Who would have thought that a network could be your lifeline in the property management industry? Get ready to unravel the power of networking from our guest, Kelley Seaton, owner of The Leasing Network, who has mastered the art of forming trustworthy connections in her field. Kelley walks us through her journey of running a boutique business, and how these ties have been critical in coping with unprecedented situations, like the COVID-19 pandemic. You'll be amazed to hear how a reliable network can not just simplify your tasks, but also contribute to your professional growth and satisfaction.
But it's not all about networking. This episode takes an unexpected twist as Kelley opens up about her distressing experience of social media hacking. Listen to her first-hand account of the stress it induced and the valuable lessons it taught her about maintaining an online presence. It's a stark reminder of the perils of over-reliance on internet leads and a wake-up call to safeguard your online assets. This conversation is a gold mine of insights for anyone navigating the property management industry or running a small business. Don't miss out!
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Who would have thought that a network could be your lifeline in the property management industry? Get ready to unravel the power of networking from our guest, Kelley Seaton, owner of The Leasing Network, who has mastered the art of forming trustworthy connections in her field. Kelley walks us through her journey of running a boutique business, and how these ties have been critical in coping with unprecedented situations, like the COVID-19 pandemic. You'll be amazed to hear how a reliable network can not just simplify your tasks, but also contribute to your professional growth and satisfaction.
But it's not all about networking. This episode takes an unexpected twist as Kelley opens up about her distressing experience of social media hacking. Listen to her first-hand account of the stress it induced and the valuable lessons it taught her about maintaining an online presence. It's a stark reminder of the perils of over-reliance on internet leads and a wake-up call to safeguard your online assets. This conversation is a gold mine of insights for anyone navigating the property management industry or running a small business. Don't miss out!
The PIP Advantage for Landlord Insurance
Up to $70,000 contents cover included in our landlords policies
14 months cover for just 12 months premium in your first year
Further discounts when you have three or more properties insured through PIP
24/7 Australia-wide claims service
Online Real Estate Agent Portal for easy access and management
Visit their website
Keep your property managers doing what they love and outsource the things they don’t to a company that thrives on positive feedback and guarantees a premium personalised service
www.propertyassistwa.com.au
This weeks sponsor is On Tap Plumbing & Gas - 24/7 Plumbing servicing all of Perth from Mandurah to Two Rocks.
www.ontapplumbinggas.com.au
6206 6888
Welcome to the PM Collective, a dynamic hub designed to empower business owners, property managers and BDMs to excel in their careers Through access to intimate conversations, cutting edge of video training, mental health support and unparalleled motivation. Our community is the ultimate destination for individuals seeking to elevate their professional lives to new heights. So sit back, relax and enjoy our next conversation on our weekly podcast, the Art of Property Management Today's podcast. I am absolutely delighted to introduce you to Kelly Seaton, who is joining me today.
Speaker 2:Kel, thank you for jumping on Now.
Speaker 1:I met you last year at a US sort of leadership tour with property management partners and today you and I are going to have a bit of a chat just about sort of the networking in general in the industry and the importance of it, and you know, I guess, what we've got out of doing it. So we'll touch on that a little bit later. And we're also going to touch on a recent situation you've been in when you've been hacked on social media. So I want to sort of talk about that as well. But before we get in, can you please introduce yourself to everyone that that is listening a little bit about sort of how, your history of getting into real estate, but then what your office looks like at the moment.
Speaker 2:So I've been in real estate for quite some time. My name is Kelly Seaton. I run a business called the Leasing Network, which is a property management only exclusive business. We're on the Central Coast in yourself Wales, South Wales, between Sydney and New York. I have had portfolios in the Hunter Valley and Brisbane as well, but we have now just come back to the coast in West Dane, which is really cool. We are a small boutique business. We only have three staff members. I have a six at times, but yeah, we're going to three, which is amazing. It's a nice, really nice cultural, just a beautiful office with the three girls, which is really nice. Do you work from?
Speaker 1:home or do you have an actual office?
Speaker 2:I actually work from home. So we did have an office. And then I guess we've got COVID to think for that, because before COVID it was kind of a little bit like we sounded like a backyard, you don't have an office, whereas now everyone's really accepting of us working mobile and I think we did the numbers and things and we're pretty much out of about 60 to 70% of our days at properties as opposed to being at our desk. So it kind of made perfect sense to work from home. So they come to my house. We do different things as well, so they don't work here five days a week. We do, for example, tuesdays and Thursdays. They work from home days.
Speaker 2:So stuff like that, done at the same time as well as work, and as long as they get the hours up and they do their job, I could have done that 9.30 and finished. That's right. That's right. As long as they get their job done, it doesn't matter. Sometimes they do jump back on at six o'clock at night and do a little bit more if they're in a particular case and run to sport that sort of thing. So I think it's flexible, but the job has to get done.
