Old or New?

When I was a young whipper-snapper aged 19 in my first year in sales I listed a property in a suburb of my home town. I’d seen other properties advertised as being in the same suburb but in the “old” part of it.

Using my superior intellect, I decided that if they were being advertised as being in “old ” – I’d go one better and advertised mine as being in “new ”.

New is better than old right?

Well, not in this case. The old part of the suburb was seen as far more desirable than the new part.

Not surprisingly I spent my open home at the property in complete peace and quiet (in other words completely alone).

Ironically – an “older” (aka more experienced) agent in my marketplace would probably have never made that mistake. “Old” once again trumps “new”!

But new doesn’t have to always lose out. New doesn’t have to deal with the assumption that “they should have known better”. If new owns up to the mistake and goes about fixing it appropriately, new can oftentimes create a better relationship than was there in the first place. New also often has more time to fix the mistake.

At that stage, as new as I was, I had fewer listings than my colleagues, I had no family commitments, I had all the time in the world to open the property 5 times a week if was necessary and all the time to put in to fix the relationship after my little slip up.

As a newbie in any industry let it sink in that you’re going to make mistakes. What you do to resolve those mistakes using all the advantages of your “newness” is what really counts and what will decide whether you get past the new stage or whether instead you move on and become new in another industry.

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By Kirsty Dunphey with No comments