Our job, as Champion Agents, is to help buyers uncover their desires and needs for their next home and guide them to the achievement of that goal based on market conditions, financial capacity, investment influences, and short and long-term value. You might use a script like this to open this discussion with your prospect.

"One of my primary jobs is helping you select the home that best suits your needs and budgetary considerations. I will counsel you on different options and features with each home. We will also discuss school districts, resale value, potential features that are functionally obsolete that could affect the future value of the home, area and neighborhood value trends, and anything else that would affect your short or long-term enjoyment and equity in the home you are considering."

We need to clearly understand their desires and needs based on preferred style, preferred features, preferred location, price range, and payment parameters. These are all core areas of probing and discussion for a Champion Agent. The key word is preferred. What do they prefer? They may not get what they prefer. That is one of our main jobs through market knowledge; to bring them into the reality of the marketplace. One of the skills, after we secure a client to represent, is to manage their expectations. This segment of the interview helps us uncover their expectations, so we can begin the process of managing them. We need to know what they want, but the marketplace will ultimately determine what they can purchase. The style of home, features they desire, and location categories are pretty straightforward for a skillful agent. Most people will easily tell you what they want in these areas. They have been thinking, dreaming, and planning for these for weeks, months, and years. If we leave this discussion of style, features, and location at a surface level, we put our ability to manage their expectations at risk. Just knowing what they want isn't enough. We have to first know why they want it.

Why do they want a certain style of home? Why do they want a three-bedroom or four-bedroom home or a pool in the backyard? Why do they want a certain size lot or school district? One of the mistakes salespeople make is they don't know the why of the client. It is paramount to know why. We gain the perspective of how they think. It also gives us a view of the reasoning and motivation behind their decisions. We don't usually dig deep enough to find out why. We are just merely finding out bedrooms, baths, square footage, location, and neighborhoods. That's not enough service quality for your clients to commit a prospect to your way of doing business. The other area to address after each segment of style, features, and location is, "How important is it?" The style, features, and location are a collection of wants, needs, and dreams. What happens if you become fixated on the dream items and fail to fulfill the needs in a home? If we don't know how important the pool is for them or that fourth bedroom or three-car garage, we have no way to guide them through the marketplace challenges. A Champion knows how important the pool is to a client. Does the home have to have it installed now? Can it have room in the yard to add one later? Is this a "10" in terms of have to, or is it a "5"? "If we found you a home that had everything else you want and need without a pool, how strongly would you consider the home?" Why they want it and how important is it are essential expectation questions for each buyer.

The area that is most challenging for most agents is the financial area. When dealing with price range, payments, and financial qualification, there are more moving pieces to consider. It is also unnatural to ask, probe, and question someone else about his or her finances. We need to probe and thoroughly understand this area to provide the best counsel to our clients. The most significant of these areas is the monthly payment.

There has been a transition in our culture in the last thirty years. That transition is the shift to what I would call the payment society. The price range discussion has shifted more toward a monthly payment or monthly budget discussion. The reason is people are more payment focused than price focused.

Forty years ago, people had very few monthly payments. When I was a child, my parents, like many people in that era, paid cash for everything, even their cars. If people didn't have enough money to buy a new car, they bought a used one based on the cash they had saved. With saving currently at an all time low in the United States, the payment society continues to grow. The trend to a payment society started in the '70s. More and more people bought cars on payments and used revolving credit cards to live beyond their means. In the '80s, cars began to be leased instead of owned. It allowed us to own higher status and better cars for equivalent payments of lower level cars that we bought. The focus of monthly payments became ever more entrenched through use of credit cards and leasing.

The trends of the '70s and '80s have lead to a high percentage of our prospects that have car loans and credit card debt. The average American has in excess of $8,500 in consumer debt on credit cards. Less than 40% of people who have credit cards pay them off monthly. The car loans and credit cards make monthly payment such a significant discussion at this stage of the counseling interview.

On a personal note, if I have just described you being in the 60% of people who have consumer debt on credit cards, resolve to execute a plan to get rid of your consumer debt in the next six to twelve months maximum. If you have car payments, make a plan to pay off your car in the next twenty-four months after you retire your consumer debt. There is a great Proverb, "The borrower is servant to the lender." Having debt in depreciating assets like cars, consumer debt, furniture, and anything that loses value is clearly putting you in the servant position.

I, like many people, was in that cycle of debt in my 20's. Against my parents' wise counsel and guidance, I fell into the trap of debt. The good news is I got out before I exited my 20's. Most people stay in that cycle their whole lives. When I got out of consumer and car debt, I vowed never to go back; and I haven't. The best part is, when I got out, I was amazed at the money I had each month to invest and enjoy. I was able to really save money to invest in the future and even enjoy some better things in life for today. I urge you to change. I would rather be the lender than the borrower today!

Published: December 2, 2011

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Dirk Zeller is a sought out speaker, celebrated author and CEO of Real Estate Champions. His company trains more than 350,000 Agents worldwide each year through live events, online training, self-study programs, and newsletters. The Real Estate community has embraced and praised his six best-selling books; Your First Year in Real Estate, Success as a Real Estate Agent for Dummies®, The Champion Real Estate Agent, The Champion Real Estate Team, Telephone Sales for Dummies®, Successful Time Management for Dummies®, and over 300 articles in print. To learn more regarding this article, please visit www.realestatechampions.com.