Today we’d like to introduce you to Tiffany Bean.
Hi Tiffany, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I got started in Real Estate when I moved to Texas 10 years ago. I was designing clothes at the time and flying from Houston to LA was harder than I realized it would be. So, my realtor had mentioned that he thought I’d be great at it and I called him to see if he was serious….10 years later we are business partners and have had a great time doing real estate together! We both come from a place of service, how can we help others the most, so our business goals align as we are always just trying to help people the most we can! We are not a traditional team, we are more of friends that work together and try to have a good time doing it!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I never had any clue how crazy real estate was until I became a realtor! I think real estate has the perception of being easy and I believe Realtors are in part to blame for that, I know I am! Just today, I am dealing with an absolutely crazy, difficult issue and trying to keep a deal together so it can close tomorrow morning. The buyers are staying in a hotel and have movers scheduled; the seller has not done the repairs required to pass a VA inspection; there’s a hostile seller involved; the inspector wants to go check tomorrow which is closing day! I’m just trying to find a solution for all parties that will get them to the closing table and be able to move into their new house without incurring more expenses, but I’m trying to make it seem like no big deal to the buyers so they don’t stress more in what is already an extremely stressful time for them! This is typical in real estate that the realtor is trying to downplay how stressful some things that happen are so that the parties involved had a positive experience but it backfires and I think we now have the perception that real estate is easy. It’s very rarely smooth! With so much money involved and peoples emotions involved, it’s just one of the most stressful times in peoples lives and their realtor is the one they call and unload all that on! I really struggled my first few years with taking it all personally and just being so upset for everyone. My business partner, Will, told me “you can’t care more than the client does.” That has helped me to work through a lot of issues that arise. I have this internal desire to fix everything and make it perfect, but if the clients aren’t willing to do the work involved, I can’t worry more about it than they do! So, there are constant struggles in real estate. Every file brings a whole new group of people that you work with, the other realtor, the title office, the lender, the inspector, the appraiser, the buyers and the sellers and any one of these people may be absolutely crazy or mean or just stubborn so it’s constantly trying to figure the players involved out and how to best work with them.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
We’ve been in business 5 years now as a team with Compass and love our brokerage. I’m convinced there is no better tech available in the real estate world than what Compass offers us and that technology allows us to do so much more for our clients than we could without it. Especially our sellers, I feel like we have so many tools to help us sell listings better than any other brokerage I know.
My favorite part of real estate is working with buyers. I love helping people secure the home of their dreams and I love helping make things come together for people so this makes me the happiest! I also just love touring homes! Especially unique or old homes, I love mid-century modern homes so I get so excited when I have clients looking at these! While these are my favorite parts, they are probably the smallest amount of my time spent.
Prior to becoming a Realtor, I designed clothing for 10 years and owned boutiques and before that I was a merchandiser for 10 years. My job was to go into retail stores and look at their numbers and determine how to better merchandise their stores to maximize sales. I also opened new stores and remodeled stores. This training has come full circle for me in helping my clients to sell their homes. When I first started, I was nervous about telling sellers they needed to change things before photos or going on the market. As time went on, I realized I could help sellers sell their home and decided it was my responsibility as their realtor to share with them the tactics that I can use even if it may not be what they want to hear. So, I spend a lot of time with my sellers talking through my ideas of what needs to be done to sell the home. I’m not one that wants to spend money to sell your home. I fully understand it’s already an expensive process so I don’t try to get needless updates done, but do walk through staging tips and tricks that can help your home photograph better and ultimately sell quicker. This has now become one of my strongest skills and I’m really proud to have taken something that made me nervous and turn it into an invaluable asset!
The biggest realizations I have made since being in real estate is 1) no one updates their head shots and no one looks like their head shots! and 2) people either get into real estate to make a lot of money or because they love helping others and these make for very different types of realtors. I accidentally landed in real estate and it ended up working out wonderfully for me. I had been in fashion for 20 years and owned my boutiques for 10 and enjoyed it but felt that I wasn’t helping anyone at all and wanted to. I know there are several families that wouldn’t have a home had I not helped them and I love making a difference for people! I really feel that I have found a place where I can help others and enjoy what I do at the same time…most of the time!
Are there any books, apps, podcasts or blogs that help you do your best?
I’m in a coaching club called With Heart Coaching and I do the weekly “Happier Human” zoom call and I cannot sing it’s praises enough! Skye Michiels is the coach and has different guest speakers that are all related to helping us improve ourselves and find happiness and make others happier! Some weeks is about nutrition and some weeks it’s about finance planning or finding time for yourself…just different topics that are all nurturing to the soul in some way with amazing guest speakers! This is one of my favorite times of the week and helps me to reset myself to be able to deal with all the heavy things that come my way the rest of the week. The group that attends weekly have become some of my closest friends even though we live states apart. I cannot recommend it enough!!!
Other than that I love true crime and ghost story podcasts!!! I’m a huge fan of Morbid, 2 Girls 1 Ghost, and Crimes of. I’m open to any other recommendations anyone has! I love learning about crazy things in history and these help me when driving to just take a little break from the world of real estate!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://whiteoakhou.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/texastifbean
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TiffanyBean.Realtor.Compass
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffany-bean-compass/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@TiffanyBeanRealtor
- Other: https://share.google/pakVBhaMJtM6Jd1xS
