James Engel KW Beverly Hills

its 7:40 am in Beverly Hills, 90210. Its cloudy and no one at work yet. Trying to beat the traffic brings me in earlier then anyone else. Just got the chance to take a look at this weeks MLS open house guide. Gotta give it to Robert Kass he has just listed 2 properties, one of them is the infamous Fleur De Lys in Holmby Hills priced at a meager 125,000,000 and the other the house of our beloved Malibu resident who must be sick and tired of fighting the coastal comission Cher's house at 45,000,000. You can find both listings at www.robertkass.com, gotta be proud and wish this gentleman luck its must be an enormous task just to even market those , let alone sell them. I can see a few happy vendors, escrow, title and loan guy. How much would title cost on 125,000,000 sale I wonder.

On the other end of the Bhills spectrum, gotta give my idol in the office Michael Eisenberg credit for his listing at 2533 Benedict Canyon, Listed at 1,895,000 he makes Bhills affordable for all the rest of us.

When I look out of my office, I see the cranes and construction going on furiously, by wilshire and see that they are getting close to finish that enormous project. I am so curious to see how traffic is going to be once that building is occupied.

Ohh and there is the traditional Bhills house , gorgeous kitchen for anyoen doing a remodel by Linda May at 503 Arden Drive, you can see it at www.503Arden.com. It seems the market is getting smarter pricings are getting realistic and the buyers standing in the shadows are peeking out at good inventory and good product

Well I hope the best to all my fellow Bhills agents and luck in selling their inventory.Lets see how our prospecting goes today and if we can get our buyers prequalified thru our hardworking Wells Fargo reps and get them to write offers on some properties

Good Luck to us all

Why is it that most agents that walk into an open house, choose to scribble their name, skip their phone numbers and wont give their email adress. Isn't the purpose of coming to an open house (brokers open) to see the inventory in your farm or your clients hunting grounds to be knowledgable for it for the sunday open for when you are accompanied by your client (this rant is for a tuesday open in LA which is usually referred to as the brokers open).

1) Why is it that agents fear to drop a business card or fill out the sign in sheet legibly, so they can be notified regarding new listings or price changes. Are they all scared that we agents will sell their names to MLM companies for mona vie sales

2) When you have a brand new construction with gorgeous finishes and brand new sealed flooring, why is it such a big issue to wear the booties provided or to take off shoes.

3) When you bring along a client for a brokers open and there are 10 other brokers walking around, do you really think anything you say will be private.

4) How ethical is it to come to an open house of a broker/agent and then chat up with other agents pitching a listing you or your office has down the road, that is not open that day

5) When you come to an open which you will probably take no longer than 3 minutes for , why is it you have to carry the dog along with you. Is he licensed, is he a part of your team, and should you not ask (whatever the size is) before you bring a pet along for a brokers open

I do 90% of my business on the commercial end, sat a brokers open for my partner and just found it interesting to observe how people behave in this market. We all need each others help and support in this market, we all need to stay informed about price changes, status changes,etc. I think a little professionalism and common sense could go a long way in todays market. Dotn forget you will be writing the offer that we will be reviewing or vice versa.

Yep it is a Tuesday morning and got the hot chocolate from starbucks and have 8 minutes to kick off. Continuing on my post of time management, here is how my day should go today.

8:00 to 8:30 I wil be making calls to property managers, vendors, and returning voicemails. I have prepared a list of who to call, if i dont get ahold of anyone I will leave a message

8:30 - 35 take break and will check emails

8:35 to 10:00 am will start a cold call session - will shut down cell phone, print the call list from my computer (in excel format name, surname, property owned, phone, and 2 empty columns for email and notes) Will not stop until 10:00 am or until i have made 20 contacts. ( I define contacts as people I have a longer then 1 minute good conversation with ). I will leave voicemail (scripted on every answering machine and voicemail)

10:05 to 14:30 will be heading out to my partners open house , to hold it open as he is on vacation. 3457 Moore Street in Mar Vista, a gorgeous contemporary, steel-glass-concrete, structru he has built. I am taking 2 books to read (Sales Bible - Jeffrey Gitomer, and Getting Things Done - David Allen). If any of you can not read a book if their life depended on it should try the Gitomer series, they are amazing and fun to read.

15:30 will be back at office (for those of us that dont live in LA it takes 45 minutes to get to our KW BEverly Hills Office and then another 15 minutes to find parking, that is if you are lucky)

15:45 Need to check emails again and respond to the ones that are urgent.

16:00 - 17:00 return any call backs, send out any emails or faxes. Call wife see if anything is needed for pick up. Browse loopnet,costar and themls.com for any new listings I should know about

17:00 to 18:00 I will be online going on to my social netwrok sites including activerain and posting blogs, comments, new videos. the goal is to post 1 fresh item on each site every day.

18:00 to 18:30 is my time, listen to voicemails, work on unnecessary projects, read a magazine, send out emails, draft thank you notes, online shop, or just stroll down to starbucks to grab a small hot chocolate for my 1 horu commute home, it is my time

18:30 to 19:15 is spent on LA freeways or shortcuts, I call clients during this hour (top clients the ones you have personal relation with, listen to spanish tapes (learned spanish driving the 405 for 3 hours a day last 4 years) call mom, call family, call friends, just call)

19:15 arrival at my kingdom. I shut off my phone, get out my notebook, write things that are on my mind business related that are annoying me or stressing me down. Then go in and get ready to be attacked by 3 munchkins, Matthew (6) a super mario galaxy contender, Alara, (3+) my curly beauty and Naz (almost 2) my cute face master. Cell phone goes in charger and on vibrate. And family time begins

21:30 with my wife we move into the home office, go over some finances, talk about day and get caught up on eachothers life. I prepare a to -do , to-call, to-meet list for the next day and rest of week

23:00 is usually bed time

The trick to keeping the schedule is , not to get distracted! There will be times when pressing matters need your attention and schedule gets out of synch, but you need to remember the schedule is a guideline you can follow and change the pieces, replace them or move them around. The only rule I never break is, after 19:15 work stops, all can wait until tomorrow

To all of us out there today, have an awesome day.