Become a Rock Star Real Estate Agent

7 Steps to Make $100k a Year

Jennifer Seeno Tucker

• Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781631950261
• eBook ISBN: 9781631950278
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business Development
• Index: Business

Within Become a Rock Star Real Estate Agent, Jennifer Seeno Tucker helps real estate agents create the favorable circumstances that will increase the success and effectiveness of their sales career, so they can rake in the profits.

Become a Rock Star Real Estate Agent shows real estate agents that they can have a successful and thriving real estate business. There is a way for real estate agents to use their current skills, knowledge, and expertise to create a profitable real estate career capable of earning $100k or more every year. Become a Rock Star Real Estate Agent is designed to guide real estate salespeople who are truly ready to earn the profits they were born to make. Author, vice president of business development, and associate broker of EXIT Realty United, Jennifer Seeno Tucker helps real estate agents to:

• Learn how to regain control of a stagnant real estate sales business
• Recognize the patterns as to why their real estate career has failed to thrive
• Overcome sluggish real estate transactions that are hurting their bank account
• Identify highly qualified clients that will help them reach their income targets every month with ease
• Keep their real estate business growing on a deliberate path of prosperity

Chapter 1

SPIN YOU AROUND, BLURRY—PUDDLE OF MUDD

You’re never really ready for when your whole life changes. For me, that day was September 1, 2007. I was visiting family here in New York while my husband was in Wyoming, where we lived for a couple years. He was in a serious car accident—serious enough that I immediately flew back west after being in New York for only twelve hours. The nearest level trauma hospital that was able to care for his injuries was in Montana. No one on the phone would tell me the severity of it, so when I approached his room in the ICU to find him on a ventilator with a shunt in his head, a broken back and hip, and in an induced coma, my mouth dropped to the floor. I nearly fainted and wept beyond belief. I had never cried like that—never felt an emotion so strong that I did that night. It was the saddest day of my life.

Our daughter was fifteen months old. I had left her in New York while I attended to her father. When I asked the doctors if he was going to make it, they said to me, “Let’s see what happens in the next thirty days.” Being the courageous, brave, stonewall person my dad had taught me to be in situations like this, I just shook my head and said “OK.”

OK? Was I crazy? Who just replies back OK? That was the first time I had surrendered. Given up. I had to let go of control. I mean, what could I do? I had always fought back under almost any circumstance. My fist was constantly pounding my hand, but this time there was no punching. I wasn’t in the driver’s seat. The only people who could help him were the doctors. They were the professionals. I couldn’t rescue him—save him from this trauma. Or could I?

I went to chapel every day and prayed. I asked God for help to guide my husband back to us, for he was only twenty-seven at the time. I hadn’t been to church in nearly ten years except for our wedding day; I didn’t know if I was being heard or not, but I figured it couldn’t hurt.

He was in a coma for nine weeks before “waking up,” which definitely doesn’t look like it does on a daytime soap opera. It was a very slow process, and it little by little wore me down. My daughter was still staying in New York—a tough decision to make, but I couldn’t take care of her, give her the love and support she required as a sixteen-month-old, as my time was consumed by tending to her dad. Dealing with doctors, insurance companies, and in-laws was a full-time job—an exhausting full-time job that required executive decisions to be made at a moment’s notice. I was also staying in a hotel room long-term just to be close to the hospital. Financially, our little bit of savings that we did have was wiped out between lodging and food.

After he woke up from his coma, I no longer knew who I was. I had gained thirty pounds and began working for our town within the parks department scrubbing public toilet bowls for pool patrons. I had my master’s degree, and I was scrubbing the remainder of someone’s lunch off this can of filth. I needed this job. I had to take it, out of desperation, to stay close to home should my husband have an emotional breakdown and not tend to the needs of our daughter. This civil servant job was the only job I could work that would afford me the time to deal with my family’s unfortunate situation. I was earning twelve dollars an hour, and although it was more than what the college kids were making, in New York supporting a family of three, it was difficult to survive. We utilized every federal, state, and local government program that was out there, including food stamps, WIC (Women Infant Children), Medicare, and the Daycare Assistance Program. The mere thought, let alone the days I had to enter the social security offices were agonizing and embarrassing. I hated it so much I can recall puking outside the office of my social worker. Of course, she asked if I was pregnant—I wasn’t! Paying bills was nearly impossible. I was late with the minimum payment every month, there was no catching up, and I couldn’t see the light at the end. I felt as if I was drowning and began getting a ringing in my ears from all the stress. Our car, which became an Uber not for hire, taxied my husband from doctor to doctor. It was on its last leg. And eventually, I filed for bankruptcy.

