done their research in citing science to back up their assertions, with a decent end notes section to connect readers who want to follow up. I especially appreciated the explanation early on about why our brains are drawn to solve crises first. I thought I just tended to consume a block of unread e-mails from top-to-bottom because my inbox is organized that way. But a big part of why I don’t start at the bottom of the list has to do with how satisfying it is to put out the proverbial fires. Similarly, being able to resolve an e-mail that’s marked urgent immediately (even when it’s not urgent at all) gives us a rush of dopamine, which makes our brains feel awesome. This is certainly not a scientific statement, but the authors use a powerful comparison to show why being aware of this tendency is even more important this day in age:

Technology can amp up the addictive power of urgency tenfold. It’s like smoking crack cocaine, which is immediately more stimulating…addictive [and] dangerous.

The fifth chapter also includes some helpful research on how good proteins and fats help us think and act more clearly, as well as evidence of how work-life imbalance and sleep deprivation can hurt productivity even more that was previously assumed. 

The book also contains simple but effective ideas for how to better organize yourself to tackle meetings, to-do lists, and scheduling, though a lot of these items rely on a willingness to explore productivity hacks that exist in the e-mail/calendar/task management software you’re already using. 

Overall, The 5 Choices is a good place to restart if you feel like you’re beginning to falter on your promises to change your distracted ways in the new year. Bring on week two, 2015!

Meg White

Meg White is the multimedia web producer for REALTOR® Magazine and administrator of the magazine's Weekly Book Scan blog. Contact her at mwhite[at]realtors.org.

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