3 Tips for Agents Who Want to Open Their Own Brokerage

"It was never my dream to work for a real estate company for the rest of my life." —Stacie Perrault Staub

Was it the idea of promoting someone else's brand, working around someone else's schedule, and splitting your commission that encouraged you to pursue a career in real estate? Probably not. Working for an established brokerage is a great way to get started in real estate, but it's rarely the end goal of aspiring agents.

In a recent Secrets of Top Selling Agents webinar, Stacie Perrault Staub, founder and owner of West & Main Homes and the brain behind the popular Genuine Hustle conferences, shared her tips to start your own real estate brand. Watch the free webinar, Launching a Real Estate Brand from Scratch, for more information, or find our three tips from the webinar below!

1. Take Your Future into Your Own Hands

It can be hard to leave a job or company you love, but eventually you have to "make the decision to take a leap and go out on [your] own and start [your] own thing." Staub stressed that "finding those like minded people that share your passions" is a crucial step toward building the confidence you need to launch your own brand.

Consider planning a conference, hosting an event, or forming a mastermind group to help you connect with real estate professionals who have already started their own brand, or who, like you, are just starting down the path.

2. Be Prepared for Anything

Starting a brokerage can be a pricey business. Plan ahead. Staub explained that "I did a lot of saving last year, kind of anticipating something. I didn't even know that I wanted to start my own brokerage, but I knew I wanted to invest in something or do something to move my life and my family's financial future forward."

It's also a good idea to "read your employee guide. Read the agreement that you signed...and just make sure that you have your ducks in a row before you start telling people." Some brokers are very supportive of agents who decide to take their careers forward by building their own brands.

Others, Staub warns, aren't. "I have heard...horror stories from people who [decided to start their own brand] and whose broker turned their email off right away or deleted their database or shut off their access to all of their tools, so I think just being fully ready and prepared and having done as much of the transition before you say something is probably the best advice I could give."

3. Create Something Scalable

When you initially start looking for business tools, you'll probably only need solutions for a few agents. Don't succumb to the temptation to just cover your current needs. Staub suggests that instead of thinking, "This works for the five agents that we have now," that you ask yourself "Will this work for twenty agents? Will this work for fifty agents? Start from the beginning implementing those processes so that [you] don't have to go back and rebuild and relearn as [you] grow."

Staub found that "going to events like Inman and reading constantly online and having played around with a lot of products at Live Urban, I knew exactly the kind of direction I wanted to go with all of my tools." If she was still uncertain about a good tool to use, she consulted her mastermind groups and asked them "What works for you guys? What are you guys doing for a CRM? What are you doing for a website?"

To view the original article, visit the Homes.com blog.