The Quiet Between Deals

The slow weeks between sales decide a good deal of what the next busy season looks like. When nothing is registering and no offers are coming in, there is a strong pull to treat the time as dead, or to spend it worrying about the next commission. But most of the work that produces future sales is exactly the work that cannot be done while a deal is running.

Think about what a slow fortnight allows. The buyers whose bonds were declined last year can be phoned, because some of them have since cleared debts or changed jobs and may now qualify. Mandates close to expiring can be reviewed honestly with the sellers, before the listing goes stale. Photos taken in a dry winter can be replaced now that the garden is green. None of it pays this month.

An agent who only works when a deal demands it is leaning on luck for the next one. The people who always seem to have something in the pipeline are usually just the ones who used the slow patches well, while everyone else sat waiting for the phone to ring.