#AgentAmy’s thoughts over the last couple of months…

I read a news article in the Free Press recently about the amount of Manitoba’s taking steps to get their real estate license, my first thoughts were, "I hope they know what they are getting into." Here is a little bit of the Free Press article….

"In the 12 months ending in March 2020, 353 people enrolled to take the first module required in training to be a sales agent. Over the next 12 months, even with an initial dip due to COVID-19, it jumped to 817. In all of 2017, 2018, and 2019 combined, 1,066 people enrolled in module 1; since last May there has been 938 sign up.

The first quarter of 2021 saw 111 people get certified as new agents. Over the first quarter in the previous four years, an average of 48 realtors got started. Throughout the last three quarters, 225 new agents have printed business cards — more than any three consecutive quarters combined over the past five years."

I started in the real estate business about 9 years ago. I had lots of experience in sales but nothing that compared to the real estate industry. I worked for Jen as her unlicensed assistant for about two years and then decided to get licensed and become a Realtor. I have been a Realtor with RE/MAX for 7 years (this seems crazy to me)! I love my job, it is hard, time consuming, physically, and mentally exhausting, rewarding, fun, everchanging, among other things but real estate is not easy. It is talked about a lot in the media. The housing market and how crazy it is and then people just assuming that everyone in the business is making crazy amounts of money because houses are selling so fast and for some much over list price. What you need to understand is that yes, the housing market is crazy BUT it is extremely challenging to work in a market like this. We are working all hours of the day, making sacrifices as well as our families. We put our clients first and hardly take time for ourselves. Our focus is our clients because without them we are nothing in this business.

I have had some time to think (some, not a lot) over the last couple of months and what I really want to say is Thank you – short and sweet haha! I want to say thank you to my husband Chris, who works Monday – Friday 9-5 but he does not stop there. There have been countless nights where I am not home for dinner and/or bedtime and he makes sure our son is well fed, happy, loved, read-to and asleep, as well as working tirelessly on our basement renovation. I give him the gears a lot but he is my rock and I couldn’t have made it where I am today without him. We have been through a lot in the last 16 years, its hard to imagine what the universe will throw at us next.

I want to thank my son Gavin, for being the best little boy we could have ever imagine. You are independent, determined, strong willed, smart, caring, loving, adorable, I could go on forever, but you get the idea. I love you with everything I am, and it breaks my heart every time I have to leave the house and you say “Mama, you have to go to a work appointment?” To which I say “Yes, I do” and you proceed to cry. He does not cry so much anymore, which makes me sad because now my leaving is normal to him. I cherish him every chance I get. I also want to thank my parents, who are always there to support me, and I will always be grateful for that. You taught me that hard work will get you far and to always be proud of myself. This past year and a half has been challenging in so may way but not being able to see my parents and sister and her family has been one of the hardest things (they live in BC). The end is in sight, and I can not wait to see you all soon.

I also want to thank Jen Queen, who has always been an inspiration to me. She is one of the smartest, hard working, generous people I know. She has built a booming business in a very short amount of time. I was a little hesitant to join her one-person team 9 years ago, but it was one of the best decisions I have ever made, so thank you for believing in me. She has also built a solid team, that supports one another, which I believe is a key to success.

#AgentAmy

Amy McDermid

Phone: (204) 470-5356
Email: Amy@JenniferQueen.com

June marks my tenth year in real estate.  To switch things up this year, I’m going to report what I can remember from each year.  I find each year in real estate has at least one significant or impactful lesson to teach us.  So here we go!

Year 1 (2011):

Lessons: Relationships matter.  Be good to those that are good to you.  Walk away from those that just don’t appreciate you. The majority of my business this year came from ComFree listings (before they were a licensed brokerage – which means I wasn’t breaking any rules).  I had many hang up on me, but those that agreed to list with me turned out to be wonderful clients that I still work with today.! 

Sold 12 homes this year.

Fun story from this year: Sold my first acreage (72+ acres)

Year 2 (2012):

Lessons: Relationships matter (again).  Started to learn about the importance not only of keeping in touch with clients throughout the process of their home buying/selling process, but long after as well.  Many of the clients I worked with in 2012, I am still in touch with today.

