(Excerpted from The Consultative Real Estate Agent by Kelle Sparta)

The Process of Change

Before we can begin to talk about the problems that individuals face in real estate transactions, we first need to understand the process of change itself. It is through the understanding of this process that we will be able to better coach and educate our clients on what they can expect throughout the transition period. It is this sort of information that makes us stand out from the competition and puts us in a position to create loyal, lifelong relationships with our clients.

When we or our clients go through the process of change, there are a series of distinct and measurable steps that we take each time. In understanding these steps, we give ourselves a sense of control over the process. The knowledge of the steps and what each one is about, allows us to be more comfortable with what is a very uncomfortable process.

Fear

Before anyone can begin to make changes in his life, he must first get past the fear that holds him in place. Fear is the biggest stumbling block for most people. Ninety percent of the population is motivated to move away from what they don't want, while only 10 percent is motivated to move toward what they do want. This makes us a society of fear-mongers. We use fear in advertising, we use it in movies, we use it in relationships. Threats, ultimatums, warnings--all are ways in which we try to control our environment. But what are we afraid of?

Many people will tell you that they do not make changes in their lives because they are afraid of the unknown. If they make a change, they don't know what will happen and they are afraid of that. I suggest that this is not quite the unvarnished truth. I believe that it is not the unknown that we are afraid of. I believe that what we are truly afraid of is losing what we have--no matter how unsatisfactory what we have may be. Our current reality is where our comfort zone lies. And in this comfort zone, we feel at home. It doesn't matter how miserable that "home" feeling is - it's ours and we know what to expect from it.

This is why so many people stay within bad relationships, bad business partnerships, bad living circumstances. They are afraid of what they will get if they let go of them. They fear that what comes will be worse than what they left behind, or that they will not know how to deal with the new things that show up.

Also, we instinctively know that when we change one aspect of our lives, we run the risk that everything else in our lives will change with it. We are afraid that we will lose the things we have worked so hard to put in place. We know that every aspect of our lives plays into every other aspect. When we disrupt one, the others get shaken up as well. We are afraid of losing what we have that we like.

The problem with this thinking is that is makes us forget about choice. We often fall into the trap of thinking that everything happens to us, rather than it being the result of us acting upon the world. We forget the causal relationship between our choices and the changes that they result in, so we feel out of control, victimized by circumstances.

I know, you're probably thinking, "OK, fine, but what does this have to do with real estate?" The answer is:  everything. Our clients are dealing with this fear all the time. No one decides to buy or sell a home without having to go through this fear process. They have to believe that selling is the right thing to do. Some of them are forced into it by foreclosure, a divorce, or a death in the family. Others make a positive choice to move into a larger house or a better school system. But in each case, these people have to choose to change their lives substantially in order to make this kind of move. Each person we meet who is moving has shown great courage in facing her fears and deciding to move forward anyway.

Consider how you felt when you were a new agent in the business. When I do trainings, I often ask the groups I teach how long they waited before they got into the business. How long did they think about becoming an agent before they actually went out and did it? I get answers from a few days to as much as twenty years. On average, I find that my students tend to think about getting into real estate for about five years before they actually make the move. Why does it take us so long? Fear. We are afraid to give up a steady income. We are afraid to test ourselves and see if we can do it. We are afraid that we will fail. We are afraid that we will succeed. Whatever the fear, it's there. If it weren't, we would all get into the business the first time we think about it.

This is the same type of fear our clients are facing. When we meet someone who is "thinking" about selling her home, what she is actually saying is that she is weighing her choices and trying to decide whether she is willing to risk disrupting her life and bringing about unforeseen circumstances, or whether she is too comfortable with what she has to risk changing it. The only way we can affect her decision is to offer her support in seeing that either what she has isn't so hot (this is good for 90 percent of the people), or what she will get is worth the change (the other 10 percent).

When people don't change, it is this point that stops them. We all know people who talk about needing to make a change, but never quite seem to manage it. It is fear that stops them. We may think it is laziness or lack of motivation, but that is not the case. Fear is an insidious creature. It lurks in our subconscious minds distracting us from making changes. It suggests that we are tired, or that we need to go do something--that this other thing over here is far more important. These factors are not laziness or lack of motivation, they are fear distracting us--dragging us away from a decision that will change our lives.

We see this often in sellers who just can't seem to get their houses ready for sale. We've told them that they need to pack away a bunch of their personal items. They know that they need to fix the leaky roof and patch the spot inside where it stained the ceiling. But somehow, they just can't seem to get to it. In fact, sometimes we come over to see how they are doing and it seems that the house is worse than it was the last time we saw it. These people are wrestling with fear and they are losing.

What can we do to help? We can explain how the process of change works. We can talk to them about fear and how it can distract us from the work we need to do. We can have them bring in a professional organizer to help them get the process rolling. Sometimes, having someone there to help can be invaluable to a seller.

We faced many of the same issues when we were new in the business. We were overwhelmed by the amount of information that we needed to absorb. The feeling of being overwhelmed quickly turned into a sense of helplessness or even hopelessness and we became afraid that we wouldn't ever be able to learn it all. Our fear manifested as shut-down and we stopped working. We found ourselves slogging through emotional molasses trying to force ourselves to go out and meet people, see properties, learn the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) computer system, etc. We found it hard to get out of bed in the morning. We started coming into the office later and later, and sometimes not coming in at all.

Many agents leave the business when they hit this barrier, but we slogged on. Eventually, we got an understanding of the industry, of what was expected of us, and of our clients. In short, we eventually got a sense of comfort in our new surroundings. And, as we developed this sense of comfort, our fears dissipated and life got easier. We showed great courage in not giving in to the subconscious and conscious fears that threatened to stop us in our tracks with self-sabotaging habits. We ignored our impulses to shut down. We moved through the feelings of inadequacy and incompetence. We reassured ourselves that we could do it. And because we believed it, it was true.

Our clients need our support in believing that it can be true. They need us to remind them that they must take positive steps towards their goals. They need us to praise them for the work they do and prod them to continue onward. Their fear is causing them to get stuck in the mire. We provide them with the push, pull, yank, and twist that gets them unstuck. They will need our help for as long as it takes for them to get rolling again. Once they build up momentum, they'll be fine on their own. But until then, our job is to loan them some of our motivation.

For more on this subject and consultative selling in general, see Kelle Sparta’s book, The Consultative Real Estate Agent:  Building Relationships that Create Loyal Clients, Get More Referrals, and Increase Your Sales.

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