3 of the best parts for my business during Quarantine.

I have done my best to follow protocol through the Covid Quarantine this year and at times have had both frustration as well as gratitude for the experience. When your livelihood depends on meeting people and you work from home, many of us have had to reinvent the way we operate personally and professionally. Here are a few things that I have adapted during the quarantine that I am grateful for and can imagine I am not alone

1. Shut in with the family - As difficult as it has been, being locked in with the family has its benefits. I realized that every call doesn't need to be answered. With the tv in the background or the kids arguing over the color of the sky its hard to be on the phone but it also made me step back and evaluate each incoming call. Ask my wife and she will tell you at one point if the phone rang I answered it no matter my current placement but during this time at home with the family I learned to not take that clients 3rd call in an hour or just let one go to voicemail and call back a few minutes later.
2. Good meetings not all meetings - When you are in sales and starting a company sometimes you feel like you need to take every meeting and not miss a thing but during the Quarantine we were literally not able to meet in person. And when we did a meeting it was typically a zoom call meeting which just isn't the same. I found myself wondering if the extended rambling on the zoom call was necessary and especially made me crave high impact one on one meetings. Yes I will have coffee with anyone with a pulse but after this covid thing ends I am going to make an effort to schedule much higher level and intentional meetings then in the past.
3. I'm glad I am cheap - I drive paid for regular cars and wear a uniform and its not because I think its the coolest thing but because I can afford it during the worst times. These are a couple of silly examples but they are true and you don't need a financial planner to tell you to safe more with them to be effective. My goal every single year is to make more then I spend but the hardest thing to control is how much I make so I keep my expenses at a minimum to be a prepared as possible for a time like the Spring of 2020. I have been blessed the last few years with a terrible business and feel its my responsibility to preserve my earnings as much as possible since it can go away as quickly as the media decides it should go away. Being cheap is something that may not sound fun but it sure came in handy with the phone stopped ringing in March and as we go into July its still not back to anything close to normal activity. In turn I have been able to keep my eye on the ball and focus on my future business instead of scrambling to hang on as much as maybe years past.
4. Keep Selling - In the past I have been confronted head on with the reality that no business is guaranteed and nothing is handed to us so I work accordingly. I love to celebrate a sale or a big month as much as the next person but I also value the power of momentum and opportunity. Even when times are bad for everyone and no one is making real estate decisions I have to continue to stay top of mind and engaged. I know several agents that disappeared until things come back or businesses that have all but thrown in the towel and I don't know that either come back. Continuing to sell, market and filling the pipeline in business is a must during a time when our arms are tied and a quick easy deal may not be for a while.

I love trying times and I really love looking back to see how I have evolved professionally or personally. So a period like the covid pandemic is right up my alley and boy was it a doozy. I sure hope everyone is doing well and looking forward to some type of normalcy in the coming weeks.

curt