Client-Centric Real Estate: How Our Focus on You Makes All the Difference

What is the difference between a client-centric company and an agent-centric company? Is there even a difference? And, if there is, what difference does it make to you, if any?

Before we answer those questions, let’s start with a simple question. Who is the most important person in your real estate transaction?” The answer is YOU! That’s right, it’s about you, your property, and your desired outcomes. It’s about your agent acting in your best interest, prioritizing your needs, and protecting your information and your assets.

Fiduciary Duties: Protecting Your Interests Above All Else

Our mission at Hawaii Life is to represent you and your best interests with expertise, integrity, and personalized service. We are a client-centric company, which means that we ensure you receive the highest level of representation. Our fiduciary duties to you include loyalty, obedience, disclosure, confidentiality, accounting, and reasonable care. Bottom line: Your interests are first and foremost. Always.

We’ve provided you with a simple definition of a client-centric company, but being client-centric is anything but simple. It requires incredible intention, focus, and the utmost in service to you, our client. And, it demands that we prioritize your needs, wants, and satisfaction above all else.

Why Support for Agents Still Matters

So, what about our agents and their needs? And, what exactly is an agent-centric company? Hmmm….this might be a bit harder to define, but an agent-centric company is a company that prioritizes the needs and well-being of its real estate agents. On the surface, this sounds good. After all, agents are the life blood of the business. To a large extent, they drive the business. But, here’s the thing –  if a company’s overall focus is agent-centric, i.e., it’s all about the agents, their needs, their wants, desires – and may I daresay – their demands, it may come at the expense of the company’s clients and their satisfaction. And, that’s not good. For anyone.

Don’t get me wrong, agents absolutely need support and resources. And strong leadership.  They deserve training,  guidance, oversight, and all the right tools and resources to represent their clients well. At Hawaii Life, we absolutely appreciate and respect our agents. But, it’s not about them. And, they know it. In fact, they embrace our client-centric culture because they know that everything we do – and they do – is about you, our client.

Agent-Centric vs. Client-Centric: What’s the Difference?

As a company, our obligation to our agents is important – very important – but it is different from our obligation to you. We have an obligation to support our agents, but our fiduciary is to you. We equip our agents to succeed in managing your transactions and representing  your best interests well. Very well. We provide them with tons of support, excellent technology and systems, creative, state-of-the art marketing tools, in-house training, an incredible and highly specialized staff, and most importantly, excellent brokerage oversight. Our agents are  supported 100%, but they are not our clients and they are not at the center of our company. You are.

Why is this even important? It’s important because in a competitive industry like ours, many companies clamor to recruit agents in order to gain market share. And in so doing, they sometimes work so hard on finding agents to recruit, they lose sight of the real work – that of promoting the best interest of their clients and representing them well. If a company is purely numbers driven and hyper-focused on gaining agents, their focus can become so singular that they can lose sight of the clients they represent. In an effort to increase agent count, they may also forego necessary vetting and settle for less than quality, experienced, and highly trained agents.

Fortunately, there are many good brokerages and agents in Hawaii – brokerages and agents who represent their clients well and who keep their clients at the center of everything. But, as a Buyer or Seller, you should know that real estate companies are not all the same. They come in many shapes and forms. Business models can be vastly different. So can a company’s focus, ethos, culture, and sadly, even their professional standards.

The Bottom Line: You Are at the Core of Everything We Do

How can you tell if a company is client-centric? You can begin by looking at leadership and the company’s track record of success. And, even better, you can ask. Just ask any of our agents, “Why Hawaii Life?” and you’ll hear the same response. It’s about doing good work. About representing our clients well. And, it’s about the quality of the people you surround yourself with. People who possess positive personal traits, strong character, a stellar work ethic, and a collaborative spirit – people who consistently demonstrate a commitment to those they represent.  People like you.

Hawaii Life is an agent-supportive, client-centric company – a company where solid representation matters. A lot. Representing you and your interests is at the core of everything we do because you are at the core of everything we do. Absolutely Everything.