The Importance of Your First Clients

Pour everything you have into your first clients. It will be the last time you have this much time. 

If you’re just starting out in real estate, here’s something you should do that we wish we’d have done: Give everything you have to your first clients, because you’ll never have more time and attention to give than you do right now. As you grow and as busyness sets in, more things compete for your time. Eventually, you’ll think back to today, remembering what it was like to be able to be exactly who you wanted to be as a real estate agent. 

If you’re just starting out in real estate, chances are that you’re looking ahead with a bit of uncertainty. You’re wondering how life as a REALTOR® will all play out. Will you be successful? What kind of customers will you focus on? Will this be your job or your side hustle? 

Whether you’ve started with a brokerage or are doing it more on your own, you’re at a unique time in your real estate career. Now’s the time that you will be able to spend your time and focus your attention on your customer exactly as you want to.

To be clear: We’re not saying that eventually you’ll compromise your standards of excellence or service to homebuyers or sellers. We’re also not saying “This is as good as it gets.” Instead, we’re saying that eventually you’ll need to focus your attention and enforce your standards on other elements of your business as well. When you have less demands on your time as a real estate agent, your time can be spent on giving your customers today the kind of attention and care that you want every buyer and seller you ever work with to receive. 

Some areas to focus on with customers in your early years: 

Responsiveness – 

Be as responsive to home buyers and sellers today as you want to be throughout your real estate career. If you want to always get back to customers within a few hours, then do that with your first time customers. Be quick to provide answers. Be ready to give them direction or advice. 

Discovery – 

Get to know these customers as well as you can. It will set a precedent in your real estate career for how well you will know your customers in the future. Spend time finding out exactly who they are and where they want to end up. 

Thoroughness –

Do your best to leave no stone unturned in these early years with these first customers. Practice the art of being thorough in every detail of real estate with your homebuyers and sellers. Do your best to not be surprised by details or to not be derailed by demands. Do your homework. 

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As your real estate career moves forward, you’ll be faced with more responsibilities, more demands on your time and events on your calendar. These demands will ultimately translate to having less time and attention to give to an individual customer.