Is running your real estate business affecting your mental health? A business that truly hums is one of the most powerful ways to support your mental wellness and ensure that you’re feeling on top of your game.
So if you’re tired of being at the mercy of the twists and turns of the property market, join industry experts Sherrie Storor and Kristen Porter for our upcoming webinar, where they will reveal the Blueprint for Real Estate Success.
Sherrie Storor, a razor-sharp coaching powerhouse and one of Australia’s most experienced and accomplished real estate trainers, and Kristen Porter, founder and legal strategist of O*NO Legal, combine their expertise to deliver actionable strategies to reduce the stress in your business and maximise both your own performance and the performance of your team.
Join us to learn:
Learn proven success strategies to scale your business
How to effectively and profitably build a dream team and EBU (Effective Business Unit)
Effective recruitment and retention strategies to grow your sales and property management teams
Learn which method you should be using to increase the value of the rent roll asset - organic growth or acquire and buy and where to find them
Exit – preparing for the future - whether it be 20 years or 6 months
Rise Wellness Webinars are brought to you by MRI Software.
Sherrie: Wonderful. Thank you so much. Kylie and I speak for both of us when we say we are super pumped to be here, because it is all really about how we can give back. And I think that's what is so wonderful about the Rise initiative. So today, we want to give you a little snapshot into what the real estate principles ministry is all about. So, as Kylie said, this is your playbook for success. So we want to show you how to successfully grow, scale and exit your business.
So, as Kylie said, and again, don't be scared. Jump into the chat, tell us which marketplace you work in, and why you are here today because you're gonna get as much out of this webinar as what you put into it. So the more that you communicate with us, and tell us any questions. Let us know where you're at. We might be able to personalise it a little bit more.
So so Canberra Kristen's telling us that she's in Canberra, which is awesome. I'm from I'm in the Gold Coast today. So yes, so let us know that you are here. We'd love to chat with you now. Oh, John Cunningham! Hello! So he's on the Northern beaches. Sydney. Mackay. So thank you so much for for letting us know that you are here now, at the end of today's session, you are going to have learned exactly the certified strategies to scale your business and why you need to build your dream team and then exactly how to do it.
How to build effective recruitment and retention strategies to grow your sales and your property management teams and which method you should be using to increase the value of your rent roll. So whether that be organic growth, or whether it be to acquire and buy, and if that's the case, and where to find them. And then, finally, how to create a plan for your future, so whether that be legacy or exit, and whether that be in the short term, or whether it be in the long term.
So at the end there will be a QA. So you guys don't seem like a chatty lot. But we are here to answer your questions, so please pop them into the chat. If you have any questions, and we will most certainly either answer them along the way, or we'll come back to them at the very end. Now there'll also be an exclusive offer on a big project that Kristen and I have been working on. So, Kristen, do you want to take over and share with us a little bit about the real estate Principles, Ministry Framework?
Kristen: Absolutely and welcome everyone. There's a few familiar names. So Hi, I've always like a good framework. I'm a visual type of person and the real estate. Principles, ministry framework that Sherrie and I have created. And I think this is actually the 1st time we were unveiling. It is actually today, this, this framework.
So we've broken it up just into 2 simple sections, helping you scale your business so that you can then have that profitable and hopefully uneventful exit. So to scale, we always look at, you know, implementing advanced growth strategies. Because usually by now you're pretty good at the basic growth strategies. We're looking at some more advanced strategies for you, scaling your team, and of course expanding with mergers and acquisitions, which is my specialty.
Secondly, we then go into the second phase which is really looking at your exit, so determining the right exit strategy for you so that you know we can increase the value of your agency with your succession plan. So that you can then execute that seamless exit. And so, you know, we will talk a little bit more in detail in a little bit. But we won't have time to dive into all 6 of those elements today. But we wanted to give you a basic understanding of the framework.
Now, the things we are looking at today is a kind of your structure, and we'll go through that in a little bit and we'll share some what? What we've learned from working with some very successful agencies. And of course we'll touch a tiny bit on exit and value.
Sherrie: So Kristen, we like working with so many of our clients, we hear all the problems. But the funny thing is that they seem to be all the same kind of problems. And so this is problem number one, that we probably hear the most, which is that people are complaining about being chained and stuck in their business. So if you are here and you are feeling like this, you're feeling stuck in the day to day running of the business and actually thought that owning an agency will give you time to spend, you know, doing the things that you love with the people that you love and having holidays and working less. But instead, you are chained to the business, and you can't actually take any of those things, or much time off at all.
You may have also dreamt that your agency would provide you with income, cash flow, and a retirement plan, but instead, all of your earnings are going straight back into the business and actually covering your costs.
Now, here's the second problem that we see, and it is so hard to get great people. And then once we've got them and they've got, you know, the right values. They're a wonderful fit for the culture, and they certainly very, very good at their job. You know we tend to see that you've trained them up, but then they may leave because they may have been money offered more money elsewhere, and your competitors, then end up reaping the rewards of all of your hard work, and also having the benefit of your IP. So Kristen, problem number 3.
