9 Proven Skills To Be Successful Real Estate Agents

Success can be defined in many ways, but in the real estate business, a real estate agent is considered to have succeeded based on the number of deals they close in a year or the number of properties they sell. Simple, is it not? However, how is it that in the same city and under similar market conditions, some agents are barely managing to sell one house while other real estate agents are busy juggling multiple clients?

What is assured, though, is the fact that this potent mix of some known, some less know, and some entirely new set of skills are definitely going to be beneficial to real estate agents at all levels of their careers. After speaking to our team of real estate experts, where they have a collective real estate experience of around 71 years, we have identified the nine skills you need to develop to be a successful real estate agent. We have further divided these skills into the categories of personality traits and real estate industry skills.

Personal Traits A Real Estate Agent Must Develop

All jobs have their requirements, and similarly, there are specific skills that can help boost a real estate agent's success. The following are the personality qualities that would enhance your growth and some tips on how to pick these up.

1. Communicate Effectively

This may seem obvious, but a surprising number of real estate agents tend to struggle with communication in the initial years of their careers. So how exactly is this communication supposed to work in the real estate industry?

The primary thing to remember is that you are offering a service to your clients. As such, always communicate in a way that is beneficial for them. You can be friendly, but you still need to create value. Whether over calls, emails, or meetings, you must strive to take the transaction ahead every time. The efforts have to be there from your side every time so that the client can respond favorably at least half of the time.

2. Negotiating To Persuade

The ability to negotiate successfully is a trait that is in demand in all employment fields. However, when it comes to real estate, an agent is constantly in the negotiating mode in each interaction. Whether it is listing appointments with sellers where you have to convince them about their homes’ true value, or you are trying to strike a deal with the buyer’s agent while ensuring that your clients are satisfied too. Your skills at negotiating will be put to test every day. It may seem like an intimidating prospect, but it is very much part of the job as a real estate agent. When you deal with people, you must have a strong negotiating prowess, with the ability to maintain relationships.

When you negotiate as a real estate agent, it must always be professional yet persuasive. At no point should the clients feel that you are being pushy. Always give your clients choices. This way you can help them feel that they are in charge, and they decide to take action and move forward with the deal. All you have to do is make sure that both the choices are equally beneficial to you and your client.

3. Motivation To Advance

One crucial aspect needed to succeed in real estate is inner motivation. Many agents are surprised to see this in such a list. They think that 'Yes, I am motivated. That is why I chose to be in this field.' But we are not discussing your reasons to choose this as your career path. We are talking about the inner drive to pick yourself after facing rejections. The resilience to bounce back even in adverse circumstances.

4. Strong Work Ethic

One thing you will definitely hear all real estate agents say is required and will find for yourself agreeing in the initial months of becoming a real estate agent is a strong work ethic. It is not enough to have earned your real estate license. You must also constantly work towards gaining more business knowledge. Your clients should feel that you are doing the best job when it comes to selling their properties.

5. Honesty And Integrity

At the end of the day, successful real estate agents are those who are able to build trust and rapport with their clients. When dealing with sellers, you need to showcase honesty and knowledge. It is essential, as, in this business, the sellers are entirely relying on the service offered by the real estate agent.

Therefore, there needs to be integrity throughout the process until the deal is finalized. This is why undervaluing a property to get it sold quickly to boost the real estate agent’s sales ratio or representing both the buyer and the seller for the same property is not considered to be acceptable.

As a real estate agent, you need to ensure that your client gets the right value of the home through the sales and the buyers get the perfect house for the money they are spending. Therefore, transparency and integrity are a must in all your communications with your clients at all stages of the deal.

Business Skills Real Estate Agents Must Learn To Succeed

Once you have worked on the personality qualities, the next aspect to focus upon would be business skills. Yes, these are also essential to get more clients and convert more properties into sales. This is the reason why our real estate experts have picked these as a few of the must-have qualities. These are a mix of both process methods and technical aspects on which a successful real estate agent needs to work to excel.