I was beyond humiliated and mortified to be in this position and retreated from family functions even further. I felt unworthy to be in their presence because I couldn’t support my family. I’ve heard people grow and transform through either insight or suffering. There was definitely no meaningful evolution occurring here, so at this stage of my life, it was definitely the latter.

Over a seven-year period, my husband did make a miraculous recovery, but his chronic condition ultimately was the death of our marriage. Caring for him was a full-time job as I tended to his daily life skills and assisted him with getting washed, dressed and brushing his teeth. I was more of a nurse and caretaker than a wife. He was not the same person I married. As a result of his brain injury, he became violent and hot tempered and would make impulsive inappropriate spending decisions online, and his attitude about life was extremely negative. But this was our situation and I accepted it until one day I didn’t. I was not willing to just “exist” for the sake of the relationship without having any purpose or meaning any longer. I had finally hit the limit where I wanted more for myself than I was getting.

On to the life of single parenting. I was still scrubbing toilets but felt I could be utilizing my background in physical education to open my own children’s fitness business. I think I was motivated to make such a big bold move by watching Shark Tank. I always wanted to be my own boss, as I hated answering to people, but complied most of the time because that’s what good girls do. Additionally, I admired my mother as an entrepreneur. I mean, she was super successful and had managed to put us through private school and college as a real estate agent. In her office one day, consulting with her about my lack of growth in my business, her secretary had given her a paper on a rental lead to follow up with. She literally took the lead, crumbled it up, and tossed it in the garbage.

I exclaimed, “What are you doing? That’s a lead, which you could convert. Why did you throw it away?”

“I don’t have time for rentals. I’m way too busy working with buyers and sellers,” she said.

Well, I had the time, so I told myself, “OK, go get your real estate license.”

I picked up the phone right then and there and enrolled in the course. I completed it in three months and became licensed in December 2012. I wasn’t going to fail again and felt supported in my decision. It really felt right, which catapulted my quest for top producer in real estate. I was eager and hungry—I mean literally. My daughter and I began our game to find the best brand of macaroni and cheese out there.

I managed to start in real estate just working with the renters, which ran me ragged, and in New York, I was getting my workout climbing up and down stairs, but I appreciated the knowledge and learning curve in how to navigate through a transaction. It also allowed for opportunities to make mistakes without costing me too much. It was a natural learning curve.

Dealing with renters also gave me experience in talking and communicating what I was trying to say. I was always the “shy one,” as Mom had always explained. It ultimately became me—who I identified with—and I took on the personality and made it my own. But in hindsight, I was always deep in thought, consistently observing people’s behavior and analyzing their actions and reactions. It was observing in my early childhood that led me to be a very talented athlete. By analyzing people, I became calculated and could anticipate a change, a shift in the decision-making process of my opponent. I was so good at it that I earned a full athletic scholarship to college. The combination of my background in sports, basketball and softball, and as a physical education teacher as well as my ability to be agile and anticipate the reactions of others was the perfect combination for real estate sales.

The chaotic nature of real estate brought out the athlete in me, as I could pivot and turn, adjust and adapt, and think on the spot for any objection a prospect would shoot my way. Swish! It was a slam dunk every time.

But I was never home. My daughter was that latchkey kid. She learned how to make her own mac and cheese with some one-on-one FaceTime. And soon, it was scrambled eggs, and at one point, I think I walked her through baking chicken in the oven. She became the chef of the house.

We were lucky enough to have a roof over our heads for minimal rent—at Mom’s house. So, I was working with mom, living with her in her house, and of course we would travel together to go see family. To say this didn’t put a strain on the spiritual bonding of a mother-daughter relationship is being kind. She was consistently the parent at home and at work and I was consistently the child, a mere eight years old, whenever we had any business or family related conversation. Over that period, we must’ve broken up our business partnership at least twenty times. But our teamed-up business was really doing well.

That’s right: I had moved up to putting chicken on the table.

