Virtual assistants are becoming more popular as they fit into most businesses. That’s why it’s no surprise to see a demand in industry-specific tasks for virtual assistants in real estate.
Many people shift their careers into property management to work smarter and get an amazing retirement, but there’s an even smarter way of working in real estate that most agents underestimate — hiring real estate virtual assistants.Working as a real estate agent is not all about unlimited income potential and fancy showcases — it also involves a LOT of paperwork, prospecting, researching, coordinating transactions, and more tedious work that requires much time. Luckily, there are job-specific tasks you can assign to a real estate VA or virtual assistant to free up your schedule and focus on showcases and signing deals.
If you’re already thinking about how much valuable time is lost on repetitive tasks that sustain but do not grow your business, you may need to consider building a remote team of virtual assistants for real estate.
To help you decide if work-from-home assistants are what you really need, let’s talk about:
We’ll also give a list of real estate virtual assistant interview questions to help you find the right candidates, how to hire the best real estate virtual assistants, and what makes hiring a real estate virtual assistant successful in the long term. Let’s get right into it!
A virtual assistant for real estate is the same as any typical VA — independent, freelance, self-employed, and working from another location. Although, there are instances where virtual assistants are also part-time, project-based, or outsourced from an agency like Remote Dynamics PH.
The flexibility in contract and schedule will still depend on your business preferences. You can save up on paying benefits and taxes with the freedom to select which services your business will benefit from. The most notable difference is their specialization in the industry of real estate.
So, what can a virtual assistant contribute to real estate if they are working remotely? Well, it’s definitely to save time and money!
A real estate virtual assistant can be in charge of the time-consuming and repetitive (but extremely important) paperwork, lead generation, appointment setting, financial reports, performing market analysis, and more. Freeing up time from these clerical tasks allows real estate agents or realtors to focus on growth in business networking, site location, pitching during showcases, and increasing sales.
Real estate professionals are in charge of administrative, marketing, and sales-related tasks. It’s also a combination of desk and fieldwork. Unlike most jobs where you are just employed, working in real estate allows you to manage your job like your own business.
A virtual assistant for real estate professionals can take over desk work to open better opportunities in fieldwork. Here are some tasks you can assign to real estate virtual assistants to grow your business.
Lead generation is all about collecting leads or prospective property buyers or developers. The types of leads may be unaware of the property you are selling or leasing, or they may have been interested in purchasing it for quite some time.
These leads are sourced from website traffic, email subscriptions, social media, or attracted clients from advertisements. The leads’ contact information is input into a database where the status of closing a sale is tracked.
It is also easier to do lead screening, or evaluate the purchasing power and credit score of a buyer or developer, with a very organized database. You can expect to filter out which prospects qualify into becoming future buyers or developers.
A real estate virtual assistant assigned to perform lead generation must be proficient in the following:
A big factor in the success of real estate prospecting is marketing. Marketing is a strategy that builds brand awareness of a product — in this case, the properties for sale or lease. Many real estate agents undermine the potential of quality pictures of houses, the interior design of rooms, and blueprints.
These pictures are proof of the high value your property can offer. It also shows the message you want to share with your audience or prospects — whether you are pre-selling a condo or endorsing a promo on a house.
Some real estate companies even start their own YouTube channel and upload house tours which is a more organic approach to pulling in interested buyers or developers.
Real estate virtual assistants assigned to marketing must be experienced in the following:
All businesses will have administrative tasks, especially in real estate. Once the number of prospective buyers comes in waves, processing papers, data entry, and managing the database can take up a whole day from a real estate agent’s schedule.
Just imagine if those hours were spent on-site location for high-value property development, meeting buyers at open houses, or exploring new strategies to find more potential buyers.
You can definitely assign these tasks to real estate virtual assistants focused on administrative work:
Sales are like a finish line in real estate — this is where the action happens before winning the goal. After generating leads, the sales team will be in charge of sales closing.
Sales closing is the stage where real estate agents finally get the buyer or developer’s big YES in buying the property. The buyer or developer finalizes the property payments and signs all the papers to complete the property sale.
While there is a lot of action going on, there is also a lot of desk work for real estate virtual assistants in sales. These VAs must be effective and efficient in the following:
“Doing it yourself,” doesn’t really mean you’re saving money. The time you’re spending on desk work in real estate could have amounted to a sale if you only let a virtual assistant do the paperwork, database management, and other tasks for you.
This is just one perk a real estate virtual assistant can give on saving time and money. Hiring VAs from remote locations also allows cost savings on office space, payment for utility bills, budget on office equipment, and transportation expenses.
Ask yourself how many properties can you manage and how much more can you add if you were to reassign your repetitive administrative tasks?
If you find yourself wanting to focus on closing the deal, improve your strengths and weaknesses at work, streamline your system, and increase productivity, then considering a real estate virtual assistant to help you out may be a good idea.
At this point, you’re probably decided on whether you need a real estate virtual assistant. The next question is do you need one jack of all trades real estate VA or a team of expert real estate VAs?
Highly specialized or expert virtual assistants will not require much training since they have the experience to qualify for the tasks you need to remove off your plate. Most of the time, these virtual assistants just need to be introduced to the company mission and vision, documents, files, software, passwords, or team members. Highly specialized or skilled VAs are great at working independently under pressure.
Jack of all trades virtual assistants are a bit different. They are talented in numerous specializations but not as skilled as the expert VAs. You can count on them to accomplish basic graphic design or video editing while still being able to manage your calendar and schedule appointments, but don’t expect posters or videos that can win the Cannes Film Festival.
Choosing between a team of expert real estate virtual assistants VS a jack of all trades real estate VA will depend on the amount of work you’re planning to reassign and the quality you are aiming for. You can consider hiring VAs as a long-term investment for your real estate business which you need to plan carefully.
A jack of all trades VA may be beneficial for real estate agents who are starting with a few clients. Those who plan to start aggressively on marketing and sales may need a team of expert VAs who can also provide ideas and generate revenue in ways you may never have even thought about. Create projections on your target income in sales to determine the cost-benefit of hiring real estate virtual assistants.
The right candidates for your remote real estate team can just be waiting at an outsourcing website. The key to success in searching for candidates who will fit your company culture is to clearly define the tasks you are looking for and the outcomes you are expecting to get. It can also help if you are looking in the right places.
Here are some companies that outsource real estate, and virtual assistants. Be sure to create a job description that lists all your qualifications and hide some trick questions to ensure that the applicant is very interested in the job and is willing to put in a lot of effort.
Quality work only begins with top talent. Real estate VAs must also be equipped with tools that can increase ease of access at remote locations, productivity at different time zones, and utilizing platforms that can evaluate automated solutions. Here’s a list of free real estate virtual assistant tools your team can use:
Unlike real estate brokers, real estate virtual assistants do not need any license. VAs may be trained with a higher educational degree, courses in community college, and VA certifications. Rev Academy has a course where you can learn the basics of property management online.
Access to expert real estate virtual assistants and real estate virtual assistant tools are great for starting your journey towards increasing productivity, sales, and business expansion. Take advantage of this jumpstart by proceeding with great leadership and preparing progressive training materials.
While investing in products or tools can improve your real estate business instantly, these have a limited timeframe. Investing in your people will bring a more positive dynamic to your team and bring back higher value in the future.
Interested in hiring real estate virtual assistants? Contact Remote Dynamics PH at Info@remotedynamicsph.com to get recommendations suitable for your real estate business!
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