2022 was an exciting and prosperous year at HST.  We worked, we collaborated, we learned, we worked some more.  2021 was a different year:  we masked, we gloved, we cleaned, we zoomed, we learned, and worked a lot, sometimes with stressed clients and stressed agents.   In 2022, as the COVID pandemic has slowly lessened its stranglehold on [...]

Freudenfreude:  taking delight in someone else's achievement, the opposite of schadenfreude. 

 

You may be familiar with Schadenfreude, a word of German orgin, that has gotten new attention after appearing in an episode of Ted Lasso.  I ran across this word, freudenfreude, which aptly describes how I feel each and every day as the Broker [...]

This year’s Agent Recognition even was held Friday, February 8th at Pine & Iron Axe Throwing in Hartford and catered by Bears BBQ.  Our annual outing celebrates everyone’s accomplishments and participation in the previous year of outstanding sales production and customer service.  We close the office for the afternoon so everyone has an [...]

 

I had a call from my sales rep at Zillow.  She said was checking in to see how I was doing.  Actually, I think she called because she was notified that I increased my “spend” on Zillow in order to capture 109% of my market—who knew there was such a thing?  This special percentage must be reserved for the Premier-est of the Premier or the [...]

And the Winner is…. Us!

 

 Home Selling Team in Mansfield CT landed the top spot again in our 15 town region by over 100 properties sold or over 20% market share. How’d we do it?

• Grinding it out
• Slogging Through
• Blood, Sweat & Tears
• Nose to the Grindstone
• Killin’ It

Whatever you want to call it… we did it with a multi-pronged approach focused on training, synergy, service and marketing.

I recently wrote a blog post on how to help birds survive the harsh conditions and bone-chilling cold this winter. At the time, I thought a comparison could be made on how to keep agents and their clients happy, fed and protected in the harsh market conditions we experienced in Mansfield and our general market area in 2017: Declining prices, crumbling foundations, foreclosures, budget crisis, out-bound migration, Mansfield single family rentals.

A professional real estate agent working full time in real estate sales must be diligent in their business acumen and the nurturing of existing and future clients through the most favorable and harshest of climates. This can be accomplished with ease when you have a team of people to collaborate with when difficult or unforeseen problems or challenges arise. Check.

Marketing real estate is more effective and beneficial when everyone commits to brand awareness and exposure. We invest heavily in post signs, directional signs and riders and our Realtor.com position as a participating office provides us more exposure and direct leads on our own listings. Check.

We strive to get every client the best price and terms in every transaction. We strive to provide referrals of affiliates and vendors we know and trust to make a real estate transaction as smooth and trouble-free as possible. Was every client happy last year? No. There are some clients, that no matter what we do, are not satisfied with their real estate transaction or on our end, there has been what I consider to be a communication failure. Thankfully, this is rare and our client satisfaction is very high, as evidenced by our ranking, ratings and reviews both individually and office-wide. Check.

I am looking forward to a warm spring and a less challenging environment where birds and real estate agents and their clients can get a much needed respite from survival mode.