WHEN OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS

Answer the Door

December 27, 2023

I FEEL IT

My Gut Is Never Wrong

I feel it, y’all. It’s in the air! With every breath I take, the anticipation and excitement about what’s coming next builds. Is it the holiday season? Is it my birthday month? (If you don’t celebrate the whole month of your birthday, we should have a chat.) Is it Jerome Powell and the Fed and the possibility of a softer landing?

I don’t know the reason and I do not care.

I just know that great things are on the horizon for all of us. I feel this deep in my gut and my gut is never wrong. That’s why today we’re talking about being ready to answer that door when opportunity knocks.

Be the cat.

THIS IS GONNA BE A GAME-CHANGER

Because Yours Means Yours

I am super excited about working with Homes.com!

THE REALITY OF REAL ESTATE

Trust But Verify

Maybe you’re a bit of a skeptic and this year has been hard on you. So if you say, “Glennda, I want to believe you about good things on the horizon, but I need something more reliable than your gut feeling that it’s gonna get better,” I hear you.

Then how about this?

Of course, many of you listened to me when I said the following a year ago, so y’all are already ahead of the curve!

@glenndabaker

You’ve got a great opportunity to double and triple down on what you’re doing and get business while everyone else takes their foot off th... See more

STORYTIME WITH GLENNDA

Short Answer? Buy the Boots

I have been entrepreneurial my whole life. Sales is in my blood and I’m always looking within to see what I can offer to get a leg up. For example, in high school, I looked older than my classmates. I kid you not, my face is the same now as it was forty years ago.

Because I looked older, I quickly discovered that I could buy beer at the Pitch & Putt. In 1982 dollars, a six-pack of PBR was $2.99. So my underage self would waltz in and I would buy those beers by the case. Then I would sell them out of the trunk of my car at $5/can, for a net profit of $27 on each six-pack.

Do you know what I could do with $27 in 1982? A lot.

That’s not to mention the social capital accrued by going from someone who was bullied to someone who was suddenly gatekeeping what her peers most wanted. While this is maybe not my most shining achievement, it is an example of me figuring out what was unique about me and using it to create opportunities.

After high school, I got a job as a shoe salesperson at Davidson’s. I quickly became the number one seller, and I sold more shoes than everyone else put together and I didn’t even work there full-time. (Because I loved clothing so much, most weeks it was like I paid them to work there.)

My coworkers would get so mad at me because they were sure I was gaming the system, but I promise you I wasn’t. If someone wanted to try on a pair of black loafers in a size 8, I’d bring them those loafers. I’d also bring the size 7.5s, 8.5s, and every other color they came in, plus some similar styles. While my peers were coming out of the back room with one box, I’d come out with an entire tower. I was willing to get sweaty and dirty in pursuit of making a sale. More often than not, when my customer found their Cinderella shoe from that big stack of boxes, I’d sell them on the benefit of getting them in multiple colors. I was making a 7% commission, so I was going to be damn sure that I left no stone unturned with my shoe shoppers. What I learned is, there are times in our lives that we will be presented with opportunities and what matters is how we capitalize on them.  

What’s ironic is I was hemming and hawing a couple of weeks ago over a big purchase. There was a pair of Gucci boots I desperately wanted, but they were really pricey. I mean, really pricey, but oh, my stars and stripes, were they gorgeous. Still, I had trouble getting past the cost, so I left the store and got into my car and started looking all over the internet to see if I could find them cheaper.

I could not and I drove away.

Then I drove right back, parked in the same exact same spot, and went into the store and bought them because it was my birthday and I wanted them and I could afford them.

But you want to know why I really bought them?

Even though I’ve spent all year preaching about trimming the fat and watching the bottom line?

Because like Christophe Choo’s Chanel jacket, I believed they were magic. Boots like these are the kind of thing that can help put me in a position of opportunity. They are a shorthand way for me to project the success I’ve had in real estate before I even open my mouth to confirm it. They are an investment that will pay off.

Are these magic boots going to lead to $60M in closings like Christophe’s Chanel jacket did? I intend to find out in 2024. When opportunity knocks, I’ll be standing there in these fabulous boots.

One of the best examples I can give y’all on how to maximize what you’ve got is Jesse Itzler. He’s the co-founder of Marquis Jets and one of the owners of the Atlanta Hawks. This is a man who understands how to create and parlay an opportunity out of very little.

When Jesse was 22 years old and living on a friend’s couch in LA, he quickly learned that all the moguls congregated at the iconic Beverly Hills Hotel. He knew if he could just get near these power brokers, they’d be receptive to his message. But there was no way he could stay there—he didn’t have the money. Still, he felt in his bones that was the place to be. So imagine how shocked he was to find out that anyone could eat lunch there, not just those powerful guests.

While Jesse couldn’t pay for a room, he could he spend $30 on a salad and a water, and that’s just what he did.

Jesse went there every day for lunch in the early ‘90s, camping at a table from 12 to 4, making it his office, at a time when he didn’t even have his own bed. He became a fixture in that place. People got to know him, and they just assumed he belonged. His strategy was to put himself in the room with the people who’d move the needle… and it worked! In his own words, he studied, he mingled, he watched, he learned, and he met all the right people. He looked at that roadblock and found an alternative route.

Sometimes you only get one shot at an opportunity, so you have to leverage everything you have in order to take it.

Now, if what you need is the right pair of boots to get in that room?

Well, y’all know what to do.

GLENNDAISM

It Goes Without Saying

❝

Convince them that you can be who they think you are.”

Glennda Baker