Washington Mortgage Planner-straight up mortgage advice and commentary

Good morning:  I was listening to a great CD this morning from Brian Buffini that covered how to deal with clients in a challenging market.  For more information about Buffini's programs, log onto www.buffiniandcompany.com.

Brian Buffini talked about the 5 stages of grief or loss.  They are:

1) Denial

2) Anger

3) Bargaining

4) Depression

5) Acceptance

So how does this relate to what we do?  First, a lot of us came from the "perfect storm" where it was easy money in real estate.  Now, it isn't anymore.  Yet I'm sure quite a few of us refused to believe this was actually happening.  This is the denial phase.  In the CD, Brian Buffini talks about how one of his friends had to sell his house for over $60,000 less than he wanted.  And it was fairly priced to begin with.  The market just turned.  So, number one, if you're a seller, it's important to be realistic about what your property is worth these days.  Otherwise, you may want to wait until the market improves.

The second phase of loss or grief is where we get upset or angry because it's tougher to get what we want.  Again, a seller may feel like their home is worth more and start to blame their realtor, etc. for not marketing it properly. It could be as simple as the market has changed.  You need to be realistic and adapt to the new conditions.

Third, bargaining can lead to selling yourself short.  You may want to give away the farm just to get your property sold.  Or you cheapen what you do or who you are just to consummate the deal

Fourth, I believe a lot of us have given up our efforts because it's just too hard.  This is depression.  So many people in the real estate industry I know have scaled back.  I'm not sure they ever experienced hard times.

Fifth, and finally, acceptance is the light at the end of the tunnel.  I have a good friend who is a real estate agent who recently underwent a very trying personal challenge.  She definitely went through all the stages of grief.  What's remarkable is she moved to acceptance within a couple of months.  My hat's off to her.

So the lesson should be that we need to move toward acceptance as quickly as we can.  It doesn't mean this is supposed to be easy.  We're obviously in a very challenging market that is not predicted to improve until sometime next year at the earliest.  But if we realize it's a "normal" market and do what it takes to succeed, we can all win!  Good luck to all of you.  I'm pulling for you!  Have an incredible day.

Paul