The Sperry Van Ness® 2012 Rookie of the Year award is given to the advisor who is either new to the commercial real estate brokerage field or new to the Sperry Van Ness organization, and closes the most deals in that first year. This year’s honoree is Jennifer Donathan, a senior investment advisor at Sperry Van Ness/Commercial Real Estate in Liberty Township, Ohio.
Perhaps the secret to Jennifer’s success is that in just a short time she has developed an efficient system for generating listings. First, Jennifer works hard to maintain an organized, complete, and accurate database of investors for her asset type. She then makes it a point to communicate with those investors on a regular basis, usually through email blasts.
Once Jennifer has secured a listing, she reaches out to surrounding property owners in order to further promote her services. This has been a very successful tactic, as it helps to build up her reputation and generate referrals.
Jennifer advises that to be successful, advisors should concentrate on two things:
1. Keeping the momentum going. Deals always have numerous challenges such as financing, appraisals and inspections. Advisors should work to come up with viable solutions to those challenges quickly to keep the momentum going. Staying on top of the lender, title company, buyer, seller, and other broker also keeps the deal flowing and ensures confidence among all parties involved in the deal.
2. Only activating a listing when it is complete. The more organized and complete the package is upfront, the less time you will have to devote to answering, searching for, and providing information that should have been readily available. Having a complete listing allows you to focus on marketing. Buyers will move on to other properties if they can’t get their questions answered or if there are no supporting materials to back the marketing package.
*All Sperry Van Ness® offices are independently owned and operated.