navigate commercial

The Residential Business Model is Changing Rapidly

It is no secret that the residential real estate industry has experienced significant disruption over the past decade. An influx of new tech-savvy operators with sophisticated online business models have resulted in increased competition and downward pressure on commission fees in many regions. This has effectively decreased the overall number of traditional residential listings and jeopardized the future earnings of many residential agents and brokers.

Conversely, the Commercial Real Estate (CRE) industry has not experienced any significant disruption in their commission fee based business model over this same time period. While technology companies have developed a number of popular web sites for displaying commercial property listings, most of these third party sites have been designed to support the marketing efforts of Commercial Real Estate professionals as opposed to competing with them for individual buyers and sellers. This much more cooperative approach has evolved primarily because the CRE marketplace is generally regarded as being more specialized and somewhat more difficult to service than the residential real estate market -- likely due to the wider array of property types and sub-types in the CRE sector and the greater complexity in determining commercial property values. We agree that CRE is generally more complex, but it is not prohibitively more complex. 

The Commercial and multi-family income property markets have actually been thriving in most regions over the past two decades. With more and more  investors and property developers getting involved in this high-growth sector, commercial agents have been keeping busy and reaping the rewards of their traditional commission-based business model. Further, Commercial Agents and Brokers tend to earn more money per transaction than residential agents (because of the generally higher commission fee percentages multiplied by generally higher transaction values) and they also tend to engage in repeat business with their top tier clients at more frequent intervals. This perceived industry complexity has protected the CRE sector during otherwise turbulent times and it represents a huge growth opportunity for anyone who may be considering a full-time or part-time career in the commercial real estate space . 

Knowledge + Confidence = Success

This combination of strong CRE market demand plus commission fee stability is excellent news for residential agents and brokers who are considering the commercial property sector. We believe that most residential real estate agents and brokers already possess over 50% of the knowledge and skills required to work in the commercial market space and it's our goal to help them break through the "glass ceiling" by providing the additional training and guidance they need to get there. The CRE sector typically eludes many residential agents because they lack the essential knowledge and/or confidence regarding the core business concepts required for CRE success. However, we also believe that "Knowledge is Power" -- and all of our courses are designed to empower residential agents and brokers by filling in the critical information gaps and equipping them with the essential knowledge, tools, and business strategies to become proficient in the sale and leasing of residential apartments, retail plazas, offices, warehouses, industrial buildings, development land, and much more! 

Invest in Your Future. Learn, Adapt, Grow ... and Repeat!  

CRE success is now within your reach -- enroll in our courses, follow our sage advice, and prepare to grow your career! Regardless of your personal learning objectives, our courses offer something for everyone. They are packed with practical information, key commercial definitions, metrics, terminology, market insights, and proven business strategies that combine to form an essential road map for your CRE success! The navigate commercial online learning and business coaching model has four key steps and we look forward to joining you as you embark on your exciting new professional development journey: 

Step 1: Learn. Enroll in our online CRE training courses and successfully complete them. By gaining the necessary commercial knowledge you will be better able to provide competent client service to your CRE prospects. You will also receive essential CRE business forms and marketing materials, practical business advice, and our insider strategies for CRE success. 

Step 2: Develop your initial CRE business strategy. This may involve doing both residential and commercial work concurrently or putting a plan in place to make a complete switch over to commercial. In either case, we will teach you which commercial sub-markets to focus on and, most importantly, which ones to initially avoid. We start with the easiest commercial sub-markets first (as we want to ensure that neither you or your clients make any mistakes) and after you gain more knowledge and skills you will then be able to expand into additional CRE sectors over time. 

Step 3: Update your marketing and presentation materials. Once you have acquired a reasonable level of knowledge and competence,  you can then revise your Listing Presentation, Web Site, Business Cards,  Commercial Sign Proofs, Property Brochures, and other marketing materials to reflect your new commercial service offering. The navigate commercial Back Office Marketing Team has prepared a set of downloadable business templates for all of these key tools and all of our students will have free access to use and modify them as they see fit.  

Step 4: Get out there! You should now have the knowledge, confidence, and business tools required to get started with marketing your new array of CRE services and begin opening doors to new commercial opportunities in your local market! And if you ever get stuck or need our help along the way, the navigate commercial team is not far away. We offer all students free access to our NavCare commercial advice, consulting, and coaching service for 30 days after each course has been completed and we also offer ongoing NavCare subscriptions for purchase any time thereafter.  

Our Guiding Principles

The following guiding principles are at the core of navigate commercial business practices and we expect our staff and students and to embrace them in their business activities as well: (1) ABP - Always Be Professional; (2) PCS - Provide Competent Service, and (3) DNH - Do No Harm.  You can read more about these guiding principles and many other interesting CRE topics in our navigate commercial Blog.