Sold 38 homes this year.

Fun story from this year: One of the homes I sold had bullet holes in the side of it.

Year 3 (2013)

Lessons: Not all sales are happy sales.  Sold homes for clients that had previously bought in a happy time, but were now selling for sad reasons (death, divorce, job loss).  This career is full of ups and downs, and our job is to help people navigate our clients through the good times and bad.

Sold 47 homes this year.

Fun story from this year: I sold my own house this year.  Still regret it today (would have kept it as a rental)

Year 4 (2014)

Lessons: The importance of pricing (and ownership of bad pricing).  I had more listings expire this year than ever in my career.  Sometimes it is scary to have conversations about pricing with sellers – you don’t want to offend them, particularly if you were wrong.  Learning how to have those difficult discussions became paramount this year.

Sold 66 homes this year.

Fun Story: I had more homes expire this year than sold.  This line was super embarrassing and cringe-worthy for me to write! 

Year 5 (2015)

Lessons: Have a plan A, a plan B, and a plan C! From selling another personal residence, to having a slightly softer market, it became paramount to formulate multiple plans for selling. 

Sold 93 homes this year.

Fun Story: Logan and I had purchased a former (remediated) grow-op before I was in the business and chose to sell it in 2015.  We “sold” it three times before our third cash buyer came along and was able to close. We also welcomed our first child this year.

Year 6 (2016)

Lessons: Remember your “why”.  After the birth of our daughter, Everly, work-life balance started to become more important.  Parenthood also really emphasized the motivations for why families choose to move.  I thought I “got it” before, but I don’t think I fully understood the brain of a parent until I was one.

Sold 62 homes this year (maternity leave for four months).

Fun Story: I negotiated a complete deal at a table with clients while nursing a poopy baby.  Thank you to the lovely family that encouraged me to bring my baby along… your kindness and acceptance of my situation meant a lot to me.

Year 7 (2017)

Lessons: Be confident in your value proposition and the advice you give.  Stand firm in it and don’t back down.

Sold 107 homes this year.

Fun Story: I was pregnant (again) this year.  I also had to cancel an open house due to an incident of domestic violence as a bunch of walls and doors had been punched through.  Sad all around.

Year 8 (2018)

Lessons: The best interest of your clients always come before your own.  There were a couple of sales this year that involved careful consideration of a clients’ position.  Whether it be helping with some home renovations, doing some pro-bono work, or just advising not to buy or sell, there were a multitude of situations and reasons this year that warranted a different kind of care.

Sold 75 homes this year.

Fun Story: We welcomed our second child, Blaine this year.  He has a very piercing scream that would challenge the strongest eardrum.  I made many calls from my sunroom even when it was -30 outside just so I could sound “professional”.

Year 9 (2019)

Lessons: The importance of a team. Amy was off for most of this year as she was taking maternity with her son, Gavin.  So, we ended up hiring Ashton and Carrie both in late 2018.  Learning to grow and work as a team was so paramount to our future success.  We really missed Amy’s presence and were so happy to have her back toward the end of 2019.

Sold 154 homes this year.

Fun Story: Started listing my first luxury properties (or what I consider luxury property)… SOOO much fun to market!

Year 10 (2020)

Lessons: What we need, is really quite simple.  The year of COVID… where what was highlighted was the importance of such basic necessities – health, family, shelter and love.  We thought that real estate would be dead and that we would need to buckle down for a tough year.  It turned out to be the exact opposite, with record sales.

Sold 168 homes this year.

Fun Story: I gave birth to our third child in June of 2020… and was negotiating in between contractions. The poor agent on the other side of the transaction was so uncomfortable with this that he called my broker for the transaction.  I may have sent out a DocuSign for signatures from the hospital bed…

Well, there you have it, 10 years of lessons, sales, teamwork, amazing clients, and so much joy from this profession.  No two days are alike and I wouldn’t have it any other way! Thanks for reading this far!!  I look forward to another 10 years

#AgentJen

Jennifer Queen

Phone: (204) 797-7945
Email: Jennifer@JenniferQueen.com