Oh Canada!

Canadian???

Born and raised in Abbotsford BC, I always had BIG dreams to build an empire of some kind. Years later, here I am living in the Greater Seattle area and I'm expanding my worldwide network. I'm looking for likeminded individuals who are entrepreneurs, visionaries, hard working big dreamers! Have you ever considered a work from phone business opportunity?

We should talk! Email me and let's connect.

Tired of the Grind?

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Do you ever feel like you are living your life stuck in traffic? You spend hours of your day staring at brake lights, both real and metaphorical. You're working so hard, but for who?You are yearning for a life that puts you in the driver's seat of your future. Curious how real estate could help you.... There are many ways to utilize a Real Estate License that do not necessarily include working with buyers and sellers. Just get your license, hang it in our office, and refer people our way. We do all the work, you collect the referral check! What's a referral check? Come and listen to Rebecca explain at our next Career Tour or email her at rebeccad@kw.com

Military Moms Post

Military Moms!!

Portable Career for Military Spouses

I recently posted a job for our rapidly growing team and I had a couple of conversations with some applicants and it brought to light something I had never thought about. As a military spouse, her resume was quite fragmented. Moving all over has it's benefits but it can leave your resume looking a little sketchy without an explanation.

Real Estate has opportunities that allow you to have a portable career. Once you get your real estate license in one state, you can refer business to other real estate agents around the world. So if you are looking for a career that can follow you no matter where you go, send me a message. I would be happy to share how real estate can provide a great career and multiple income streams.

Click get started today!

Do You Know Your Magic Number?

For years I resisted a particular brand of agent talk. Maybe you avoid it too. It made me uncomfortable. It made me cringe. It was one of the three topics we're raised to believe aren't appropriate to discuss in polite company. Sales. Number of transactions closed. Which amounted in my mind to the same thing--money.

When I got my license, I can honestly say it felt like a calling. I didn’t have any real estate experience other than a bad home-buyer one. For me, real estate was about finding a way to serve. A way to make sure that, at least the clients who worked with me, would never have a bad experience. It was a way to minister in the marketplace, if you will.

I have trusted that the Lord would bring me amazing clients and he always did. But when people would ask me how many homes I had sold those first couple of years,  I would meekly say, "a lot."

One day at an agent conference, I ran into Brett Tanner. I went up to him to thank him for the classes he had taught and to tell him how much they impacted my business. He asked me how business was and I answered, "Great!" But honestly, I didn’t know whether it was great or not.

Because I truly did not know how many homes I had sold that year. Seems crazy to me now, but it's the truth. He could tell I was a bit embarrassed and he was so gracious about it. He told me that numbers were the language of our business.  And he asked me, "Are you willing to let it grow as big as it wants to grow?"

In that moment everything changed. What you measure improves, so I made a commitment to always know my numbers. I went back to my office and looked up my reports and I had sold 35 homes that year. That is actually a pretty great year, right?

That experience was followed-up with an epiphany in a business planning clinic (You should attend this class!) I had heard other agents talk about doubling their business from year to year, and I asked myself why I couldn't do the same. What was stopping me from seeing that kind of growth in my own business?

The answer was my actions and my mindset. So, I changed both.

In 2016 I set an ambitious goal of serving 77 families, and this was before I hired my own team. (I had a part time transaction coordinator) The actual number I closed that year was 60.. but I wasn’t disappointed, because that was so much higher than I'd ever aimed before.

Knowing my numbers meant that I could make decisions with confidence. Because I knew my numbers, I could dream big. So I did. One of my biggest dreams was to live on the water… not just have a peekaboo view--but actually own a waterfront home. Then through a series of crazy events, I bought my little cottage on the sound. A bank owned repo that was in need of some love. It had been on the market for months with no offers and in no time, it was mine.

Knowing my numbers and focusing on them in a healthy way gave me freedom to think and dream bigger. What are the big dreams for you?

How I Got Out of Debt & You Can Too

Allowing yourself to be vulnerable and admit to mistakes you've made, especially in a public format, is really intimidating. As honest as I am on social media (and in life), I don't share everything. I cultivate the image of myself that I want to project. It's essential to my business that I'm careful and circumspect about what I say, but it's also about walking that tricky line that's become an issue with the advent of blogs and Facebook and Twitter. Balancing my own inclination toward privacy with the internet's invitation/temptation to share it all. Everything. All the time. With everyone. I think I've spoken here before about money, which is definitely a loaded topic. And I may even have mentioned debt before. But I don't think I've shared the specifics of my story and how I climbed clawed my way out of it.

So that's what I want to do today.

Several years ago, when I was relatively new to real estate, I was also drowning in debt.   Over 50K in debt, to be exact. And it was diverse--student loans, credit card balances, a car loan, medical bills… you name it, I owed money for, on, or to it. Maybe you have similar debt, or more, or less. Whatever the amount, it can feel crippling. It can suck the life right out of you. Sometimes it's a gradual, creeping realization that we may have borrowed ourselves right into a life we can't afford. Other times it's a bright, flashing, blaring siren of dread the instant we signed our name on the dotted line.

This is how I felt: I was in a tunnel with no light at the end of it. The number was so huge to me that I literally couldn't imagine a scenario in which it wouldn't exist anymore. I was working so hard and none of what I was earning felt like it belonged to me.

The light appears...

I was with a small group of friends one night and a gal said there was a book about how to pay off debt for pennies on the dollar. That seemed way to good to be true. But I bought the book and read it front to back and then over again. I read it until I got the courage to start calling my creditors to settle the accounts. (Looking back, I learned some crazy amazing negotiating skills through that experience!) The thing I hadn't realized was that companies will settle with you for less than you owe for a couple of reasons. One is that sometimes the original creditor sold the debt to a company that just goes around buying existing debts for much less than what's owed on them. They then set about trying to collect. So, you can negotiate with them for pennies on the dollar because they only paid a fraction of what you owed in the first place.

Secondly, sometimes a company has essentially given-up on collecting anything on the debt. So, if you call and make them an offer of something, they'll take it.

Still, it is not a fun experience to make those calls. It's the opposite of fun, actually. And the good news for you is that you don't have to do it yourself. Our trusted team has a credit repair expert who does the negotiating for you and, together we can help you create a plan that leads not just to freedom from debt but to home ownership too. For some it’s a 6-month plan, for others it’s 18-months.

Just know I’ve been there. I personally short sale my property and contemplated bankruptcy a couple of times... so I'm not asking you to consider something I haven't already myself. There’s no shame. I know the struggle and I’m happy to help encourage you out of it. We should talk! Call us to schedule a confidential consultation.

I did a short video about my fun real estate math equation, where 1+1=4. Whether you're trying to get out of debt or avoid it, more and diverse income streams are a necessity. Check that video out below!

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