Sunday, December 12, 2010

2010 - The Year in Review


What a year its been for me during 2010 in my travels as a Realtor with Zip Realty...

So 2010 started off with a bang with a luxury sale on a new construction home in Bon Air and my having achieved Zip's President's Club award for the 1st time after a strong Q4 2009 where I had 12 closings. As the year progresses, I've been able to not only keep the President's club status for the entire year, but after 15 closings in Q2, I achieved the Gold status and maintained it going forward.

Then, I headed out to Los Angeles in May for REO University's annual conference and just missed getting a chance to watch Kobe and the Lakers play at Staples the night after we left. At this conference, I made the connection with Titanium Solutions and later become a Home Retention Consultant. The family took our annual June trip to Myrtle Beach along with my in-laws, after my wife and I had snuck away to Puerto Rico for a quick trip in April. Then, in September, for the first time, I went to the Five Star REO conference in Dallas and while there also visited Jerry's World (aka. Dallas Cowboys Stadium) for the game and heartbreaking loss to the Chicago Bears. Somewhere around this time, I got certified with the Default School for their RDCPro designation/certification.

Right before going to Five Star, I was fortunate enough to become approved as a new REO agent for Bank of America, after having just earned my 1st REO property for another firm. The roller coaster continued as I got a contract on that home and then lost the listing as it sold to another REO company. A stroke of luck though as that caused me to keep the listing with the new firm and am now approved with them as well (although as of writing this the home in question still hasn't closed due to seller-side title issues as a result of the sale).

Then a major change was announced in late October/early November with the Zip Realty changing their nationwide agent sales force from W2 employees to 1099 contractors. That change allowed me to start my new team, The Wright Choice (www.thewrightchoicerichmondrealty.com), and right now I have 2 other agents having joined the team and the future looks very bright for our group going forward, including the search for a marketing agent to augment our efforts and several listing agents. Along the way, I closed 45 transactions in a whirlwind year that went by really fast in a lot of ways.

I'd really like to thank my wife Aimee for putting up with all of the hours and helping to manage our household during this time. Additionally, I'd like to thank my District Director Ralph Maggiore for supporting my growth and my broker Vivian Stevenson for helping me save several transactions and watching my back-side. I really miss my old team, The Producers, that won several awards during the summer of 2010 and as a prize attended several Richmond Flying Squirrels together in the Bank of America box.

That being said, 2011 promises to hold many changes and realty stories-to-be, as well as hopefully a lot of production. While my goal for 2010 was to get my first REO and I achieved that, my goal for 2011 will be to achieve the following two things: 1) to conquer short sales on the listing side with at least 10 short sales closes & 2) to end 2011 with at least 4 agents on The Wright Choice and having closed as a team at least 50 transactions.

P.S. - I would be remiss in this analysis of 2010 if I didn't include my son, Brandon's rise to the rank of Wolf in Cub Scouts and his team's undefeated I-9 Flag Football Championship.

All in all, it was quite a memorable year and obviously I have a lot to be thankful for from this year, and to be hopeful for as we progress into the next (2011).