The Sign Against the Tree

A few weeks ago I told you about the man who yelled at me in Ocean View, the one I almost didn't turn around for. Here's what actually happened next.

My first four months in real estate, I closed nothing. Not one deal. Cold calls all day, doors on the weekends, zero income, and a wife working two jobs so I could keep trying.

That man was a retired Navy diver. My first real client. My only real client at the time.

I followed up for weeks. I did everything right, everything I was learning.

And one morning my phone buzzed with a notification: his house had just been listed. With another Realtor.

I was really disappointed. I stood there and asked myself the question every rookie asks in the dark at some point.

Can I actually do this?

The front yard

About a week later, he called. Asked me to stop by.

I thought that was strange. The house was already listed.

I got my answer from the front yard when I drove up. The other agent's sign had been pulled out of the ground and was leaning against a tree.

They'd had a bad experience. They'd fired her. And they moved forward with me.

That became my first listing. It sold in weeks. My first commission check was a gross three thousand eight hundred dollars, six months after I got my license.

Fourteen more deals followed that year.

Here's what that yard taught me, and I've built everything on it since:

You don't always win the choosing. But if you keep showing up, you win the re-choosing.

Year one of anything is brutal.