Figuring out the best way to allocate your time isn’t just tough as a real estate mom, sometimes it feels impossible. You know the balancing act well already, and you know how hard it is to let anyone down. Running a successful real estate business requires a lot of your time. Being a mother also requires a lot of your time.
Your goal is to balance the two effectively, so no one is left out in the cold. Unfortunately, there are many instances where you will have to make a choice. This is a hefty decision – your kids or your clients. Luckily, it’s not that cut and dry, because if it was, there wouldn’t be many real estate moms in business anymore. We are all moms first and foremost.
With this in mind, let’s take a closer look at this tightrope act and see what we can do to minimize the unbalance.
The Upheaval of Family and Work
Successful businesses just don’t magically happen. They take incredibly hard work, dedication, and devotion to the cause. This breaks down into a lot of time spent on work, which often means less time with the children. Guilt on a mother’s shoulders is second only to the guilt a mother can give her children. While giving the guilt takes years of practice to perfect, feeling the guilt is a talent all too easy to learn.
Whether it’s missing a sporting event, not being there for your daughter’s big dance, or not having the energy left to take your kids to the park; when we feel like we’ve let out children down, it’s pretty much the worst feeling in the world. Kids grow up fast, being afraid of “missing out,” is a burden every parent faces.
On the other end of this spectrum is the want to see our business succeed. As a real estate professional, building your business and continually growing your business results in a huge sense of accomplishment. We’re proud of what we do, and we’re proud we can do it well. When we have to cancel an appointment, or can’t quite meet a client’s needs, the devastation we feel is natural.
Balancing Your Life
Learning to balance your life, in all its forms, is incremental for success. And not just for your career, but also for your family. Here are a few ideas to help you out:
• Determine what your sales goals are first, and then determine how much time you need to make those goals. Work it down to the number of clients you need to have and the amount of homes you need to sell. Be exact!

• What is going on for your family each week? Know what social functions are important for you to attend. If it’s an easy week on the social front, go ahead and plan a bit more time for you business.
• If there are commitments both for your children and for you business, decide WITH you children (get their input) which of their activities you will attend, and which you will miss. Balance those against your work commitments.
• Schedule these commitments into your database. Top Producer is an excellent database to consider if you aren’t currently using one.
• When new meetings need to be set, work them into your preplanned schedule. Don’t deviate from this. Especially don’t break your word to your kids if you can help it – if you’ve promised you’d be at a specific function, try very hard to live up to this.
Most clients are flexible. An hour here or there won’t affect them overly much, and certainly won’t be a deal breaker. Be honest with them that you have other commitments, but that you definitely want to work with them. They’ll appreciate both the honesty and your willingness to fit them in.
If you must change plans with your kids, only do so once you’ve discussed it with them. This is not asking them for permission, but rather, giving them the respect you would give a business associate you had to change plans with. Allow some discussion about it and be sure to balance the missed event with something new.
Once again, balancing your professional life with your personal life is mostly about communication, organization, and preparation. By combining these three aspects, you’ll eventually find it easier and easier to walk the tightrope!
Real Estate and Life Coach Cheri Alguire has partnered with hundreds of Real Estate Professionals to help them become more successful in business and in life. Coach Cheri offers Group Coaching for Moms, Working Mothers and Pregnant Women in Real Estate, on how to balance careers with family responsibility. Learn more at www.realestatemoms.com, and visit Coach Cheri's Real Estate Moms blog at www.realestatemoms.com/blog.


Looking for Property in Nimes, Provence?
Given the high house prices evident in Provence and parts of Northern France, the Languedoc Rouissillon region, is becoming an increasingly popular focus for property buyers, looking to invest in France.
Languedoc Rouissillon offers an ideal climate and good transport facilities. Cheap and regular flights are available through RyanAir, with destinations to Nimes, Perpignan and Carcassonne. British Airways operate flights to Toulouse and Montpellier. There is also a fast TGV train to Avignon.
Nimes, a Languedoc town, offers French estate agents some excellent French investment properties for British property buyers. Two main options present such buyers: a rural location close to Nimes or an apartment or villa in Nimes town. So it is important to be clear about what you are looking for in terms of investment and quality of life.
Buying in Nimes, you can easily participate in French lifestyle. The town offers a wide range of activities including:

lively bars and restaurants
a bustling shopping centre with an old town, a range of department stores, boutiques and antique shops
a sandy beach within 25kms of the centre with tennis and windsurfing facilities
several museums drawing on Nimes’ rich Roman history
a golf course situated within a short drive of Nimes’ town centre and a
a football stadium located on the outskirts of town.

Prices for property in Nimes currently average around £100,000. Estate agents, nvillas can help you find out more about this town, the Languedoc region and key French investment property issues.


IDX Search Tools Give Prudential California Realty’s Boyd Smith a Competitive Advantage
EUGENE, ORE. - Eugene based IDX, Inc. today announced the addition of Prudential California Realty’s Boyd Smith to its suite of real estate clients. Smith now uses IDX, Inc.’s primary application, IDX Broker, to display and completely integrate Multiple Listing Service (MLS) listings on his personal website. This allows him to retain leads generated from direct traffic, rather than losing out to the listing broker through the use of traditional framed MLS search tools.
The IDX Broker application provides agents, brokers and other real estate professionals with the tools needed to create a competitive advantage in a growing real estate market.
The objective in developing a website with an integrated IDX/MLS data feed is to generate new leads quickly at a low cost to the client. With automatic email announcements, custom client home views and advanced admin and integration controls, Smith’s clients now have access to the entire MLS database on his website. This gives his website an advantage over those that don’t integrate the MLS listings with the IDX search tools and gives his listings free advertising on other real estate websites that also display the MLS data.
Additional benefits of using IDX Broker Pro include the ability to automatically create featured listing pages, check the status of new MLS listings and generate automatic emails 24/7. As a member of California’s Sandicor MLS, Smith’s clients can search the MLS quickly and easily using IDX search tools.
About Boyd Smith
Specializing in Mission Hills, Hillcrest and Bankers Hill, Boyd Smith is an expert on downtown living. Smith is dedicated to making every transaction an experience that brings together family and friends and strives to meet every client’s real estate goals with this motto in mind: “We don’t just sell homes, we create lifestyles.
About IDX, Inc.
Headquartered in Eugene, Oregon, IDX, Inc. is a leading provider of web-based applications for real estate professionals throughout the U.S. IDX, Inc. offers two primary applications: IDX Broker and SLM Pro. IDX Broker allows individual real estate agents and brokers to integrate listings from their Multiple Listing Service (MLS) seamlessly into their own real estate website. This integrated IDX data feed allows agents and brokers to generate and manage leads online from all listings in their respective area of specialty. SLM Pro is a Sponsored Listings Management marketing program that assists businesses with the complex task of creating and managing a dynamic online marketing plan. SLM Pro uses a unique approach to online ad placement that maximizes the overall reach of a user’s website, while delivering relevant and targeted traffic efficiently. For more information about IDX, Inc. services and products, please visit http://www.idxbroker.com or call (800)421-9668.