7 time management tips for real estate agents

Article by Silvia Liu Marketing Specialist 4 October 2018

From nurturing and following up leads to completing paperwork to meeting clients and closing deals, real estate agents have a multitude of different tasks to juggle and complete on any given day. So how do successful agents manage their time?

Here are seven time management tips for real estate agents to help you maximise your time:

1. Track your time

At the end of a busy day, you’re often left wondering where the time went. That’s why the first step to better managing your time is to know exactly where it went.

You can do this by tracking your time using time management apps like RescueTime and Toggl. RescueTime tracks your time spent on websites and applications whereas Toggl breaks it down by project and task. Both apps have free plans for basic time tracking and are available on desktop and mobile.

Image credit: rescuetime.com

Once you know exactly where your time went, it becomes much easier to spot inefficiencies in your day. Subsequently, you can create actionable goals to eliminate procrastination and boost productivity i.e. condensing your time spent answering emails to one hour per day.

2. Prioritise your tasks

When you have multiple tasks due at the same time, it can be stressful and overwhelming to think about, let alone do. That’s why it’s crucial that you lay it all out and prioritise your tasks based on importance and urgency.

The Eisenhower Matrix is a great tool to help you do this as it sorts tasks into four quadrants–do first, schedule, delegate and don’t do.

Those that are important and urgent belong in the “do first” quadrant while those that are important but less urgent should be scheduled in your calendar.

Meanwhile, tasks that are urgent but less important can be delegated to another staff member or a real estate virtual assistant. For all other tasks that are neither important or urgent, you should stop doing them.

By following the Eisenhower Matrix, you can produce the most impactful work in the least amount of time while reducing stress and burnout.

3. Outsource

Once you’ve prioritised tasks using the Eisenhower Matrix, you end up with a list of tasks in the “delegate” quadrant that you can assign to others. These tasks might include data entry, bookkeeping, scheduling appointments, posting listings and responding to rental and sales enquiries, just to name a few.

By outsourcing these tasks to virtual assistants or freelancers, you can reduce labour costs and improve overall productivity. Additionally, your team can spend less time on admin and more time nurturing relationships and generating revenue.

4. Leverage technology

Another time management tip for real estate agents is to leverage technology to save time and money. This might mean automating tedious tasks such as outreach, appointment scheduling, segmentation, email blasts and follow up messages.

A great customer relationship management (CRM) software is a good place to start. Be sure to choose one with built-in automation to help you conditionally nurture your leads and lead scoring capabilities to help you take the guesswork out of prospecting.

This might mean setting rules to automatically send your lead an e-card when it’s their birthday, a “just sold” email to those who have enquired about a particular listing once it’s been marked as sold, or an email prompting them to schedule an appointment in your calendar if their lead score reaches a certain threshold.

If you’re a property manager, a modern cloud property management software can also help you streamline workflows and reduce human error. With features such as bill scanning, one-click disbursements, automated reconciliation and triggered messages, end of month can be done in minutes, not hours. Plus, there’s no need for backups as your data automatically syncs to the cloud. For 360 Property Management Mackay, this meant 115 hours of regained productivity and a cost saving of $3,437 every month.

5. Stop multitasking

Did you know that multitasking reduces productivity by as much as 40%?

Every time you switch between tasks, you create a new mental block which can diminish productivity and performance. That’s why it’s best to focus on one task at a time, in order to get the task done quickly and efficiently.

This is reinforced in Gary Keller’s best selling book, The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results. His book discusses the value of focusing on the most important task in any given project to yield the best results.

So the next time you feel tempted to multitask, mute your phone, close any redundant browser tabs and block off time to really concentrate on completing that one task.

6. Connect with your team

One of the best time management tips for real estate agents is to connect with your team on a day-to-day basis. This can be as simple as a quick 5 to 15 minute stand-up meeting to talk about what each member is working on that day and any questions or concerns they might have. Not only does this improve transparency and understanding of shared goals, but it also reduces roadblocks and encourages positive team building.

7. Take care of yourself

Even if you have a million and one things to do, it’s crucial that you take care of your mental and physical health. Not only does this help you avoid burnout, but it also ensures long-term productivity for you and your team. After all, when you don’t feel your best, you don’t operate at your best, which can greatly impact your work and those around you.

So make sure you get enough sleep at night, drink at least eight glasses of water every day, make time for exercise every week, hold off on coffee till at least one hour after waking up, take breaks when you need to, let go of perfectionism and switch off after work to have fun.

If you enjoyed this article on 7 Time Management Tips for Real Estate Agents, you might also be interested in 5 Surprisingly Simple Tech Hacks to Boost Your Productivity, 10 Incredibly Useful Tech Tools Every Real Estate Agent Needs and Top 6 Benefits of Cloud Property Management Software.

Did we miss a time management tip for real estate agents? Let us know in the comments below.