If you’ve never been much of a goal-setter, now’s the time to get started. Creating a real estate business plan and setting effective goals provides a roadmap for your daily activities, keeps you motivated and enables you to accomplish much more in your real estate business than by simply taking each day as they come.
To create a workable real estate business plan and set effective goals, you must follow a simple 7-step formula;
Step 1: Your Goals Must Be Written Down
Committing your goals to paper helps you to focus on exactly what you want to achieve. Research has shown that written goals are also more likely to be achieved than goals that are simply stated but never written down.
Step 2: Your Goals Must Be Stated In The Present Tense
You want to state your goals as though they have already occurred. For example, state that “I have earned $100,000 in 2015″, not “I will earn $100,000 in 2015″. When your goals are stated in the present tense it creates a sense of urgency to make the goal a reality.
Step 3: Your Goals Must Be Specific And Measurable
Creating goals is not a time to be fuzzy or wishy-washy. There can be no lack of clarity in your goals. You wouldn’t say, “I have listed a lot of houses this year.” Instead, you would use actual numbers so that you, and others, can hold you accountable for your goals. A goal that is specific and measurable would be stated as, “I have listed 30 homes in 2015″.
Step 4: Your Goals Must Be Time-Bound
To be effective, your goals should have a deadline for achievement. Otherwise you convince yourself that “I still have time” and put off doing the necessary tasks to reach your goal. Instead of stating your goal, for example, as “I have listed 20 homes”, try stating it as “I have listed 20 homes by June 30, 2015.”
Step 5: Your Goals Must Be Challenging, Yet Attainable
To find out what you’re truly capable of, your goals need to scare you just a bit. They need to cause you to stretch the way you think about your personal life, your business and more. To avoid total frustration, your goals also need to be attainable. There’s a balance between challenging yourself to reach new heights of achievement and setting yourself up for disappointment. Only you can determine what that balance is for your life – and your business.
Step 6: You Must Share Your Goals
One of the main reasons people fail to set goals is fear that others will laugh at them for wanting to achieve something in their life that others couldn’t imagine for themselves. Nobody wants to hear their goals condemned as far-fetched or ridiculous. But you simply have to find that one person, or two, who is supportive and will hold you accountable. Establish with this trusted friend or family member how you would like to be held accountable in a positive way that encourages your efforts. Nothing is as destructive to reaching your goals as having the person you shared them with, and to whom you look for support, to use negativity when you are struggling.
Step 7: Create A System For Attaining Your Goals
As the old saying goes, “You can eat a whale, you just have to do it bite by bite.” While I’m not sure I want to eat a whale, that is good advice for reaching your goals. Tommy Newberry, one of America’s top personal coaches, shared this idea with me many years ago. I have followed it relentlessly and have found it an excellent way to attain your goals! By the way, I set my plan up using an Excel spreadsheet so it was easy to use.
First, start with a 10-year plan. Grab a piece of paper and write down everything you’d like to accomplish, do or have in the next 10 years. Don’t hold back – think outside of the box! What do you want for your family? What accomplishments would you like to achieve in your business? Where would you like to travel? What would you like to own? What charities would you like to support with your time or money? Find photos of your dream car, your dream home – whatever it is you are striving to attain and make those images part of your plan. Having a visual reminder of your goal will help keep you focused.
The image below is a sample of your 10-year plan:
Once you have completed your 10-year plan, identify several items from the list that you think you can realistically achieve in the next three years. Three years is plenty of time to make some things happen but it’s also a short enough time period that you can see the “carrot at the end of the stick”. Write down which items you will achieve in each of the next three years; for example, identify several items for 2015, several more for 2016, and yet several more for 2017. Some goals may be attainable within the year and others may take time, such as saving for your kids college education or for your retirement. For those goals that span several years, break them down into annual accomplishments, such as saving $5,000 per year. And again, use pictures of your goals to remind you of the rewards.
The image below is a sample of your 3-year plan:
From your 3-year plan, select several items that you would like to accomplish in the coming year as part of your real estate business plan. Again, some of these could be completed over the next 12 months while others are “getting-started goals” such as savings, growing your business, etc.
The image below is a sample of how your annual plan might look:
Once you have identified your goals for the next 12 months, break those goals down into quarterly goals. For example, if you were looking to grow your business in the coming year, you may consider establishing a series of goals that build on one another such as identifying a niche market to pursue in the first quarter. Then, in the second quarter, you may have a goal of launching a lead generation and awareness campaign within that niche market. Your goal for the third quarter is that you have taken 5 listings in the new niche market. Then, in the final quarter of the year, you have taken an additional 8 listings. Following this process enables you to break your bigger, long-term goals into smaller, more attainable goals that keep you on the right path.
The image below illustrates a typical quarterly goal plan;
For each quarter, establish goals for each month that, once completed, will enable you to have achieved your quarterly goals. To use the example above about identifying a new niche market, the goals you might establish for January could include evaluating neighborhoods with high average annual turnover rates of home ownership, assessing the competition, developing your positioning strategy, creating your marketing plan, etc. By accomplishing each of those tasks by the end of the month, you would be well on your way to reaching your quarterly goals and then, ultimately, your annual goals and beyond.
The image below is a sample monthly goal plan;
Next, break each month into weekly goals – these are the “baby steps” you must accomplish that help you achieve your larger goals. To continue the example above, your weekly goal could be to search for neighborhoods that you would like to consider for further analysis, to conduct sales activity searches using your local MLS to begin your neighborhood evaluation and to identify the agents with a consistent track record of sales within each neighborhood.
The image below illustrates how a weekly goal plan is established;
Your last step is to break each week down into a daily to-do list. These are the daily tasks that you must complete to reach your weekly goals. The image below shows how your goals are broken down into daily to-do items that must be completed.
If you are committed to this process, I can assure you it will work for you. In the many years since I began using this approach I have only missed one goal that I had set for myself. So take the time to create a well thought out real estate business plan and be sure include some personal goals you’d like to achieve as well.