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2. Keep Watching Out for Those Identity Thieves

Once again it's the beginning of a new year, which means for a lot of us it's time to set new goals. This can be a time to put last year behind us and create a brand new slate of opportunities to pursue for ourselves in 2006.

But what are you really going to do differently this year? I'm asking this because so many agents often begin the new year feeling excited about all the possibilities that they can create for themselves with a fresh, full calendar year ahead of them. But in the end, how many agents will really accomplish throughout the year what they originally setout to do in January? Oftentimes agents can have the best of intentions every new year of accomplishing some exciting new goals, but by the time the end of the year rolls around they then feel disappointed with their results.

If you'd like to know the reason for this, it oftentimes lies not in the goals that agents set forth for themselves in the beginning of the year, but in the flawed game plans they utilize throughout the year when working towards accomplishing these goals. For example, an agent who made $150,000.00 last year might set an income goal of $250,000.00 for 2006. But keep in mind that the sum total of all the best the agent could bring to the table throughout 2005 had them earn and get paid a total of $150,000.00 in commissions. So do they really now know what they have to do differently in 2006 to make the jump from $150,000.00 to $250,000.00 in commission income? And if they do know, why didn't they just apply this information to their real estate business in 2005?

Setting goals at the beginning of the year can be a great experience for all of us, but it's how we're going to get those goals accomplished that represents the real meat and potatoes that will either lead us towards accomplishing those goals, or feeling disappointed.

So with this in mind I'm asking you:

1) What are your goals in your real estate business in 2006?

2) What specifically is your game plan of activities you're going to do to make these goals a reality by December 31st?

And...

3) What do you have to do differently than what you did in 2005 in order to achieve your new goals for 2006?

And finally, one activity that's extremely important to incorporate into your game plan for 2006 is feedback. You need to check in with how you're doing throughout the year to determine if you're on track or off track in accomplishing your goals. And if you're off track, you need to make modifications to your game plan to still ensure that you'll successfully achieve your goals by December 31st.

As an example of this, experts say that a jet flying from New York to Los Angeles is off track from reaching it's final destination approximately 98% of the time. But the continued monitoring of the flight path and correction through both the jet's inertial guidance system and the pilot himself still ensures the jet's a timely arrival in Los Angeles.

With real estate agents, however, this is often not the case. One's ideal goals for the year can be created in January, but the "flight path" of the agent throughout the year can oftentimes be completely off track from accomplishing these goals. The agent can be thinking something like, "As long as I'm feeling really busy, I must be on track towards accomplishing my goals for the year."

This is similar to the pilot of the commercial airliner saying, "As long as I'm up here right now flying this aircraft, I must be on track towards arriving at my desired destination on time."

But alas, in both situations, achieving the desired goal in a timely manner does not result from just being busy doing activities, it comes from doing the right activities at the right time, and in the right sequence.

With this in mind, see if the following has ever applied to you:

You set your goals for your real estate business in January and feel enthusiastic about accomplishing them. You feel extremely busy throughout the year, but you recognize you're falling behind in achieving your income goal for the year along the way. Then around September or so, you start thinking a thought like "If I can just find, negotiate, and close both sides of a $50,000,000.00 transaction by the end of the year, I'll meet my income goal."

Like the airline pilot and the inertial guidance system within the plane itself, you need to monitor your success throughout the year to make sure you're on track. Set a reminder at the end of every month in your software program to check in and see how you're doing. Are you on track towards achieving your income goals for the year, or are you falling behind? And if you're falling behind, go immediately and get some help from someone. Sit down and talk with a top producing agent, your manager, or hire a real estate coach. Because right now you're risking throwing those income goals completely out the window if you don't.

You may have noticed something in our industry over the years. Our industry has its fair share of people who have big egos. I deal with this constantly with coaching clients who produce great results in their business through working with me, but more than anything they really want to return to having no one whatsoever advising them on running their  real estate business. But trying to do it all alone in this business on an ongoing basis can be a very costly decision. As Albert Einstein once said, "We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." And if you're constantly solving your business development problems with the same mind that created them, you could be in for a very long and frustrating experience.

So check in with yourself once a month to see how you're doing in accomplishing the goals you've created for yourself in 2006. And if you find yourself falling behind in accomplishing these goals, stop everything you're doing and find someone who can give you the help and direction you need to get back on track and make those goals a reality.

Click here for downloadable E-books and live audio interviews with top-producing real estate agents. These interviews are with industry experts who show you exactly what they do to continually make hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars a year.

2. Keep Watching Out for Those Identity Thieves

While my focus is on writing articles to help you improve your real estate business, sometimes things come to my attention that are so important that I feel I have to tell you about them. With this in mind a friend of mine who's in real estate told me a story of how he recently became a victim of identity theft, and I thought I'd pass along the story to you in case it may help you in protecting yourself.

He noticed something peculiar happening with his checking statements from his bank. There were checks clearing on his account that he had never written, and when he looked at the checks themselves he was absolutely stunned at what was on them.

Someone had gotten a hold of his checking account number, and had printed their own checks with his account number on them. But what was really shocking was the fact that the person who printed and cashed the checks printed their own name on them, not my friend's name. And of course my friend's bank just continued cashing these checks, never noticing that the name on the checks themselves didn't match the name on the account.

I remember sometime ago my own bank told me they always check and match the signatures on any checks I write before they ever release the money to the payee. But after hearing about this problem my friend had with his bank, I now have serious doubts that my bank is really doing this for me.

We're all targets for identity theft these days. About five months ago someone got a hold of my credit card number and bought about $3,800.00 worth of products before I became aware of the problem and closed out the credit card account. But at least I was protected in that situation against any unauthorized charges by my credit card company.

Which brings me to another subject that I have great concern with these days when it comes to identity theft...using debit cards and making electronic payments to people directly from one's checking account. While I'm a huge fan of using technology, these two approaches have always seemed like risky ideas to me. To illustrate why, here's another real-life story:

Steve Lopez is a journalist for The Los Angeles Times, and several days ago he wrote a story describing how he had been the victim of identity theft. Four individual withdrawals totaling $2,000.00 had been made from his checking account from four different ATM machines. When he told his bank about this, they immediately credited him back the $2,000.00, but they later changed their minds and removed the money from his account again. They told him the reason for this was that the money had been legitimately taken out of his account with an ATM card, and because of this he wasn't entitled to have the money credited back into his account.

Steve did his own investigations with experts on the subject, and found that identity thieves are finding newer and more creative ways to get your ATM and debit card information. Sometimes they can be working in conjunction with people who have access to your ATM card number and the magnetic information from the card, and sometimes they can be near you at a gas station, appearing to be facing away from you talking on a cell phone, but the camera on their cell phone is recording you punching in your pin number into the payment machine.

When Steve went to the Los Angeles Police to report the money that was stolen from his checking account, the officer he made the report to told him to stop using his debit card. The officer told him that with credit cards the law makes incidents like these the responsibilities of the credit card companies themselves, but that the law with debit cards is not the same. Steve was also told that once people have your debit card information, creating a duplicate of your debit card can be done relatively easily with just a personal computer and some additional equipment.

So in reality, you may be safer using credit cards and not giving anyone other than your bank the ability to claim money out of your checking account. While using debit cards may make sound financial sense from the perspective of spending only what you have, it's simply too easy nowadays for people with less than good intentions to sell, utilize, and collaborate with others to remove money directly from people's checking accounts.

I'd rather have my money still in the bank and be able to question any and all charges on my credit card statement before I ever have to pay them.

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