We always said to prospects that I did the walking and she did the talking, which I didn’t mind because I lost twenty pounds. But it wasn’t the walking that helped me lose and keep off all those boxes of macaroni and cheese I had eaten. It was the feel good of making my own money, out-right owning my own car, and earning the trust of clients on my own. I was an entrepreneur. Making my own decisions and leading my business in the direction I wanted it to go.

I loved the freedom real estate allowed for me. I could come and go as I pleased, work or not work at my own pace, without having some administrator or supervisor at my back requesting my lesson plans and then critiquing them with his red pen and making me revise them to his standards. Most of my working years were spent as a physical education teacher in both the public and private school settings for ten years, and I developed empathy for my students. I truly enjoyed watching them grow, but I was never quite felt comfortable teaching, and raising other people’s children was simply weird. Moreover, I liked to teach lessons my way, no matter what red ink was scribbled across my page. I hated that some admin would tell me what I needed in my classroom when he was there to observe for forty-five minutes one day in a180-day school year.

As an agent I was working hard all the time. There wasn’t a day I missed, and I knew I was earning the respect of my father, for he believed that working hard will get you places. The harder you work, the further in life you will go. He worked his butt off, all the time. So much so that he never attended any of my athletic games or school events. I could see I was the same way as my father, working about ten- to twelve-hour days, seven days a week. It didn’t matter when someone rang my phone, I was there to answer it, and I was there to show a house no matter what that interrupted in my life. It was completely random and chaotic, yet I also thrived in the chaos of real estate—the random people and interactions with others. No matter what time of day—late at night or early in the morning—there is always someone I could talk to about real estate. It literally took over my life. The videos I was watching, the coaches I was listening to, the seminars I was attending—I was spending a lot of money listening to other people talk about real estate. But I couldn’t get enough of it. I wanted more, and I knew I was meant for more.

My personality likes the quick rewards, and the money I was making wasn’t quick enough as I wanted it, which is why I dove headfirst even further. No matter what the circumstances were or who was hurt, or what family birthday party or anniversary wedding was missed, there was always a reason to put these family events aside. That reason was real estate and that I had to make money. I had to put food on the table. I had to support my daughter. Money was the main objective—it was my only means to survive. I mean, I had lived without money after my husband’s accident, and that was difficult, it was hurtful, and it was so much pain and so much disgrace not being able to provide for my family. I withdrew from life—from the essence of my being.

During this time, my body ached on a consistent basis. Each night I would attend to my daughter and read books to her. I loved that time we would spend quietly together. But instead of a reading routine, I would fall asleep in my daughter’s bed all the time and could barely make it through A Fly Went By. I constantly had a numbing in my ears, and I was seeing a chiropractor at least once a week.

My business stagnated over the next year or so, and I was making somewhere between $50,000 and $70,000 annually. It was good money, I didn’t have too many bills, and I was able to put some chicken on the table. But I wanted more. I wanted to be successful, and I didn’t feel successful with me earning this much money. I was still working part time scrubbing toilet bowls for some extra cash as well. I knew if I could transition to a full-time agent, I could really earn $100,000, even the possibility of more, but I didn’t know how to do it. I didn’t have the means or the skills or the time. I definitely had the desire, but it wasn’t happening. I could see what other agents were doing, but I didn’t have the past clients like they had. I didn’t have the ability to speak to people in a meaningful way like they did. Their experience brought them to where they were, and I was only in the business for a short period time.

I kept thinking, If I could just earn more money, my problems would be solved. I would be able to put steak on the table as opposed to chicken. I could see my chiropractor twice a week as opposed to just once. My relationships would be cohesive, and I would be able to move out of my mother’s ho...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Chapter 1 Spin You Around, Blurry—Puddle of Mudd
• Chapter 2 Follow You Down—Shinedown
• Chapter 3 Show Me How to Live—Audioslave
• Chapter 4 Open My Eyes—Buckcherry
• Chapter 5 One Step Closer—Linkin Park
• Chapter 6 Sold Me—Seether
• Chapter 7 Light My Way—Audioslave
• Chapter 8 Simple Design—Breaking Benjamin
• Chapter 9 What’s This Life For—Creed
• Chapter 10 Money Talks—AC/DC
• Chapter 11 Unchained—Van Halen
• Chapter 12 Ladies Come First—Hinder
• Acknowledgments
• Thank You
• About the Author