Truth in Real Estate®

14 January 2020 by Kevin Cahill

This year, 2020, is sure to be a really incredible year for our real estate brand, REALean. Here it is, the end of the second week, and we’ve already had some great successes… no matter how small a victory, I think it is really important to celebrate the success.

We just had a closing today, a really nice listing in Saint Pete Beach, Florida, where we are headquartered… a small-ish 2BR 2BA condo just a short walk to the beach… we were their agents when they purchased the property in May of 2016, when they paid $195,000… today, they sold it for $258,000… they did well. We’ve helped these sellers with 5 transactions in that short period of time, and we are honored to be their Realtors in Florida. Super nice people!

We listed a new property yesterday, in Treasure Island, Florida… interestingly, we were the listing agent for the previous sellers in March of 2017, and the current owner was so impressed by our handling of the transaction when she bought the home, and also very impressed with our innovative commission model, that she chose to hire us to sell her home. We showed the owner a couple homes on Sunday, and she found a great villa that would work really well for her… so we put together a purchase agreement for that home, which was accepted last night, and simultaneously, we put her home on the market yesterday… so those are nice small victories to start the year off right, start the year off strong.

And we are excited that our agents are taking listings and are very busy so soon after the holidays. One of our new agents, Jeff Thomsen, took his first listing today, and a very nice listing at that… a home in Madeira Beach, Florida priced just under $460,000. So another reason to celebrate…

My belief is that you have to remain mindful of every victory you experience, or else you run the risk of not appreciating the victories… and if you don’t appreciate what you have, if you are not filled with gratitude for all the blessings in your life, those victories, those blessings might move on to someone else who is ready to shower appreciation and gratitude onto every little victory and blessing they experience.

That’s just a bit of an insight into my mindset… let me share with you a bit of my background…

I’ve been a Realtor since 1999. I started my career in the Cleveland, Ohio suburbs of Shaker Heights and Cleveland Heights, with Smythe, Cramer Co., learning about the business and the industry in a nicely affluent community, enjoying success early on in my career at a young age, with a very supportive leadership team guiding me along in those first years. Over time, I rose to be the #38 agent in the company of over 1100 agents across greater Cleveland… when you enjoy that type of success in this industry, you are often invited to meet with competing brokers to learn about their companies, but I really like the people who brought me into the business, in particular, a gentleman named William McKelvey, who was the president of Smythe, Cramer Co. So I didn’t see myself needing anything that I couldn’t get at Smythe.

However, over time, things change… An interesting company called Keller Williams Realty had arrived in Cleveland, and I met one of the company leaders at a broker open house, a really nice guy named Mark Brenneman… Mark shared with me some great KW resources and materials, and at about that same time Smythe, Cramer Co., was in the process of being acquired by Howard Hanna Real Estate, in Pittsburgh, PA… so things were changing, and I was open to opportunities.

It’s interesting how things can line up, and all works out just fine… Mark kept in touch with me about KW, and I nearly joined him in December of 2003, but before I made a decision, I spoke with William McKelvey about the opportunity presented to me… at that moment I was #52 in his company, and William made me a wonderful offer to stay, significantly increasing my commission split, providing me with a technology budget and a special marketing budget, and I was thankful for his confidence in me and his ongoing friendship and support.

Throughout the following year, Mark kept in touch with me, and I utilized as much as I could learn from Keller Williams Realty, while working diligently at Smythe, Cramer Co. One of the interesting notions that entered my mind is the cyclical impact of your environment… how your environment impacts your thoughts, how your thoughts impact your feelings, how your feelings impact your actions, how your actions impact your results, and how your results circle back around to impact your environment… for better or for worse… Largely, I had felt like I was in a very good environment… though I was open to exploring, learning about, and understanding another environment.

I had also read Jim Collins’ wonderful book Good to Great… the opening words of the book are fantastic… “Good is the enemy of Great.” I had reflected on this concept a lot, I had discussed it over numerous coffees, with numerous friends, from numerous industries… I was committed then, as I am committed now, to being the very best version of myself I could be… and being in a “good” environment could be precisely what keeps you from discovering a “great” environment. “Good” is comfortable, it is safe, it is predictable… there is a little less pressure, a little less risk. People flee from “bad” and they look for greener pastures when they are in “not so good.” But they typically stay in “good” for a very long while if they not exposed to this interesting concept, that good is what keeps people from discovering great.

The following November, my office manager at Smythe just so happened upon me walking down the hallway as she was returning to the office… she surely didn’t realize what she was doing when she mentioned to me that she had just come back from a meeting at the company headquarters, and that I would be pleased to know that my commission split was approved for another year. Now, a year ago, I was #52 at the company, and at this moment, I was #38 at the company… I had absolutely zero concern that my commission split would change for the worse. Now, I wasn’t necessarily thinking that I would renegotiate my commission split, but I was thinking that I’d like to have a proper meeting with this manager to discuss where I was and where I envisioned myself going… how the company could continue to support me, how the company could provide some guidance, some insight, into the next phases of my business career in this company. Instead, just a quick passing comment that I wasn’t getting penalized for having doubled my business in the past 12 months.

I called Mark, made the arrangements, and I was gone… I joined Keller Williams Realty, and felt so good to be in such an excellent environment. I was sad to leave William McKelvey, who had been such a great friend to me, so encouraging, so supportive, always there for me. But as Smythe, Cramer Co. was completing it’s sale to Howard Hanna Real Estate, things were changing, the environment was not what it used to be. And sadly, sometimes you need to make smart business decisions that have a sad friendship impact.

(Look for my next post, where I shall continue this story…)