Kristen: Yeah, so this is a really interesting one. And it's probably more a mistaken belief than necessarily a problem. And that is that a higher number of clients always means your business is worth more. But the truth is, whilst having a substantial client base is really beneficial. It's the quality, and not necessarily the quantity, especially if you have a rent roll. And so a smaller client base with long term, high value and even diverse relationships, can actually be more valuable in the long run.
And then so if we go to the next problem that we see is that often when we get to the other end. That exit side. People sometimes think improving the financial performance just before Sale will help you maximise that value. But the truth is, it can take quite a long time to get that value up. And we're going to talk today about how your agency is valued. And some little tips and tricks on how to increase that value without necessarily having to add more properties, or necessarily do more work, which I think is pretty cool. But we'll get into that detail in a minute.
And so you know the answer to these problems that we've been seeing. And this is why Sherry and I have joined together is to grow, scale and exit, but also to simplify the process, because sometimes we think of growth and scaling as these massive mountains, we need to climb. And it's not necessarily that we have to scale Everest all at once. If that makes sense and exit a lot of people especially if they've never sold a business before, which is most people think it's this scary thing in the future that they just like to put off a bit like, you know your wills and your powers of attorney, those sorts of things you think I'll just think about that one day.
And so the 1st thing we look at? Oh, no, I'm doing my introduction apologies. I'm Kristen, I'm I'm Kristen, and for those of you that don't know me. I help real estate agency principals just like you to shield your assets to future proof. Your relationships expand faster and plan your exit so that you can increase the value of your agency whilst having that peace of mind that your ass is actually covered, because I am a lawyer at the other end of the day. So today, what? What, what sort of things do I do? Well, I'm a lawyer, and I run my law firm on illegal known as the real estate agents, lawyer. I'm also a marketer and business strategist, and I'm just about to launch my new marketing business innovate marketing, which I'm super excited about.
Some of you. I know done some keynote speaking with, and we've done some presenting. And webinars, also have an online template store so that we can make legal services more accessible to the industry. And in my spare time I travel, read mostly business books, hatch chickens, and actually, at the moment, don't have on that slide. But we're lambing. I I live on a live on a property with my in-laws and our lambs. We had the 1st lambs of the season started last week, so I get to cuddle those very little creatures, too.
Sherrie: I love it so, yes, this is me. I'm Sherrie. So let me do my intro. So like Kristen, I do help real estate agents by implementing proven sales, systems and structures, helping them to leverage their listing sales and results, build their celebrity profiles, build high performing teams and ebus. And yes, I am going to be letting you in on this today whilst making more profit and working less. So essentially. What I do is, I help, you know real estate agents make the journey from being a solo agent to a team leader, and then to going on and being the CEO of their own business.
So I help business owners create a saleable and sustainable business, one that they are not chained to by creating a portfolio of profitable divisions and business partnerships by building out their executive leadership teams and 90% of my coaching clients have doubled triple quadrupled their income revenue and commission, also that they knew that they could, you know, enjoy life of wealth and freedom, one that they knew that they deserved.
So today, like Kristen, I do lots of keynote speaking. I just got back from Cairns working with the team at Langan Simmons and champions in real estate. I also am a presenter of the build your best life podcast which has got loads and loads of really inspirational interviews with agents talking honestly about how they, you know, encountered their success and what it took to get there. I also produce online digital tools, such as letter packs, blueprints and toolkits.
I also have a whole lot of online courses. And I also host Mastermind with Sherry, which by far is probably my most soulful thing that I do where it's a closed container, with about 30 agents and business owners, who fly in every single month, and we've got our very next one or our last one for 2024 in about 2 weeks time.
So let's get straight into it. And we want to talk about growing your, be your vision and basically growing your business. It does require for you to have a really clear vision of what exactly that's going to look like for you. So I tend to find that this is a bit of a stumbling block for most business owners, because often we're in the day to day of the business that very rarely do I see people step back and actually have a big holistic look at the business and have a look at what actually they want to achieve with owning a business. So that is step number one. You need to set that clear vision for yourself.
Now, once you've done that, it's about determining the right strategies in order to achieve your vision. So once we've got the strategy. We then need to break it down into workable goals, and then we communicate this to our team.
So again, often I will see that the business owner will have made these decisions, but then haven't communicated it to anyone in the business. So this tends to be, then this kind of disconnect where there is, the business owner is frustrated because they're trying to move the needle forward. But the sales team or the executive leadership team actually has no idea kind of what's going on. So we need to communicate this. And this needs to go right down to absolutely everybody in the business, including, you know, the receptionist at the very front.
Now, once we've got the goals, we then break it down into a plan of implementation. Now this includes timelines, deadlines, and early lines, and we break it down into projects and to tasks. So you might have a project which might have a hundred tasks. So you know, over the course of 12 months. You might be doing those tasks week by week, you know, month by month. So it is about moving the needle forward slowly, but certainly and of course there's no point doing all of this. If we're not tracking that, we're actually doing and moving that needle forward. So it's really important to hold your team accountable and make sure that we are tracking the team's progress.
Now, once we have done this and we've set our vision, our strategy, our goals, our communication, our implementation and tracking. We really have to have you know this all in it together. Mentality. There's got to be absolute unity and clarity on it. So we have this long term focus. But we have short term goals. And it is about understanding who is doing what in the team. And again, who is holding them accountable to make sure that we are, in fact, moving forward.
