8 Steps for Setting Realistic Real Estate Goals

Setting the right goals and sticking to them is essential if you want to make 2021 full of appointments, listings, and commissions. Whether you’re struggling from lack of motivation, an unclear purpose, or an ineffective plan, these steps have the power to take your real estate career to new heights! Discover how to set real estate goals that will produce results instead of regrets.

Step 1. Discover Your “Why”

Every productive prospector keeps one thing in mind: a strong, clear why behind everything they do. When you’re constantly working towards something greater than yourself, it’s exciting to get out of bed every day and accomplish your real estate goals. Without this strong why, your drive and positivity can fade, and your success can decline. 

To discover your true why, you have to dive much deeper than wanting a new car or paying your bills. You have to be brutally honest with yourself and uncover these two things: 

1. The positive why that you’re chasing 
2. The negative why that you’re trying to avoid

Once you have a solid reason to wake up every day and make prospecting calls, write it down in a notebook every single day. This will help keep your why at the forefront of your mind, which in turn will positively impact your prospecting, listing appointments, and transactions.

Step 2. Discipline vs. Motivation

A common reason agents fail to reach their goals is due to lack of discipline and motivation. So how can you stay motivated for all of 2021 without burning out? You need to understand the difference between discipline and motivation. 

Discipline is your ability to stay on track regardless of motivation. Motivation gives meaning to your daily goals and provides a sense of purpose for what you do.

If you’re clear on your goals and the steps it will take to get there, it doesn’t matter if you have a bad day. You should still be able to stay disciplined. Remember your why and push yourself to do the things you don’t want to do. Even if you only give 80-90% (instead of 100%), it’s still better than nothing. Your main focus should be on showing up and executing on lead generation every day.

To keep your motivation up, surround yourself with positive and uplifting people who will help you stay positive and on track. Fill your life and mind with motivational content and positive influences. Whether it’s a podcast, video, or coach, make sure your brain is filled to the brim with motivational thoughts and attitudes.

Step 3. Develop a Confidence Mindset

In order to achieve your 2021 real estate goals, you have to develop a confident mindset. Without it, real estate and prospecting are going to seem a lot harder than it needs to. If you aren’t confident in the service you provide as an agent, your potential clients won’t be either.

If you’re clear and confident about how you can better your clients’ lives, you’ll be able to believe in yourself and build confidence at every step of your journey.

Start by asking yourself, “What value do I bring to homeowners?” Whether it’s your neighborhood expertise, your dedication to service, or the 110% effort you give, determine what sets you apart from other agents. Once you believe in what you can bring to a homeowner, your confidence on the phone will skyrocket and transfer to the service you provide to your clients. 

Step 4. Determine Your Pillars of Business

With so many ways to prospect and generate new business, a common mistake agents make is spreading themselves too thin. Many agents make the mistake of trying to tackle Expireds, mailers, social media, circle-prospecting, sphere of influence, marketing, FSBOs, door knocking… (you get the idea) all at once! This puts them on a fast track to burn out and prevents them from mastering any one skill or method.

You can avoid this by finding three or four “pillars of business” to focus on. Top-producer Joe Rosen’s pillars of business include REDX, Social Media, Community Building, and then something trendy and fun. He focuses on his four pillars for 6 months, then evaluates his performance to see where he needs to improve or change.

Determining your pillars of business will help you discover what works best for your individual business needs. Plus, you’ll be able to fully master a few specific lead-gen methods rather than trying to do everything at once and falling behind.

Step 5. Make a Plan

Now you have your why, mindset, and pillars of business… it’s time to put them together to make your 2021 plan! Brainstorm specific, measurable goals that you want to achieve in 2021. Avoid broad goals like, “Make a million dollars in GCI!” and set more attainable goals like, “Sell 36 homes.” 

Once you have your yearly goals, break them down into quarterly, monthly, weekly, and daily goals. If your goal is to close 36 sales this year, you’ll have to sell nine homes every quarter, which breaks down into three a month and almost one a week! Sounds like a lot? Keep breaking it down into smaller, more achievable goals to help you stay focused on your day-to-day.

To follow the example above, determine the daily actions you need to take to achieve 36 sales a year. Track your numbers to determine how many contacts it takes to set a listing appointment, how many appointments turn into listings, and how many listings actually get sold. This will help you know how many calls you need to make every day and week to land a listing and close the sale!

Step 6. Track Your Progress

Setting goals won’t do anything for your business if you don’t keep track of them. Tracking your numbers and goals not only helps you determine if you have solid pillars of business, but it allows you to see where your plans could use some fine-tuning.

One way to stay on track is to keep a goal notebook. Write down your goals and your whys every day at the top of each paper. This keeps your mindset on track for a successful and productive day. Then, write out daily objectives that align with your goals. Throughout the day, check them off as you complete them.

If you track your goals and daily objectives like this every day, you’ll know exactly what works for your business and what doesn’t. Plus, if you fall short of your goals, you’ll be able to go back and diagnose exactly what went wrong and how to fix it.

Step 7. Have an Accountability Partner

No one ever made it to the top alone, and neither should you. One of the best ways to ensure you achieve your real estate goals in 2021 is to share them with someone who will keep you accountable. Think of it as “Goal Insurance” that will help push you to your full potential this year.

All you need to do is ask a fellow agent or a good friend to check in with you on your daily and weekly goals. They can help motivate, inspire, and push you to pick up the phone, knock some doors, or post on social media.

This added accountability will help you achieve your goals and could be the one thing that pushes you to more appointments, listings, and commissions than you planned!

Step 8. Stay Consistent

New goals and plans are always exciting when we first start. It feels good to evaluate and elevate your real estate career. Trouble comes when the excitement and motivation wears off.

But you can keep things moving in the right direction with consistency. Like we mentioned before, discipline is a choice. Motivation can fade, but discipline and consistency must remain constant if you want to pack your pipeline and boost your business. 

So make a conscious choice to follow your plan daily and success will follow.

Prosperity is Ahead!

Having clear plans with specific goals to help achieve them will help make 2021 your best year yet. It’s up to you to remain disciplined and find the things that work best for your business. The income you desire is waiting for you at the end of these tips. Go and get it!

About REDX 

REDX offers real estate professionals a complete all-in-one prospecting platform for generating listing appointments. The platform includes seller leads, a power dialer, and a lead management tool that makes follow up simple. Click here to learn more about prospecting FSBOs, Expireds, FRBOs, Pre Foreclosures, GeoLeads™, and our Power Dialer.