One Year

A year ago today the Arizona Department of Real Estate gave me provisional permission to proceed forward with opening my own brokerage. At the time I was discerning whether or not I wanted to go forward, a couple of friends were so encouraging. One in fact, who is a friend of 30+ years and reads this blog on occasion was my biggest cheerleader. If you find this post, thank you my dear, dear friend for your loving words.

The move into the unknown was daunting, but I went forward and voila! a brokerage was born. In truth, 2017 in general was kind of a sucky year, but this was a wonderful ending.

I don't regret leaving El Jefe. Nobody needs that level of dysfunction. I am grateful for the experience. Perhaps if it weren't for him and the level of crazy that came from working for him, I wouldn't have figured out this was a direction I wanted to pursue.

I do miss having other agents around for camaraderie, support and accountability. Working in a larger-than-one person brokerage also means more leads, listings and potential buyers. I don't have that luxury as a one-man show, but I have enough work. I also have the likes of a few broker friends and colleagues who help me out on occasion. Mrs. Hufflepuff alone has been a great assistance. I have even called El Jefe once or twice and bounced an idea off of him--though that comes with an emotional price.

Even though I am on this brokerage journey, I am sill evolving and changing how and what I want to do. Don't get me wrong! There are still homes to sell. This past year, there was a point when I started exploring what else I wanted to do. It left me conflicted: how could I sell real estate if I want to pursue other interests? I recognize now that some of my upcoming projects are inter-related and not mutually exclusive. I might not make tons more money with some of my other projects, that's ok. I have done the successful thing. I am ready to help others and provide more meaning and purpose in their lives. Hopefully I will be successful with that too.