Now, step 2 is about scaling your business and scaling your business does require strategies that are proven to work, not will this work, you know, hit and miss? We want to use things that are absolutely guaranteed that are going to move your business forward and one of these proven strategies is scaling your business through the use of using effective business units, or, as we call them if you use. In fact, Kristen, you call them different names right? But they they're the same thing. I use enterprise, business unit or effective business unit. Same thing. Yeah, same thing. Same right?
Kristen: Same thing.
Sherrie: So in a typical Ebu. And listen, I just want to be really clear here. Full disclosure. This is, you know, the baseline. There are so many different ways that you can formulate an effective business unit. But this is the one that typically we sort of see. Now, you know, we're talking about having a lead agent who is the team leader, a personal assistant who is cleaning up and doing all the paperwork, and then a Co. Agent who is dealing with all of the buyers, making sure that you know the marketing is being done correctly, and so forth. Now, I don't want to get too controversial in our very short time today. But what I do want to mention is that, depending on where you're at in your business, you might just have one person who's in your team. You might be hoping to put on a team. You might actually have 2 or 3 Co. Agents. You might have a VA to assist your PA. So you know there are many different forms of this, but this is just taking it through in terms of what we see as as the typical, and I guess, probably the most common.
Big question here, Kristen, why do we build an effective business unit?
Kristen: Well, I mean there's so there's so many, so many reasons to. And I might just take a little step back for those that have never even really heard of the term. And obviously we've got that diagram Sherrie. It's really a business within a business as well. So it's essentially using contractors or conjunctional agents for want of a better term. But you're helping someone else build a business within your business. And you know there are so many benefits of using this, and I know Sherrie and I helped a lot of people set these up, and it's how many ways can you skin a cat. There's so many ways you can do it so it can be tailored for you and your circumstances. But the the main benefits that I've been seeing with our clients. That implement this strategy is, you know, it can be specialisation. Now, this isn't necessary, but if you're a bigger business and you wanted to have people ever specialising in different areas, or say projects versus you know, established. It's a really really good way of setting up the specialisations. Or you might want to have a commercial division or someone servicing luxury properties.
For example, it can also be really efficient, because with specialisation, I find comes efficiency. So your teams can become experts in what they do and who they serve. They can understand the ins and outs which leads to, you know, faster and more effective service, and honestly, a better client experience for your clients.
Now, this is the big one scalability and it's a term that gets thrown around a lot. But we're focusing, you know, on your clients, and as your business grows, Edu's make it really easy to scale and to scale faster. So you can add new units by the different markets or services, or just because you're growing and it can also ensure that you're not having to outlay huge amounts of capital to expand, which I think is really attractive.
As the head of the Edu is their own business owner within that larger business of yours. So they're not your employees. They're the contractors or conjunctional agents like we said and they get paid when you get paid. Essentially. So. That's another really attractive part of the model flexibility, of course, as well. Because I find people that have Ebu set up can respond faster to market changes or market pressures. You know, if one market slows down you can shift your focus to other markets. But Sherrie might talk more about that a little bit later. But one of the biggest things we've seen, too, is just also that employee satisfaction so often people in ebus because they're a business within your business. They feel more connected and engaged. Because they're building something for themselves as well.
The the next question I actually get asked, and I know Sherrie gets asked this, too, is the one you can see on your screen. So when do I use an Ebu? When is the right time. Am I big enough? Am I too big? Am I too small? So here's just the questions I'd get you to start to think about. So here are a few signs that it's the right time if you're in a growth stage. So if your agency is growing and you're finding it hard to keep up, especially under one umbrella. So that's another. That's kind of the one of the 1st signs.
If you're in a really complex market that's another sign that you may need people with certain specialities. Team expertise can really come into it as well. So if you've got team members with specialised skills. So, for example, I've got a client that I helped set this kind of arrangement up for recently. Because they really wanted to also get into the projects. You know off the plan market, and they thought by having a specific Ebu because we we had an agent that really wanted to lead it and create something of their own and to stop them leaving. We had them create an Ebu and then really target and brand them as specialists in the project space. And so far it's been really, it's been quite lucrative for them so far. So that's been quite special to see. Again the client feedback. That client satisfaction of your clients to know that you're targeted in on them. Your team is fully focused. Instead of being spread across the whole business. You're really focused on. You know that client experience engagement. And of course, the thing that we hear a lot about and Sherrie is going to go into much more detail is the Hr attraction and retention.
I'm not sure about you, but I think everyone on this call is probably having some issues in this space. I know every business I talk to certainly is so with the real estate. You know. Talent, war at the moment. It is really hard to recruit, attract and retain talent, and so, being able to offer your team or someone that you'd like to bring in the ability to build their own business within your business. It can be really sensitive to those team members who are actually motivated by that type of thing. Not everyone wants to build their own business, I think, as business owners, we assume everyone does, but it's not the case. But this way you can actually try to keep people in your business without bringing them in as a business partner at this level, but they can actually build their own thing. Sherrie, do you see a lot of that as well.
