During slow real estate markets, agents have to make whatever changes they can to save cash. When home sales are down, real estate brokerages earn fewer bucks. Spending , then, becomes an important way to protect the main point of real estate businesses. The good thing is that agents can take several steps to conserve money.
Flexible Work Force
As a result of smartphones, notebook computers, email and fax machines, real estate brokers have to spend less time inside their offices. Agents should encourage that. Agents can benefit from the flexible work force, which spends most of its time out of the office, by lessening the amount of equipment they stock in their own offices. Rather than installing costly computers at each desk, agents can install just three for the whole office. Rather than supplying work stations and work areas for every realtor, agents can provide just five work stations. This works because most brokers –at least the successful ones–are spending most of their time showing houses to clients, attending agent open homes or helping their vendors receive their houses in showing condition.
Smaller Offices
Since technology has allowed real estate agents to conduct most of their business from coffee shops or their cars, agents can now lease smaller offices for much less money. They also don’t have to worry as much about finding a perfect, but more costly, place for all these offices. Most home sellers and buyers today find their real estate brokers online. Few of them walk into a real estate office and ask to talk to an agent. Again, this gives agents the opportunity to downsize to smaller, more affordable offices. The annual savings in rents can accumulate.
Faster Support Staff
Agents appearing to reduce significant costs from their companies should look closely at the number of support staffers they use. They may not need an office supervisor if most brokers are working away from the office. Agents may not even need receptionists to answer the phones. A increasing number of sellers and buyers contact real estate brokers straight through email and mobile phones. They seldom call the office directly. To deal with the dwindling number of calls that do develop into real estate brokerages, agents can assign their real estate agents specific times during the week whenever they have to staff the office. This will cost agents much less than hiring full-time receptionists or office managers.
