Monday Morning Coffee

Hello all,

“Store Your Nuts?”

I have been at this Manager/Broker thing now for 5 years which has included my Monday Morning Coffee email. Each of the first four years I have sent my annual “Store Your Nuts” email about this time of year. Being in it every day it is easy to pick up the correlation between activity and closings. When general activity is strong you know your closings will be strong 60-90 days out because of the time it takes to get to contract, then the table. When activity is slow obviously you can forecast the opposite. Sometimes we get lulled into confidence because we are having a strong closing period but if the activity is down we need to budget for the future. Coming out of the spring market each of the last four years the activity in the office came to a screeching halt. July & August continued to be strong closing months but the road ahead looked a little gloomy, so I sent my “Store Your Nuts “ email for the fall and winter. I am not quite ready to send up the warning flag just yet for this year. Activity in the office the last 30 days has been as strong as I have ever seen, so the fall is looking good for closings. This is a bigger picture of how I look at the office however I encourage you to take the same approach with your business. Is the phone still ringing, do you have buyers in your car, going on listing appointments… These are all signs that the pipeline will stay full and the cash will keep flowing. I am not saying we are out of the woods and it could be a cold winter but for now the fall is looking good. Let’s keep working hard and keep this rolling as long as we can.

Enjoy the coffee,

Joe      

INSPIRATION FOR TODAY:

"A single thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning."

- Unknown

THESE SHOES ARE MADE FOR WALKING!!

Remember one of the ancient sayings from your first-grade teacher? It went something like this: "We learn to do by doing." So . . . from "Chicken Soup" comes this story by John Holt:

"Not many years ago I began playing the cello. Most people would say that what I am doing is 'learning to play' the cello. But these words carry into our minds the strange idea that there exist two very different processes: 1) learning to play the cello; and 2) playing the cello. They imply that I will do the first until I have completed it, at which point I will stop the first process and begin the second. In short, I will go on 'learning to play' until I have 'learned to play' and then I will begin to play. Of course, this is nonsense. There are not two processes, but one. We learn to do something by doing it. There is no other way."

How do we learn to swim? Do we get the basics in a classroom, taught to us on a chalkboard, and then hit the pool like Mark Spitz or Esther Williams? How about riding a bike? Do we study the laws of physics, the effects of gravitational pull, or other Einstein-like theories, and then launch ourselves into the top spot in the "Tour de France?" No - we just fall down and scrape our knees a lot.

Want to add new direction to your life? Begin walking in that direction. Put one foot in front of the other. In other words, "Just do it!" It all begins with your imagination harnessing the power of your mind and the energy of your body. Once you choose a new role for your life, don't learn the part - act the part. One other thing - don't let that "single thorn of experience" deter you!