Sherrie: Yeah, absolutely 100%. I think. You know, Ebus, we've been hearing for a long time. Now that you do need to have teams within your business. So it's not a new concept. But I think you know what is the unknown is. People don't really know how to build them or really, what is the true benefit of it? So thank you so much for taking the time to to go through that. And I think if you're a lead agent building your own Ebu, and there will be a few people in here who, I think, are probably lead agents and not necessarily selling principles or business owners, but it really does give the lead agent this opportunity to increase their revenue and gci their productivity, and the number of sales, and it does give sustainability and longevity for all members of the team so often. I see that I'll have, you know, a high performing agent who's out there, and they're absolutely killing it. They might be running a million dollars in Gci. They might be running 2 million or 4 million or 6 million, or whatever the number is, but they can only do it for a year or 2 years, or 3 years, and then literally, they they kind of combust, and they, they almost sort of burn out. And it's really sad. And I think this is why, you know, rise is such an important initiative, because a mental health is so important.
So actually, you end up making a lot more money if you create a model that is sustainable over a number of years. So as the lead agent. They are then able to focus on what they do best, which is listing more properties, so their PA will come in behind them at the back end and sort of clean up. Take care of all the paperwork, you know. Do all the organising and so forth.
Now the co Agents role. And I said I was going to stay away from being controversial. But I'm perhaps gonna lay it all out here. Often in our industry. We do hear that. You know the co-Agents responsibility is to really list properties. I do disagree with that, and the reason for that is because if they were able to do it. Why would they be working, you know, for the lead agent? They would be out there, being their own lead agent.
So the best thing that we can do is really teach the co-Agent. You know how to do transactions, to get experience in the sale and to work with the buyers to work with launching the properties and listen. Obviously, we do have very strong and clear job descriptions, and we won't have time to go through all of them today, but that is really crystal and clear. We do want them to find potential listing opportunities. So when they are leveraging around the listings and calling around the neighbourhood and letting everyone know that we've just, you know, listed a property, or we've just put one under contract. You know, this is really an opportunity to say, by the way, do you know of anyone else who's thinking about selling? So they will find the opportunities in those ways from callbacks, from open homes and so forth. But you know, I really do think it's important that we do not put too much pressure on these co-Agents, and often to. Then the lead agent becomes quite frustrated, because the coagent isn't really pulling their weight. But the reality is they do not actually have the skill set to bring in listings, so to speak.
So if you're here and you're a selling principle. Firstly, can I just say hats off to you, because, being a selling principle is actually the hardest role in this whole entire industry that we have. You are trying to juggle everything from, you know, running a business from the operations side to making sure that all of your staff are okay. You know your whole sales team, your property management, and then also make maintaining your own team and your Ebu plus all of your buyers and sellers. Right? All of your vendors.
So you know it does give you an opportunity. If you're a selling prince principle to continue listing and selling, but actually increase your gci and your volume of properties sold. So this is actually possible because we want one plus one plus one, not to equal 3, but actually to equal 5. So this will, you know, increase our volume. It will increase our Gci, but it will also free up our time to oversee the running of the business.
So you know, this is really imperative, because you should be spending time with your team, whether that be your property management team or your sales division just depending on how you've got your executive leadership team set up, or if you don't have one, because you're still quite boutique. But you need to be hands on in the business overseeing the business. You are responsible for that, and the reason why people are there working with you is because they love you. You know they've joined the business for you. You are the visionary, and they want to learn from you now. It also gives you an opportunity to grow your co-Agents working within the Ebu into lead agents into selling agents, so these agents will then embody your values. There'll be a great cultural fit. They will understand your systems, your procedures, your Crm. And they will be professional because they have learned from you, they would have got the experience, and they will then be able to go on and to build their own team of, you know, within within your team, so they'll be able to build their own ebus.
So, as Kristen said, you know, the goal here is ideally to have multiple. Edu's operating within your business. So you've essentially got all these little businesses within businesses. And so for you as the business owner, the benefits are more revenue, because these teams are writing more, because collectively, they're able to do more together. And we should have systems and processes for that more on that shortly.
But you know you also as the business owner, you have got less people to manage because essentially the team leader is managing them on a day to day basis. So you are still responsible for them.
But you know, on a day to day you've got somebody else who is their direct leader and manager. So you also have a guaranteed pipeline of lead agents. So the Co. Agents are going to grow through and become lead agents in your business, and they will then go on to build their own ebus.
So the biggest challenge that we actually have with growing Ebus is actually the lead agent and their mindset, because they have become very, very successful in doing what they're doing today, and so letting go of what got them to here to understand, to you know where to get to. That next sort of level is really critical and quite imperative. And we've all heard that saying, what got you here? What isn't going to get you there but it's really hard to do in practicality. So we do need to take them on the journey. That no longer is it just their job to list, sell, and negotiate, but to list, sell, negotiate, and manage. So to really kind of, you know, have those one on ones with their team members and to do those daily catch up. So this is, you know, really critical. And this is a massive, massive agent. Fail that I see.
So the roles and the expectations of each team member is that we do want to have, you know, all parties within the team completely self-sufficient. And we want to create this self regulating team.
So essentially, what that means is, we don't want the lead agent to be micromanaging everybody. We want every person in the team, whether they be the Co. Agent or the PA or the PA to really understand what their role is, and instead of having to go back to the lead agent 100 times a day on text or emails, or on Whatsapp, or what have you, you know, but actually understand that they can make some decisions for themselves.
