In my previous column on this topic, I wrote about not giving up your present book of business and becoming part of a team. In this segment I will continue on the team concept as well as discuss a deep immersion into the office. What do we mean by that? When I spoke about your present book of business, I was referring to your sphere of influence. Most loan officers don't understand how broad their sphere actually is. We can typically show a loan officer how to expand their database from 300 to 3,000 by taking a broader view.

Likewise, most "inside" loan officers and lenders see a real estate office and focus on the sales. Of course, the sales are important. But this narrow focus causes them to miss the scope of the larger sphere of the office. If a personal sphere is huge--multiply it by a hundred times and you will see the sphere of an office, or what I call a macro sphere.

What is in that sphere? The listings of the office. These listings attract sales from outside agents. The spheres of each real estate agent in the office. Want to meet financial planners or divorce attorneys? Just leverage those spheres. How about the vendors of the office? Each of those vendors knows a ton of agents. I could go on and on. The point is, no real estate office is small when you look at it from this vantage point.

We already have established that you should not abandon the relationships you already have, including real estate agents. But now I would like to expand upon this concept by making an important point: you can meet more “outside” real estate agents from inside an office than you can on the street.

Let me back up this statement by giving you a few examples:

• Outside agents selling the listings of your office.
• Your agents selling the listings of outside agents.
• Agents coming to open houses and broker opens held by your agents.
• Agents that used to work for your company.
• Agents your broker is trying to recruit.

I could go on and add several other opportunities. The point is that focusing on a real estate office from the inside should not be limiting. There are more opportunities than you realize, regardless of the size of the office. You just need to open your eyes and take advantage of these opportunities.

Dave Hershman is Senior VP of Sales of Weichert Financial and the top author in the mortgage industry. Dave has published seven books, as well as hundreds of articles and is the founder of the OriginationPro Marketing System and Mortgage School – the online choice for expert mortgage learning and marketing content. His site is www.OriginationPro.com and he can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..