Back in the day, I used to write for Beavercreek News-Current, a little conglomerate suburban daily. A whole slew of newspapers were under the conglomerate: The Fairborn Daily Herald, The Enon Times, The Kettering Sentinel. We wrote about school board meetings and shopping mall developments in the shadow of Wright State University that was featuring the latest and greatest in computer tech: a virtual haircut. They put a helmet over your head that looked like Luke Skywalker’s battle simulation helmet, and you saw the barber, felt and heard the scissor snips, smelled the Dapper Dan pomade. Lois, the reporter I shared a desk with, was disgusted. “Technology for technology’s sake, what’s the point?” I think she was just miffed I was assigned the piece. Except, of course, I forgot to go to the demonstration and my editor the next morning was angry angry. I made a few phone calls, took some notes, and wrote the article in thirty minutes. That was the first article that I ever wrote that made the front page, but not just the front page of the Beavercreek News-Current. The article front page syndicated across the entire franchise. Lois was mad. She had worked her butt off for a journalism degree, worked hard to get the position she had, and I was just little ol’ hick Smallville.
Lois really was her name, by the way.
Anyway, it’s been a long minute since I’ve had a daily deadline. The idea behind this blog is to post every morning at 8am. Obviously, I missed. No excuses here. Completely my fault. A symptom of bad planning.
In Undercover Billionaire the contestant always has a setback.
Glenn Stearns hired the wrong lead chef. Grant Cardone dealt with Covid. Elaine Culotti worked her general contractor to the breaking point. Monique Mosley searched for investors who only wanted to buy her business from her.
This is the key to good story telling: create a problem, allow the problem to be partially solved, then run into a serious issue that has to somehow be overcome, then find success.
We can apply this to the blog and missing my daily post, but really this is a long introduction to tell you I lost some of the September cash. I can’t tell you how I lost the cash without giving away privileged fiduciary information. But basically, I need to find another $4000. Which means I need another house to sell.
I have some leads—nothing solid, nothing tomorrow.
The thing about real estate is that we are always 90 days out. Activities we do today—calling people saying hello, popping by businesses, having coffee, being out in the community, having real estate conversations—all those activities eventually turn into sales, but they turn into sales 90 days out. Or, rather, at least, that is what we are told during our KWCLM morning office meeting.
To be honest, that timeline has never panned out for me. It’s more like six months. It’s more like the person who I think will do business with me never does business with me, and the person who I think will never do business with me actually does do the business with me. But seemingly, they come out of the blue, and unexpectedly.
They don’t actually come out of the blue. It just feels unexpected. They are repeatedly exposed to my message, constantly reminded that I do real estate.
The majority of people in my office have a 1% conversion rate. I’m sitting at 5%. What does that mean exactly? It could mean one of two things.
- It could mean I’m just that dang good.
- I’m not talking to enough people.
As much as I would like to believe I’m just that dang good, I think the latter is probably more likely.
For one, I have to figure out how to talk to more people. The next Dover Chamber morning mixer is not until October, so that’s not going to work. I have about six coffee meeting scheduled for this week, and I’ll need to ask who do they know that I should know.
By the way, I love that question! It not only opens opportunities; you just meet some fantastic people that way that you wouldn’t meet otherwise.
To be honest, finding $4000 in real estate, my usual go-to, seems to be a long shot given the time frame. I’m racking my brain. And I can’t help but remember the first blog post where I wrote, “If you don’t have enough money, your problem is not a lack of money but a lack of imagination.”
Right now, I find myself with a temporary drought in the imagination department.
Could I offer a series of educational seminars or workshops, drawing from my experience in real estate and teaching? Maybe there’s a market for quick, intensive courses on home buying, leveraging my expertise and network to provide value to potential homebuyers. Or perhaps I could delve into the world of content creation, crafting e-books or guides on the nuances of the English language, the art of writing, topics close to my heart and rich with potential. Or maybe selling printables?
It’s frustrating that these are all ideas have been floating around in my head already because one of the great tools I’ve begun using on a regular basis is ChatGPT for some initial brainstorming, and these are all the ideas that ChatGPT came up with. So much for AI assisted thinking. They are all good ideas, but I think they all take a certain amount of time to implement. They feel like dead ends for a two-week deadline.
I realize this post is not just about finding a solution to my current self-made dilemma. It’s about showcasing the real, the raw journey of an entrepreneur, the highs and the lows, the moments of triumph and the periods of drought.
I’m also all about asking for help. I’m inviting you to join me on this journey, to brainstorm with me, to find that $4000 because I also believe in the collective imagination, and together we can find a way, a pathway to success that is not just about money, but about community, creativity, and the spirit of entrepreneurship.
I invite you to share your thoughts, ideas, your own experiences in the comments below!