So it does take time to get to that. But that's obviously what we're looking for. We're looking for somebody who is empowered in their role, is a problem solver and able to make those decisions. And so if you've got a co-agent who's not pulling up their socks. You want, you know, your PA to really put pressure on them and to create that self regulation. And so I see these, you know, in my teams, whether they be 3 or 5, or even 7, where, you know, if somebody's not pulling their weight, they either shape up pretty quickly, or they, or they literally shape out. So that's really what we're looking for.
So in building our team structures and positions. And again, it's really important that we do have job descriptions. But it does look different for every single Ebu depending on the people in the Ebu, and also the quantity of people within that Ebu. So we want to build out exactly what those roles are, and we want to create a ideal week for the whole team, which then has an ideal week for each team member.
And so the ideal week is not a new concept for any of us. But essentially, you know, it is really different because we've got different roles. So we've got somebody who's really in there every single day, who's confirming appointments? Who is, you know, building out Cmas to a Co. Agent who might be prospecting. So it does look quite different.
We want to also ensure that we've got a really clear understanding of how to communicate with each other very effectively. So you know, the best thing that you can do is have one on one meetings with your team members, and often they are able to park a lot of their issues and bring it up in that weekly one on one which is really great.
So the responsibilities and the roles they need to be clarified, or else you're going to have issues and banter within the team and not positive banter, but argumentative kind of banter, when no one's kind of knowing who does what and and sort of, you know, everyone wanting to take that responsibility which leads to double up of work. It leads to, you know, miscommunication, unhappiness, and also a loss of productivity. So we want the people in our business to be accountable to us, to the business and to each other. and we want to be forward planning.
So you know, often real estate. It's a very chaotic kind of, you know, business day to day, and that leads to, you know, to adrenal fatigue for many of us, and to burnout. So instead, what we want to do is we want to be as forward planning as much as we can. So we want to set deadlines and early lines. So if I can give an example of this, if you have put a property under contract.
And you know, let's say, that there is a finance clause, or various different clauses there to make it go unconditional, or on its way through to exchange. Then what we want to do is we want to actually diarise what those deadlines are. But we actually want to put an early line in, you know, a few days beforehand, just checking in so that we can actually communicate them. That then, with the vendors and the sellers. So it's about having this early line and deadline mentality.
Another example of this is sending out a newsletter. So if you send out a newsletter weekly, my recommendation is 5 o'clock at on a Tuesday afternoon. By the way, but I would recommend that, you know we don't just start working on that, you know, midday on Tuesday we actually start working on that newsletter the previous week, so that, you know on a Friday everything is kind of set. We can then schedule it so that, you know, on Tuesday, if you know, all is hitting the fan. If there's problems, if we're going out where you know we're doing deals and so forth. And of course, those things need to come 1st that we don't lose the consistency of sending out the newsletter. Does that make sense. So we don't want to be working chaotically.
And of course, I've mentioned one on ones. But doing a daily catch up with your team is also really critical, making sure that they're empowered in terms of what they want to achieve that day. But then, also, you, you know, mentioning what it is. And what's important to you on that daily basis. So we should be having lots and lots of systems and processes. And listen. You know, Kristen and I could talk about this all day because we are very system orientated.
But you these, I guess, is kind of a bit of a snapshot in terms of how to run your Ebu and the things that we should have a system for. So you know, that is, from listings you know every single listing right through, to sold from open homes, to how to handle inquiries, to auctions, to having a marketing plan from an annual point of view to monthly to weekly same thing with your community plan. You know what to do. Pre and post settlements, making sure that you've got processes for that. You should have processes and consistency when it comes to sending out your letters and also having templates put into your Crm for your email. So that is really pretty cool and you know that is such a saver when it comes to time.
Now, here are, you know, the 42 templates from a sales business point of view that you absolutely need to have. So you know, there is a combination of buy email templates, auction seller, email templates, pipeline sellers. And there's a couple of of tenant ones there, too. So if you want to take a snapshot of this, do it now right?
So once we've kind of done all this. We've got a great functioning team. We really want to make sure that you know we are recruiting well, that we are paying well, and that we are retaining. Well, like this is really the key to the business. So you know, recruiting. Well, it will see you take time out of your business, and you will need to slow down to speed up. It's a very dollar productive, you know, Job, within the within the business, but if you recruit the wrong person. It's going to cost you dearly, right? So we want to make sure that we're recruiting. Well, so you need to have a system for recruiting, and also for nurturing people to come along, because you might know you might be working in a smaller regional area, and you might know, hey, listen, heroes don't grow on trees, but you know you know the right person who you would love to come and work with you. But it might be a process of 6 months, or 2 years, or 5 years or longer to get them to come on board with you. So it's really important to kind of nurture that process.
You should have a process for interviewing, for onboarding them, and we want to make sure that we don't burn people out again. I just want to come back to the mentality behind rise is that it is about having, you know, mental health and wellness. We want to make sure that we've got people who are in our business for the long term. Because, let me tell you, that will make a huge difference to the profitability of your business and pay them really well. So they don't leave so that they don't go to their competitors, because not everyone will come and speak up. Some people will literally, just, you know, find a better option, and they will leave without even giving you that chance.