6. The Art Of Cold Calling

The first business skill that you need to develop to create success as a real estate agent is to learn the art of cold calling. It is not easy to call someone and offer your services to the other person. However, this is a skill that you would need to pick up to progress.

7. Seller Lead Generation

This is a key skill to gain for real estate agents. In this business, it is necessary to constantly be in pursuit of clients. There is a need to generate seller leads on an ongoing basis as it is the foundation of a real estate agent's job. Even the most successful real estate agents are constantly on to look out for new clients. There are many ways to gain prospective clients. Two of the most popular ones are registering on online platforms and social media.

Online Lead Generation Platforms

The online seller leads generation platforms such as Dorrmat are integral components in a real estate agent's success. However, merely registering will not be enough. As an agent, you need to carefully go through all the excellent facilities and features offered by Dorrmat and incorporate that into your business strategy.

There is a wide variety of features and facilities that Dorrmat offers. By understanding these thoroughly, you can ensure that you are deriving the maximum benefit of features such as a robust Customer Relationship Management tool, vendor addition, lead capture facility, and many more. At times a new real estate agent may not be sure how to utilize all of these properly.

Utilization Of Social Media

Social media platforms are a major source of finding potential clients. You need to learn how to benefit from the incredible marketing potential of these platforms. Facebook and Instagram can be utilized to both widen your social network and to run marketing ads targeted at specific demographics.

In this day and age of technology, being tech-savvy is a crucial skill for real estate agents. And understanding how these platforms operate and how to use them to take your business ahead are indeed skills that you should possess. Similarly, LinkedIn helps you with networking within the professional circle.

Through social media, you would be able to ensure that your marketing communication regarding your services and properties listed by you is being seen by the right buyers and sellers. You get to gain more professional contact and connections, which can lead to profitable relationships in the future.

8. Strong Networking

When it comes to networking, what a real estate agent has to do is try and build connections with fellow professionals. Try to attend seminars, Chamber of Commerce meetings, and participate in local community events. These professional gatherings will help you become familiar with more people and gain useful contact information.

By widening your professional network, you are multiplying your chances to know more buyers and sellers, thereby increasing your sales. It is a case of probability — the more people you know in the real estate world, the more clients you might end up getting. This is also an excellent way to improve your professional communication abilities.

9. Management Skills

Real estate agents are also independent business owners and, as such, are expected to be capable and possess certain key business and management skills.

Marketing Skills

As a real estate agent, you need to ensure that when it comes to selling, you are the best. Whether it is selling your skills as an agent to sellers at listing appointments or selling the property that you have under contract. Therefore, you must be familiar with all the new approaches to marketing a property and your service. From leads farming to drip marketing, to running a real estate website to posting real estate market videos, you must be ready to adapt to the changing time and pick up the new marketing skills.

Time-Management Skills

A challenge that even those agents who have been in this business for many years face is that of efficiently using their work hours. It does not matter whether you are an independent realtor or an agent working under a broker in a brokerage; it is vital to ensure that you are adequately giving time to all of your responsibilities.

From cold calling to meeting clients, to going for listing appointments to keep yourself informed about the changes to the real estate market and keeping an eye on the new properties available, there is a lot that an agent has to manage with regards to the real estate market changes. That is why a strong real estate career needs to be smart about the time spent on various activities.

Summary

The real estate industry is filled with many challenges and constant changes. This is the reason why real estate agents need to develop certain skills to attract and engage prospective clients. Most of these characteristics will enhance both the personal and professional life of a real estate agent. Remember, selling is an art, and like any other art form, it is something that can be developed.

Whether it is client communication, juggling listings and sales, giving property advice to buyers and sellers, these core qualities are meant to build a foundation that will help you succeed in this field. Some of the above might be qualities that you already possess, yet working upon them from the perspective of a real estate agent will help you to achieve the growth you wish.

By using the above-mentioned characteristics as a sort of blueprint, it is very much possible to take your real estate career to great success. With this skill set, you will have a better grasp of the real estate market and a better understanding of your clients. If you keep practicing and honing these skills, then you will be able to become a successful real estate agent.