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Running a Business Vs. Performing a Job
By Joel S. Pate
Entrepreneurs (and I am sure you are one if you are in this business) are dreamers, planners, and executors. You must be all three to be successful.
I want you to stop for a moment and ask yourself a question: Does the mortgage business in my area have the potential to fulfill my economic dreams or will the income available to me be just sufficient, but, really not ever enough?
Regardless of your answer, the real answer is that in the mortgage business, an originator has one of the highest paid professions around and if you treat your profession as a business and not as a job, you can earn income at the highest levels and can create a residual income that comes in even when you're not there.
Interested?
The basics of a running a business as compared to performing a job is that you master a list of things that after they "catch hold" produces time after time, day after day, month after month, and even year after year. How?
First, you've must decide, actually make a decision, that you want a business and not a profession. In order to have a business, you MUST move information and ability out of your head and onto paper and into others. If you cannot do that, you should stick with being a professional, like a surgeon, that does all of his own work.
If you decide you want a business, you must make a few plans:
• You must have a qualified processor
• You must have a simple marketing plan
• You must work your plan every day
• You must look at your business from the outside (harshly)
For the sake of time, I want to skip the first item on the list, but, you shouldn't. The simplest marketing plan I have ever seen, and one I might add that I know of over one hundred originators that have successfully implemented, is the concept of a weekly update on each loan in process to the listing agent and the selling agent delivered by fax on Monday or Friday.
Why? In my former life, I was a builder. I have personally been involved as a buyer or a seller on over 1,000 properties. Many of those of course required a mortgage to be obtained by the purchaser. As a small merchant builder, we directed most of our purchasers, your potential borrowers, to the mortgage company and originator that we wanted them to go to. Why, because we got a kickback? NO. It was because that originator communicated with me.
I am big on communication. How about you? I really hate to go to pick up my car at the shop and it is not ready. Why didn't you call me, I ask? Well, I, I, I, I, I. Excuses do not cut it. I want communication.
I want someone that I can trust to tell me what is going on, when it is going on, how it is going on, and for that information to be as solid as a rock as possible. Don't you? Then, why on earth do most of you, the ones reading this article, yes you, bull crap your way through conversations with your referral partners and your customers. Tell us the truth, tell us soon and tell us often. That is all we ask.
Not only do we who are doing business with you want truthful, quick, reliable communication, we want it consistently and without having to ask for it. We want what we want, when we want it, and how we want it and the originator that gives it to us gets our business. That's it. We really don't care about anything else.
Implementing a weekly update of all loans in process to both the listing agent and the selling agent, and the builder's coordinator if applicable, is the easiest way to accomplish the critical need of communication.
Setting up the form is simple. Actually I've done it for you, if you are a subscriber to The Daily Communicator. If you want to do it yourself, all you need to include are the basics of any good processing sheet. Ordered the appraisal, got it in. Ordered the VOE, VOD, VOI, received or not received.
You see, agents and builders do not have to have a depth of information; they just need to know the basics, that you are actually on the job, and that they can count on the fact that there is evidence that you are doing your job.Now, every time I have ever mentioned this marketing plan, someone will say: Instead of faxing it to the agents, I want to email it. Well, of course you do. Like a friend of mine who cannot help himself, he feels the uncontrollable need to improve something instead of doing it, those that must always improve everything, instead of using what has worked for hundreds of others, will have the desire to tweak this too. Don't.
It works, it works every time, it's simple, it can be implemented in five minutes per week per loan, and it will pay rich dividends by creating a unique feeling of confidence with your current and future referral partners. JUST DO IT, as the Nike commercial is famous for saying.
If you would like to take advantage of our customized weekly update form, and our daily marketing program to real estate agents, go here and test drive it for free: www.vadiumgroup.com/cpexpert.php.
Dedicated to coaching YOU to CP Loan Success!
Joel S. Pate
Joel S. Pate, a dedicated entrepreneur, has spent more than two decades in the building, mortgage, and real estate industries and has been involved in over $100 Million in construction loans and over $1.3 Billion of residential lending.
As the CP LOAN EXPERT columnist, Mr. Pate provides straightforward, unbiased advice about every aspect of construction permanent lending. If you ever wanted to unravel the mystery surrounding new construction lending, then you should tune in.
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