So I wanted to give you a little takeaway today, Chris and I was saying, what can we? What can we give that provides massive value? So this is a a template that I have with the 39 questions that you need to ask when interviewing. So I'm going to give you a little QR code that you can actually download this. So this will take you to my my website. So it it takes you through the processes from getting to know them.
Your company in position, you know whether or not they are the right fit for your business, you know, making sure you're answering their questions because they should certainly have questions and what the next steps are. So just tell me in the chat if you want me to stay on this slide. Otherwise I'm going to keep moving forward. So that is a really great resource. But I do want to add a disclaimer, because this template that I've given you is actually perfect for recruiting administration and support for your executive leadership team, because there's a little bonus there for recruiting leaders, property managers and Bdms and agents who are moving into the area. So not necessarily for agents who are working in your, you know, precinct today, because those ultimate agents they don't typically have resumes and they typically don't apply for roles. So you've got to really outsource them and have coffees with them. You know their resume is really the sales scoreboard.
So onboarding well, as we mentioned earlier, it really is your key to retention and to growth. So don't just bring them in and say, there's the desk, and there's the phone, which is, you know, we talk about. That's what's been happening in our industry for a really long time. We need to make sure that they really do understand your systems and your procedures.
It's a great opportunity for you, because if you're bringing somebody into your business who has been, you know, in the industry. They would have a lot of friends, and they will tell those friends about that really positive experience. So at the beginning, it's the honeymoon, and everyone's really happy. We want to make sure that what you promised them in the in the recruitment interview was actually what they're going to be getting, because they will work out pretty quickly if that is not not actually the case. So step 3. Kristen. Do you want to take us through this?
Kristen: Yes, absolutely. So you know, we're really talking also today about preparing for the future and preparing for the future. You know, it starts with understanding the value of your agency so that you can work to improve it and to increase that value without necessarily having to increase your workload. So I'm going to take you through some numbers. So bear with me. Some of you. I know we've already spoken about valuation and multiple. So bear with me for those that haven't heard me talk about this before.
So when we're talking about valuing an agency, most of the value is in the rent roll. So that's really what we're talking about today. So we've spoken a lot about sales. So far, we're really pivoting more to talking about the value of your rent roll. So the valuation is based on something that's called the multiple. And so the valuation is a very important part of any process, because a potential buyer will ask you straight up how much? It's usually the 1st question. So if you're wanting to bring in a business partner or you're selling, that's the 1st question they're going to ask. And so it's really important that the valuations done properly. But then you understand how you can actually get the value up.
And so the multiplier, which I'll go through in a minute to all the different factors that go into the multiplier. But the when you're buying the same rent roll to make sure that you're not miscalculating or overpaying or not receiving enough value. It all comes down to this magical number that we call the multiple. So the actual value of the rent roll is usually determined by this magical number times the annual management fees.
And so you can see an example there on your screen. So, for example, let's just say your management fees are $148,680. Thank you for my team for making things very specific for me. There, and let's say your multiple is 2.8 5. Then you can see what the value you're sitting on is there? Sherrie? If we go to the next slide, we can show everyone what goes into making up that magical number that you saw on the screen that 2.8 5.
It really depends where you're located, because each market's different, a bit like property prices. It's going to be different between Sydney and say where I'm originally from Armidale, New South Wales. Very different values in property prices and very different multiples for rent rolls.
And so how can we get a different multiple? Sometimes the multiple might be 2, sometimes it's 4.5. Huge differences, then in the value. So what do we need to look at? So what you can see on the screen? I'll walk through. Each point is what the valuers look at. It's what a buyer is going to look at as well. So we look at the averages, average of rents. And your management income, your management fee, management terms. So your form sixes, or your nias, whatever it's called in your jurisdiction. Your authorities. How long is left to run on those? What authority is given to you as an agent. What is your percentage? Of your management fee?
This next one's quite interesting, the portfolio location and desirability. So where are the properties located in reference to the office and in reference to the other properties in the portfolio. So this one is important because it turns to how much it actually can cost to run your portfolio if you've got your property managers driving all over the city, for example, for inspections rather than being in one tightly held area or suburb. It's obviously going to be less efficient for them to be driving an hour or 2 for inspections and things like that.
The ratio. Now, the ratio of number of landlords, owners to the number of properties under management. So this is what we talked about in those mistakes earlier that people often make so many people think that if you've got an owner that's got, say, a hundred properties that that's a good thing. Yes, it might make it easier for you to run your portfolio. However, these multi owners can be a risk to a buyer, so what I mean by that is, I had a portfolio recently who one owner actually had 20% of the properties in the portfolio. So that's a huge risk to the buyer of this rent roll. If that one person leaves 20% of portfolio just walks out the door. So in that situation, often the multi owners will be given a lower multiple to take into account that risk. So for this particular one, the main rent roll was multiple. The multiple was, I think, 3.5. This multi owner. The buyer paid 1.5 times because of that level of risk. So whilst you don't want to turn owners away, it's just something to note and to remember. When you're coming to, you know, selling or handing over to someone else the relationships again, really important. And we all know that relationships underpin all of our businesses as service providers. It's the whole lifeblood of our business and those close relationships work really well. However, when we're coming to evaluation point of view. If those relationships are too close, you might get a lower value. So, for example, if you're managing all your friends and family's properties. Then, if you leave the business like when you sell, there's a risk that those people might leave as well. So that's why they're often valued just slightly lower. The property type and condition gets looked at. So what's the mix of houses versus units? Because we know obviously, it can be more efficient to manage a heap of units in one complex than it is to be driving around to a heap of houses, and how long it takes to do inspections and all those sorts of things.
