How should Melbourne agents handle stage 4 restrictions?

However, Mr Panos pointed out that there is light at the end of the tunnel for property experts who do the hard work during this period.

“I think that if you are a real estate agent in Melbourne, you’ve got to accept the fact that you’re not going to make many sales. And if we use New Zealand as a template, what we do know, is that intelligently, you can set yourself up for around September 15, September 20 when you come out of it, launching a lot of property on the market. And, Phil, the good news is that New Zealand’s booming. The demand of buyers and the appetite is at an all-time high,” Mr Panos said.

“Prices are up in most parts of New Zealand. Ray White Remuera completed $92 million worth of sales in the month of July. We’re talking about $2 million worth of commissions. So, there is a prize at the end of this, if you can keep your chin up and you don’t fall into the pajama slope during those six weeks.”

Mr Panos believes agents should use the time to immerse themselves in the community as it is a golden opportunity to stand up and be of service.

“An example would be, go off and send a note to the people that are the vulnerable and the elderly, and let them know that you’re happy, when you’re going off to do your shopping, if they need any necessities, that you’ll pick them up, and on the way home, for particularly an older, vulnerable person, that you’ll leave them at their doorstep,” Mr Panos said.

The second piece of advice Mr Panos has for agents is to work through their database to see where potential clients are placed.

“I think one of the best things you can do is start at A, go to Z, and say, ‘Hey, it’s Tom Panos here from XY real estate. It’s business as usual in an unusual way. Can I ask you, what will you be doing post-COVID? Buying, selling or sitting on the fence?’ And work out, segment your database, qualify your database, so you can come out of it, and actually say, they’re a buyer, they’re a seller, they’re still very passive, right? I’d be doing that,” he continued.

Thirdly, Mr Panos pointed out this is a time to address jobs that have been put off due to the daily business grind.

“You’ve got a golden opportunity, Phil, to go off and complete some of those projects, right? That have been long overdue. It might be that you wanted to create an e-book, which is how to sell your home for the most amount of money. It might be that you always had a plan that you wanted to do, a weekly real estate video show, and you never got it off the ground,” Mr Panos said.

“It might be that you’ve always wanted to actually take your listing presentation from a seven out of 10, and make it a 10 out of 10. So, you’ve got all these things that you’ve got time now to do.”

Finally, the real estate guru noted that this is an opportunity for real estate agents to improve their game or improve themselves during lockdown.

“And then the last thing that I would suggest you do is spend an hour a day on self-improvement. I mean, through things like Udemy, there’s so many places now that you can actually enrol in online learning. That you can go off, and if you were to learn one thing a day in that six weeks, you’d come out of there, a black belt in 42 different subjects, right? That would be a great way,” Mr Panos concluded.

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