Wait… This Is Part of Being a Realtor?!
Episode notes
Not My Job… But Have I Done It?
Real estate looks polished from the outside. Nice houses, beautiful listing photos, closings and champagne.
Behind the scenes? Realtors are moving furniture, cleaning cat litter, pulling weeds, checking vacant homes before a freeze, dealing with contractors, looking for missing keys and talking clients through some of the most emotional moments of their lives.
In this episode of The Counter Offer, Meredith Alderson and Jenny Kim are talking about everything Realtors do that is definitely NOT in the job description, but somehow becomes part of the job anyway.
They share stories about maintaining vacant listings, saving showings at the last minute, inspecting sewer lines in nice clothes, keeping pools clean, babysitting, dealing with pets and all the other incredibly random things that happen when you work in residential real estate.
But the bigger conversation is about boundaries.
When does going above and beyond become too much? How accessible should you be to your clients? How do you know when something is outside your expertise? And when does doing everything yourself stop being great service and start holding back your business?
Meredith and Jenny talk about the emotional role Realtors play during divorce, death, negotiations and other major life changes, along with why agents sometimes need to protect their clients from the unnecessary drama happening behind the scenes of a transaction.
They also get into setting expectations early, learning to say no, staying in your lane when it comes to lending or legal advice, managing vendor referrals and knowing when it’s finally time to hire help.
Meredith shares one of the biggest lessons she’s learned while growing her business: never scale backward. Once you build the people, systems and processes that give you the capacity to grow, removing them every time business slows down can make it almost impossible to reach the next level.
Then they wrap things up with a rapid-fire game of “Not My Job… But Have I Done It?”
Dog poop, couches, toilets, weeds, lost keys, babysitting, bugs, trash, pets and plenty more.
If you’re an agent, you probably have your own list.
ABOUT THE COUNTER OFFER
The Counter Offer is hosted by Austin real estate agents Meredith Alderson and Jenny Kim, two top-producing agents having honest conversations about business, real estate, entrepreneurship, lifestyle and what really happens behind the deals.
FOLLOW THE HOSTS
Meredith Alderson Instagram: @meredithalderson.heyday
Jenny Kim Instagram: @jennykimatx
Produced, written and edited by Adam Walding.