Speaker 1:So I spoke to someone the other day who also was working from home and their team were coming to their house for working. So how are you with your boundaries when it's time to finish and you're in your house? Are you pretty good with that or are you still finding a balance? I'm terrible with that.
Speaker 2:The office is completely separate. It has been purpose-built downstairs and up here, so we have a two-story house. It's quite large. My 20 year old son lives in one part of it and the office in the other part. We do share a common room and whatnot kitchen, so it is very separate. I can kind of shut the door and just go away. But yeah, I do find myself down here a little bit. It's benefits as well when I can go and watch the Easter Apparate or something silly. So you know work. Otherwise, we do sometimes go to a co-working space as well. So there's lots of those around here now and we just do the co-shared thing, where it's really great because we can kind of meet referral partners to our business as well. There might be a counter to mortgage brokers or those sort of things sharing that, but it's a good introduction to not just having the work with just the three of us. They can see other people outside the office as well and work in that space.
Speaker 1:So how does your sign-ups work when you've got tenants moving into properties? Do they come to your house or do you meet them on-site at the property?
Speaker 2:Yeah, they don't even know where our address is. Our Google address just says the suburb, which is fantastic. We do everything at the property, so we go meet them there and whatnot when we're showing them through, but all of our documentation is very much online, so docusign, or we use any sort of using Inspection Express, which does people-less things, and so on. So it's very much at the property online.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we've got the opposite, where our office is in the middle of a big cafe strip, so we do get a lot of walk-ins. We have your old school window cards at the front. So I sort of like hearing the online option, which is what you are, because eventually I think we're going to need to be there, but we have got a very good spot at the moment and an older clientele, so the older clientele like coming in and actually sitting in the office, but it's a bit different. So I always, yeah, stop hearing different offices. So the being online, working from home obviously you are relying on online leads because you don't get walk-ins and things like that. And you had a recent stressful situation with being hacked. Talk to us about that situation, because I'm hearing it more and I would want people to know and be aware that this happens to real people like Black Kelly. So tell us what happened.
Speaker 2:I actually am really, really savvy in that space and I really thought that all of my data was completely protected, and so they hacked into my Facebook profile, which was also connected to my Instagram. At first I was a little bit devastated because of a bit of a personal story behind on Facebook page. However, facebook said yep, it's shut down, it's done, don't even talk to us, it's don't yet be scorn. So I really thought it was 100% gone and, on a personal side, I kind of enjoyed the quiet and peace for a moment. So it sounds a little bit odd, but you are putting yourself and your face is your brand a lot of the time. So I kind of enjoyed that part for probably a week, and then I started to get really stressed because I'd just been about a whole day doing content the day before the branded page as well, which was the disaster.
Speaker 2:And, being a small boutique agency, we don't have a sales department or anything like that. So I really really focus on networking, whether it's within the community or within property management industries or just referral partners and things like that really well, but a lot of our leads come from community Facebook pages, so that was an absolute mess. All of a sudden I was there and then I'm not the sort of intermediate sort of profile that I could use in my time. But then people were thinking I was not getting even more confused because there was another name, but people texting me. I went to the school by saying you're missing all these leads, you've been tagged on these pages and things like that. So I think I really need to have a social media profile. I think it has taught me that it is definitely the way of the future and that is where we are getting a lot of lead referrals from.
Speaker 2:So I'm talking about a bit of a disaster. So, and how long were you down for? So I went down on 15th of March exactly and came back yesterday, so 3rd of April. So what's that? 20 days, something like that.
Speaker 1:So I mean being an online business there's and relying on those leads. There's not really any other option. Like in my mind, I'm thinking okay, well, like do you try and encourage more people to go to your website, but there's actually sort of no substitute for community pages if that is your marketing one of your marketing plans.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we get. We honestly get so much from there. A lot of it around tenants as well, not just our landlords, whereas our landlords live on the first country. So the pages that the tenants actually comment on. I think when they realized I didn't know I was shut down. Do you know the mean bet and Message through, because we have a AI which runs through Facebook, so they would message through that and it was getting blocked. So then in the end they ended up popping our website address or our phone number on, because that's the only way someone get in touch with us. So I'm just saying to them we don't have a problem around how you need to do this and this. You know which was a way around it, but it was definitely old school, whereas people just like tag and tap in and off you go. Yeah, I thought I'd be okay without social media, but I really think it's definitely a core part of where our leads come from.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Um. Well, let's get into the other topic that I wanted to talk to you about and that was the networking Seen in the industry, because you're very good at it. I try to be, you know, good at it as much as I can from the West Coast. You have a lot more, a lot more options with events and stuff and but have you always Sort of being involved from a network point of view with other industry colleagues and what I mean that? I mean you know, going to, you know as many conferences and Catch-ups and things like that have you always done?
