Everyone Needs a Great Mentor

While some members of the Residential Real Estate Council may be industry veterans, others are just a few years into their real estate profession. The Council prides itself in providing education, networking and business development solutions to residential real estate agents at all phases of their careers. We are adding a column to The Residential Specialist that caters to those different career stages and offers solutions to challenges that agents will encounter along the way.

Take a few minutes to reminisce about your earliest days in real estate. Did it feel overwhelming, or did someone show you the ropes and guide you to success? Were you inspired by someone?

The real estate industry is a challenging one, and you can feel isolated as you run and grow your own business. New agents who are doing all the right things can still struggle for years to get their heads above water. Even real estate veterans may encounter new challenges due to changing trends.

Cultivating a successful relationship with a mentor helps tremendously by enhancing your ability to launch a long, thriving real estate career, and it’s a mutually beneficial association.

For the 2020 president of the Council, Richard Waystack, CRS, his mentor was his father. Richard wanted to be a real estate agent like his dad, but didn’t think he had what it took to sell anyone a home. “My dad looked at me and said, ‘You’ll never sell anyone a home; you can assist them, you can give them information and you can help them achieve their needs for housing.’” This statement has stuck with Richard his entire life and has shaped his success.

A mentor may be someone in your family, or it may be several people you encounter throughout your career. Lana Vukovljak, CEO of the Residential Real Estate Council, is grateful to have learned from many people. “You can learn something from everyone who you work with,” she says.

You can be a mentor at any stage of life—whether you’re a seasoned professional sharing advice with someone starting out in the industry or a successful millennial helping some industry veterans with technology and learning new skill sets. Regardless of age, ability or experience, agent-to-agent mentoring can be the most valuable resource when it comes to improving skill sets and achieving success in the real estate industry.

A quick Google search will lead you to hundreds of articles and opportunities for real estate mentors. With so much demand, have you thought about turning yourself into one? Some people fear that they will be training their competition, but that doesn’t have to be the case. You can connect with someone who isn’t in your market and grow your network at the same time.

In addition to knowing you’ve helped someone, mentoring provides the following benefits:

• Collaborate with other professionals. The more you reach out to help others, the more others will trust your ability and professionalism to serve the clients they refer to you.
• Become better at what you do. “While we teach, we learn,” said the Roman philosopher Seneca. In modern times, this is called the protégé effect. When you help and teach others, you ingrain that information into yourself as well. You use your own advice and apply it more effectively.
• Discover new professional opportunities. The more people you help, the more you are viewed as an industry expert. This could lead to new avenues for reaching potential clients or opportunities to speak at conferences. If you mentor enough, it could even become a business in teaching people how to navigate and grow their careers.
• Expand your network. A big part of a real estate agent’s business is referrals. When you mentor someone, you open yourself up to a whole network of new people who could introduce you to more opportunities down the road—especially since this is the digital age and so many successful mentor relationships can take place through technology.

For more information about the RRC MentorBoard, visit CRS.com/careers.