Systems which Sherrie and I love to talk about. This is looked at when people value your business, how systematised the business, especially around, say, the collection of rent or other management tasks, maintenance. That's a big one that's becoming way more automated and systematised these days. So what have you got in place in your business that makes it more efficient and more profitable course? Your authorities and your management agreements get looked at to make sure they're compliant and any kind of exclusions in those agreements.
So lots of different factors to think about and when we know all of those factors. Then we can start to go. Okay, what can I do better in my business? So you can see on the screen without adding any more properties into this portfolio. If we manage to get that multiple up from 2.5 to say 3.5, we've added an extra $500,000 worth of asset value without adding more properties without adding more property managers just really focusing on those factors. So I think that that's pretty cool that you can do that, that we can increase the value of business without him. To take on more business. We just need to have the systems in place. We need to have a tightly held portfolio be on top of those multi owners and things like that. So it's a really good idea to get a baseline like a valuation now. So you know what you're sitting on, so that you know what you can improve.
Hello, little friend of Sherrie's.
I do. Sorry about that. I've been away from home for a few days, and she is very needy. I apologise.
Oh, no, she's very, very cute. Okay, so we can see how we can increase that value here. Just some tips Sherrie and I kind of put together about how you can actually get that value enhancement that we're talking about. So you've got some actual actionable items to take away. And so the location of the properties like we spoke about maybe. Do an audit on your rent roll. Put them on a map. Where are they? How far from the office are they?
Now, I'm not saying any that are too far away. Get rid of them, and you know, send your owners somewhere else, not talking about that at all. But to start being mindful so it could come a time that you go okay myself. That pocket up there. So we're focusing on this area down here.
How many properties do you have in the Portfolio versus number of owners? So knowing this data and knowing of course you're not going to turn work away, especially if you're working with developers, and you got a heap of stock coming in. I've got a client at the moment we did this exercise with. And it's a big rent roll, and I think it's 800 properties 1 1 client owns in their different entities, because, you know, developer stock, which is fantastic for them and their rent roll growth personnel, do you have the right people in the right seats?
That's a really really big one. Do you have the right people around portfolio? How efficient and profitable is it because of those? Do we have them at the right level. Have you done an analysis on that business riders? So this is really interesting. When we now talk about the sales side of the business and the value because valuers and banks have been talking to said Look. If the principal writes more than 20% of the sales in the business, which is a lot a lot of us, like a lot of people. Then the sales side of the business could be worth almost nothing that there can be no goodwill if you ever sell that component.
So that's why the rent roll is so important. But also, if you can set up these abus like we're talking about today, you can elevate yourself into that more CEO position so that you, as the principal and not writing more than 20% that will increase the value of your business, or give you the freedom and all the all the good things as well. But it does actually turn to value and of course there is also a look at the Gci production. So what's the volume? Consistency as well? And who is actually writing that commission? And so that's kind of about the portfolio.
Now, being a successful real estate principal is more than just operating day to day in the business, and we know this. It's nothing new to you. You know. It's about becoming the owner and stepping up into that CEO role and you want to scale. And you want to protect and then create that exit because business and life I hear a lot about work life balance. It's just it's lifestyle. Generally, I find it really, really hard for people when they talk about work, life balance. It. It is our life, especially as business owners or lead agents. And so what kind of lifestyle do you want? What have you pictured for your future? Do you want to be chained to the business? I know I don't or do you want success, wealth, and freedom. Do you want to be able to have that 2 month holiday in Europe like I did last year? I was very, very lucky. My team was fantastic. Actually got 2 months off. It was fantastic.
So really picture your future and what you want from it. Sherrie, I know you have quite a few little trips, too, don't you. I do. Well, even in my business today, I mean, this is something that I have learned from having my own chain of agencies and it's my life.
Sherrie: Many years ago my business today I worked week, calm week off, like you, 6 weeks off in Europe this year, which was incredible. But I think you know, this is what most principals are really looking for. They want a business, you know. They know that there must be more to what they're currently seeing, which is being stuck or sort of chained into it, not being able to take that time off.
So, Kristen, you and I have been working on this project for quite some time, and, as you said, this is really kind of the 1st time that we're telling people about it. We sort of mentioned it at a at my later conference earlier this year. But it is essentially an online self, paced sales course. So it's got a 12 month access. And so, you know, you've kind of come with, you know the legal, know how and I've come come in terms of you know the business building part. So we've talked about how you can scale your agency and revenue, and how you can really put together your business and how you can plan for a profitable exit.