Speaker 2:So I've been around a long time, I think since my 27th year, so probably about 15 years ago. I probably started to really sink my teeth into Involving myself in other people. It's about getting yourself in the room with smarter people, right, so that I had so many people, my fingertips, that I was going to events with and I just thought, you know what, just get out there, kelly, and just Say hello and introduce yourself and and you'll just flow from there. So I actually have, but are definitely colleagues. You know I've got a lot of them just by attending conferences. You know I meant I meant Julie Collins, that talk about Julie. I met her at a conference and it was the morning tea break and we were two single people on our own who didn't know what. She came up to me and say can I ask you? And I just rolled from there. You know so little things like that. You know.
Speaker 2:I think I know a lot of people and if I need a question or they need a question answered, it's picking up the phone and just saying, hey, can you help me with this, I'm stuck on a situation or you know, funny, anything legislation in your South Wales, linda Gulliboska knows everything, so I can just ring Linda rather than trying to figure it out, things like that. It's really really important to network with other people that know, and it's great as well that we often have mutual clients. Would you believe you know client might have a property in your South Wales and Know somebody that can look after you really well? So, and it's just, I think, being an independent property management agency and not maybe a franchise I'm sure franchise groups go franchise to franchise, but for us I think we really stick together with the independent agencies and really help each other out there and you know they're helping our clients and we're helping. There's nuts really good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I am. I actually think it's a bit of a myth with the franchise is because I always thought the same that they've got, you know, the support within their franchise. But I think so many of them are Individually owned. I think that they they are Somewhat like you know. They are running their own independent business. Sure, it's under an umbrella that I think.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know whether they Connect as much as what I in my mind I thought they did, but I agree with the whole just picking up the phone and Calling someone. I had someone the other or going back a few months ago now but said, oh, I'm really stuck with a DV situation. Do you know someone who has, you know, dealt with it before? I couldn't help because we didn't really have any in our offices. I said, listen, I know someone to call this lady. She would help you. Tell her that. I said caller and and I've got a text message back. You know 15 minutes. They say thanks, so much all sorted and I've got my plan.
Speaker 1:And I think with property management and network with people, it's all about just making your job easier and the minute you've got a problem, if you can resolve that problem as quickly as possible by just calling someone you trust or finding out the answer.
Speaker 1:You're not going to be taking that problem home, you're not going to be stressing about it, you're not going to be procrastinating over it and letting it absorb your whole emotional state for the whole week. You're dealing with it real quick and I think that's one of the tricks of the trade is dealing with problems as quickly and fast as possible. And like I mean, I know you guys that I've all met, and you know Julie and Linda and yourself, and I genuinely would say that all of my network that I have been, you know, meeting recently, in the last recent 12 months, they all genuinely love their job and I think that they are making you guys are making your same as me. We're making our jobs easy and enjoyable by having that community around us. But if you're not finding, if you're finding the career really draining and difficult and isolated, I really am a big believer that the network and joining a community wherever you are in Australia is one of the number one things to do 100%.
Speaker 2:We actually all socialise outside of the industry now, more so than we did. It's really important now, which I have, that you can turn to or they can turn to you. We had a house fire once I'll never forget it, and I was the owner actually bringing us and said, hey, my house was on fire and we're like, no, it's not. You know like I'm sure we'd know before you. You don't even live in the States. But, lo and behold, his house was on fire because the neighbours had called him and we just jumped in the car and went straight to the house. I don't know what to do, but I had to get there first.
Speaker 2:I saw in the way I rang someone, said right, do you have? I have left the office without anything? Do you have a procedure that I can follow right here? Right now I'm going to call the driver. And so, next to me, you know Google Doc, I contacted my phone that I could edit and ask questions to the tenant straight away, which all fell in line with the insurance. You know, questions that insurers were going to ask me. It was just amazing and I wouldn't have had that list if I couldn't have just quickly rang someone and said help me out in a situation I need it like and yeah, two minutes I'm going to be at the burning house, you know. So, yeah, it's pretty cool. Yeah, so good.
Speaker 1:I mean, and I like it, while we've got Facebook community groups as well I'm sure you guys have got them, We've got them in WA. I think there's a difference with calling someone or texting someone, then putting yourself out in these private or not. Yeah, well, that's a private Facebook community groups for property managers, because when you get in there I don't know about you guys, but you can. Yeah, do you have to be a little bit careful because you're being very vulnerable and there's a lot of opinions that come in. So we really want to make sure we're going directly to somebody that we trust.
Speaker 2:I think people posting those pages anonymously here I don't know about where you are, but they do and, to be quite honest, they're probably doing that because they're afraid of people just jumping down the throttle saying you should know this or whatever.
