On paper, Maile Aguila’s story reads like a fairy-tale model of the American dream: After 30 years of laborious work, a daughter of Nineteen Sixties Cuban exiles sells $1 billion price of Miami condos in a single yr for a multi-national developer. Then she companions with The Company, one of many buzziest luxurious actual property brokerages within the nation, to promote much more of them. She lives on a sprawling farm exterior Miami with a menagerie of horses, canine, cats, a koi pond and an aviary filled with unique birds. A charmed life by anybody’s definition.
In fact, none of it got here simple. Even in a once-in-a-generation boomtown like Brickell, Florida, the place the very best condos get snapped up earlier than building begins, 30 years of laborious work continues to be 30 years of laborious work.
I lately sat down with Aguila to learn the way she did it. She walked me via how she helped rework Brickell, a previously sleepy Miami enterprise district, right into a youthful, hipper Dubai the place you’ll be able to nonetheless get a surprisingly good Cubano sandwich – and gave me her finest recommendation for brand new brokers who need in on the motion.
Maile Aguila: By the numbers
- Market: Brickell and downtown Miami
- Area of interest: Luxurious condos
- 2024 crew gross sales quantity: $1 billion+
- 2024 nationwide RealTrends Verified rating: N/A
- Highest ROI software program: MRI
- Major lead technology technique: Brokers specializing in high-end luxurious gross sales, referrals
Observe the cash, then comply with your ardour
In my New York Metropolis brokerage within the mid-aughts, each agent wished to work new developments. I did too. Right here’s why: Whereas we have been schlepping across the East Village in August displaying sixth-floor walkups, they have been sitting on Aeron chairs in glossy, air-conditioned gross sales places of work. We spent most of our days (and nights) making an attempt to generate leads. Their telephones by no means stopped ringing. All of us wished in. Who wouldn’t?
With competitors that fierce, breaking into new growth gross sales could be tough. Figuring out the precise individuals helps, clearly, however brokers who get in on connections as a substitute of benefit not often final. It’s a surprisingly high-pressure job, and expertise is the one treatment.
Aguila’s recommendation? Observe the cash, then comply with your ardour. Her path to new growth gross sales was something however conventional. She spent years working as an accountant, finally doing the books for an actual property developer. She wished to grasp how his offers truly labored — so she bought her actual property and mortgage dealer licenses. To not promote. Simply to know the reality. Then, after weeks of lunches with a persistent gross sales director who stored telling her she was closing his offers without cost, she realized she had a ardour for gross sales.
Subsequent steps: Discover out what’s being in-built your market and which tasks you’d truly be excited to promote on daily basis. Waterfront? Luxurious high-rises? Golf communities? The bottom line is to discover a area of interest that’s each profitable and fulfilling. Enthusiasm is quite a bit tougher to pretend than you may suppose. Your consumers will discover.
Turn out to be a hyper-local market skilled
Educated brokers promote extra actual property. In new growth gross sales, that’s doubly true. ChatGPT can’t inform a rich purchaser on the town for every week which models have the very best morning daylight or which buildings have essentially the most useful concierge groups. Solely you’ll be able to. Right here’s Aguila:
“It’s all about data, it’s all about studying. You’ve bought to study in regards to the market. The extra you recognize in regards to the market, the higher you’ll be able to serve your consumer. After which finally, for those who get the chance to get right into a mission, take it.”
Subsequent steps: Tour as many new developments as you’ll be able to and take notes on every thing. Don’t have a purchaser who can afford a $2 million apartment but? Go to dealer open homes or, higher but, introduce your self to a gross sales agent and supply to take them to lunch.
Whereas figuring out your native market just like the again of your hand is a essential first step, it’s not sufficient. You additionally want a technique to current that information to your leads and purchasers. Altos makes it simple. They supply automated native market report emails you’ll be able to ship out each week to remain prime of thoughts. Click on beneath to get your first market report without cost:
Even when you recognize your market nicely sufficient to rattle off the sq. footage of each unit on the town, touchdown a spot on an in-house gross sales crew for a luxurious constructing isn’t simple. Each agent in your metropolis needs that job. Why ought to they rent you?
Aguila’s recommendation? Begin at a standard brokerage first. Study the market, construct your transaction expertise and get snug with each stage of a deal from contract to shut. Then pursue the event job. However ensure you’re prepared to begin on the backside.
Working as an assistant isn’t glamorous, however Aguila believes it’s the quickest option to study the enterprise. It’s the identical recommendation she gave her personal daughter when she determined to get into actual property:
“She began in an administrative position at Sotheby’s, studying the enterprise. They confirmed her all of the totally different departments and discovered the transactional elements of taking a deal, from writing a contract to closing. Finally, for those who’re good, you’ll become an ideal salesperson, and also you may end up wanting to do that for the remainder of your life.”
Subsequent steps: Already working in residential actual property? Begin reaching out to luxurious builders and brokerages on LinkedIn. Allow them to know you need to be on a gross sales crew and are prepared to begin on the backside. Simply getting began? Get your license first, then be a part of a residential crew that sells the kind of actual property you ultimately need to work.
Make your self indispensable
Working as an assistant on a luxurious gross sales crew is a bit like going to varsity. You’re there to study, however how a lot you study is completely as much as you. Deal with it like a job, and also you’ll earn a paycheck. Deal with it like an schooling, and you’ll construct a strong basis for a rewarding and profitable profession. The distinction is every thing.
Right here’s the way to maximize your academic ROI out of your job on a gross sales crew: Are available early, keep late and go above and past to assist the crew shut extra offers. Learn to use AI to get work accomplished sooner. Do no matter it takes to persuade your crew that investing the time and vitality to show you their craft will likely be a worthwhile funding.
For Aguila, going above and past was simple. She was the one individual within the workplace who spoke Spanish fluently. Her gross sales director, via a minor miracle of persuasion, often labored with South American consumers who spoke little or no English. He spoke no Spanish. He reached out to Aguila to assist translate, after which shortly realized she was doing excess of simply explaining the main points of a contract in Spanish. She was the nearer. At lunch the subsequent day, he satisfied her she was within the mistaken job and wanted to get into gross sales.
Grasp the artwork of the gentle promote
Promoting luxurious condos is remarkably just like promoting high-end homes, with one key distinction: apartment consumers place a better premium on way of life and placement. Many are searching for pied-à-terres within the metropolis and almost all personal at the very least one different dwelling. Which means extra wining and eating, and focusing extra on facilities and native colour than the house itself. So ditch the scripts, hear greater than you converse and deal with constructing rapport.
After I requested Aguila how she offers with troublesome purchasers, she didn’t mince phrases: Kill them with kindness:
“It’s an artwork of sentimental promoting, however it’s a must to do plenty of listening. Studying to learn individuals can also be essential. And if you get the actually robust ones, and consider me, some are actually, actually robust, kill them with kindness. Generally you may need to, you won’t need to, however for those who default to being good, finally they’ll deliver their guard down.”
Subsequent steps: Earlier than your subsequent consumer assembly, do 20 minutes of analysis on what you already learn about their state of affairs and preferences. Present up ready. Allow them to know you’ve accomplished your homework. Then spend extra time listening than speaking.
The complete image
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