So but most people, this is the solution that they've been looking for. So we want to take you through this this program, and we will show you exactly how you can scale your team and remain legally protected. How to future proof. Your relationships with your partners and your teams. How to secure and retain the absolute best talent in your marketplace. How to implement events, marketing and growth strategies. And we've given you a couple of those today, and how to acquire a reproll or agency, including how to protect your new investment.
Sherrie: We'll also sort of take you through exactly how to protect your brand, your agency, and your assets, and how to determine the right exit strategy for you, because it's different for everyone. Sometimes legacy looks quite different. And I do just really clarify here. That exit is not necessarily something that you know you might be thinking of in 2 years, time, or 6 months time, but you might be saying, Listen, I'm going to be in business for the next 2 years in for the next 20 years. So who do I think my buyer is going to be in 20 years. Is it somebody internally? Is my in my business or will it be, you know, a national, or will it be a competitor, and we need to build the business out based on that right? So we need to look at it from a different point of view. Will you stay in the business? Will you retain a piece of that business, or you completely sell out? So it's different for everybody. We sort of take you through that.
So we want to determine what that right exit strategy is. We want to create your succession plan so that you can really increase the value of your agency. Because I think, Kristen, you know, I'm so grateful, and thank you so much for taking the time to show us exactly in your current business, how you can exponentially increase the value right? So that they're the sorts of little tricks we work so hard for our money. We want to make sure that our money's working really hard for us. And we do want to make sure that when we do choose to exit, that it is really seamless, and we want to execute that effectively and efficiently. So essentially. There are 6 modules in this course. So we take you through some growth strategies, and we've only shared a very small part today. But you know this is quite comprehensive. So there are 30 master classes. It's actually a few more than that where we take you through growth strategies, through how to scale your team, including recruitment, including retention, including you know how to build out Epus using vas and so forth, mergers and acquisitions, determining your exit strategy, a succession plan to increase your value. And again, Kristen, thank you so much for that today. And a bit of seamless exit.
So, in addition to actually logging on and having 12 months to complete all of these lessons, you also have loads and loads of templates. So these templates are absolutely huge, and I have to say, you know, Kristen, the value in this is incredible. Thank you so much for for doing this. And I'm so, you know, you know I love working with you, but I think the value is, you know, for a lot of us. We just have questions over, okay, well, what does it mean? And am I really covered? And now this is like all these templates are plug and play. So you can literally, you know. Put them on your website.
For example, if you're running a competition, or whatever those terms and conditions might look like. So there are employment contracts. There are so many great things in there and then. Furthermore, we have videos in terms of how to utilise these templates. So this is again really critical. So there's really no questions that, you know, remain unanswered.
But on top of all of that, Kristen and I will do one on one sessions with you, so you know I will do a power session with you, and that can be on anything in your business. So usually we recommend that you don't do that to start with, maybe you might be doing it towards the middle or the end of the course, and of course Kristen will then be able to give you legal advice based on exactly. You know what's going on in your be in your business.
So the the principals ministry is not something that we're going to be launching until later on this year. So if you want more information, you can scan the QR code and you can go and have a look, though it is not officially open to purchase at this particular point in time. So if you do want to join us a little bit early, and perhaps anyone would like to see some information on the course I'm happy to show you in the back end, because Chris and I pretty much all built the portal in the back end at this point.
We're really happy to to allow you sort of early access to that, but the cost is just under $10,000. If you choose to pay in full, or alternatively, you can choose to make it a payment plan. If that is a little bit easier for you on a monthly basis. So perhaps I might just actually share a bit of what the portal looks like. So let's have a look.
So here. So this is actually the real estate nation ministry. So I do have a number of courses here. This is the latest one with Kristen, of course. So, as you can see, we've got those 6 sort of modules, and each one of them does, in fact, have a little lesson. So if we have a look at Module number 2, which is scaling your team. So what's really great about this is, you know, talking about, you know, building ebus and how to engage contractors the right way. So you can see here that there is a lesson in this case, it's actually 40 min. So just like, you know, Kristen and I have appeared with you today. And then you've got a whole lot of templates. So I love the fact that these are plug and play. So we've got contractor agreements.
We've got contracted versus employee litmus test the license of IP, and then exactly how to implement those into your business. So you know that is just one of these lessons. So you can see that we have all, all of this sort of coming all the way through. So it really is quite an impressive course. Sorry. My Internet's a bit slow. So it's just taking a little bit longer to load up. So I apologise. Buying a rent roll so lots and lots of questions around buying a rent roll. So again, we can see in here loads of templates, loads of how to's. And we've got a 35 min video in terms of you know, Kristen, taking you exactly through this, which is incredible.
So, guys, if you have any questions, whether it be, you know, on the course or on anything at all like this is your opportunity. You have got both Kristen and I. We would love to help you. We would love to to take you through any questions that you might have so oh, Belinda, San cans like Belinda! Were you just at the lunch that I was speaking at on Monday? Let me know if that was the case. I was speaking to a whole lot of women in real estate. There were about 25,30 of us there. It was just absolutely incredible to see the power of, you know people coming together and supporting each other and actually raising money for a women's shelter which was really lovely. So hopefully, there were so many people I didn't get an opportunity to personally speak to everyone.
So any questions, everyone? Like maybe we've covered everything.
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