Speaker 2:But everybody needs to ask questions and be able to do that in a free space. So if you don't feel like you can do that in a free space and it's pointless really asking it anonymously, because then when the question is to answer, another question asked, how do they answer that without trying to say that? So I just think it's just so much easier to be able to have your network of friends and industry colleagues that you know and trust and they're always going to be there for you, and to be able to do training across the country that I've done this is where I've met all these amazing people like yourself that I could pick up the phone to ask them for a stick to make me help me with this, and I'm sure I would get the answer back saying give me 10 minutes and I'll be at my desk and I can talk to you again. So it's pretty important to be able to have those networks in our industry.
Speaker 1:And on the networks and on events and trips and things like that, breaking it down into, like you're going to have courses and conferences and trips where they've got, you know, cpds and they're very, very transactional in the learning, which obviously one benefit. Then you've got ones like you've just recently been to PM Solitude, which is very much a holistic event with the real estate industry, but holistic. And then you've got ones like you know, the US Women, which was, you know, more of that leadership, that customer service. So it's interesting because I think some people only want to do things that like might have the CPD and they're less likely to want to do the holistic side of things. But regardless, this is the way that I think, regardless of the type of event that you go to, it's not actually about the event. The event's always great, the content's always good, but I've actually every single time got more out of the network, every time, regardless, like I mean that the network is what I'm there for, the content is the bonus.
Speaker 2:I don't know how you feel about it. So I have a budget. Obviously, my budget is double what the girls is, because I want to go to all these extra things, however insane that I just took one of our girls who's been with me for 15 or nearly half a year to pay a price and because she needed that holistic approach at that time. So it's whatever they need and whatever the budgets are. I go to these events for networking. I did not go to these events to get my CPD points. Our CPD points are done on the computer at the desk, and even though some of these events might have CPD points in them, we honestly don't do it that way. We just do that here at the desk and get it done at the really really good way to do it.
Speaker 2:And yeah, the events that we go to are purely A. Who is speaking? Can I get something out of them? I'm going to the cement because I really need to get in the best with them and connect face to face and you know that sort of thing. So, yeah, purely about that, thank you. Sometimes I might skip a session to have a one-on-one with somebody that I really need to gel with really quickly. That's going to be of more value to me at that point in time, as opposed to a session on something perhaps that I'm. You know well, first of all, if that makes sense, oh no, I'm 100%.
Speaker 1:I mean that's exactly why I go to these events and yeah, I just I find it. Yeah, I think it's just a mindset shift. I just think people need to change their, their thought process. Like you and I, we go for the networking opportunities and, yeah, and just reiterating, it's about having a really enjoyable career. That's what PM Collective is about.
Speaker 1:I just want people to enjoy their career, enjoy what they do, because I am a big believer that if you enjoy your career, those problems that come up during the day they're going to resolve themselves a lot easier and you're not. They're not going to take an emotional toll on you because you love what you do. That's just. Those issues that come, those little spotlights you put out, are just a process. You know what I mean, that you just have to follow, but it's.
Speaker 1:I just feel that that is one of the big things I think like from a personal point of view. I'm also a big believer that if you are personally happy in your home life, you won't find those issues that come up in your job a big, a big problem. And I think it was Xavier that said to me once that property management is sport and you've just got to get better at playing the game. You can't wish that you're. You know that the bad situations go away. You can't wish that you had better owners or better tenants or better this or better that they were always going to be the, but you need to learn how to deal with them better in, like I said, quick, efficient way that doesn't train you.
Speaker 2:I think that's why a lot of the conferences that are retreat style conferences like Solitude, was the fact that you were going down there to better yourself or you were going down there to learn, handle a certain situation, or those sort of things. So yeah, I definitely think if you can have a happy home life, you can have a happy workplace. You know they say, isn't this saying something like, if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life? You know they love what they do and they don't come here. It's not. You know they don't come here thinking, oh great, it's Monday, I've got to go to work today. They bounce in here because we're a family again on Monday morning and here we go. We spend more time with them than we do at home with our husbands, you know.
Speaker 2:So it's really important to be able to have that and I think even with my team, I know to come to more and more events and now she's starting to network. I can sit back down watch her do what I've done, which is really cool. She's networked with all these people and now we've got even done a lot of work. I'm not sure what I've done. Which is really cool is she's networked with all these people, and now we've got even double the amount of networking in the office because she's actually directly herself, which is fantastic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so good, so good. Well, I hope that everyone listening sees the importance and how it's had a positive effect for people like Kelly and myself as well. So thank you so much for joining us. It's lovely to see you. It's been a while, so I will have to fly over and do one of the next events over your way soon. So I will see you soon. But thank you for jumping on and if anyone does want to reach out to Kelly or myself, please Google us. Find our details with both easily, google and you can touch base. So, kelly, thank you so much.
Speaker 2:You're welcome, Masha. Thank you.