Goodbye 2025 - Hello 2026

2025 - Happy to see it go or your most productive year ever? 

I guess it depends on what a person bases their productivity on.

For me, the first half of the year sucked.  I mean really, really sucked.  The feeling that I was in the wrong business and that I had no business selling homes. Don't feel too sorry for me, as I was getting a lot of vacant land listings, in Flanigan, NV.  Never heard of the place prior to this and had absolutely no knowledge of where the heck this place was.  After talking to a few people, I found that it was great chukar hunting.  That's it!  Not that it took 2 hours to get there on a questionable road or that people had to bring in water from other places.  Like, fill the large plastic holder with metal bars to strengthen it type of thing, that resides in the bed of a truck.  Not that the only power you would have is solar, wind, or generator, even though there is a solar farm to the south of this large alkali area. Not available to the residents of the area as it would cost an arm, leg, and torso among other things to bring the power to the properties.

Then there was the coaching program I was paying an exorbitant amount for. Is it worth it?  Heck yeah!  Lisa has made it so that I have become more productive: a Google sheet for ideas that I had/have, a sprint sheet to list what needs to be done for an event to happen, calling people. . . Okay, I'm still working on this one since I always seem to find something else to do besides that.  Coaching has helped me so much that I don't have the words to put it on paper(screen).  I even went to a seminar/conference regarding AI and met Lisa in person along with other great people.

I also decided to add a little more stress to my life and took on property management with 2 properties at the beginning of 2025.  Not even close by, but about an hour away. Added two more properties to manage and then added another this last week.  This last one was the most comfortable I've felt in a long time for doing property management.  Having systems in place to balance the bank accounts and the rentals themselves helps. 

Plus, almost every 1st and 3rd Wednesday of the month I would go to city council meetings and try to get the city to understand that fire hydrant inspections were their issue and not under the purview of the fire department.  (There had been no inspections for over 10 years).  Not good, not good at all! Almost every meeting I would go up to the podium to speak on the matter.  The excuses/reasoning that were given by the city manager and some of the city council members were outrageous.  I know everyone was trying to placate this citizen who was bringing the matter before them.  Little did they know that this citizen did her research prior to speaking.  After 12 months the city acknowledged that it was their responsibility and they would get to work on it.  Talk about slow government.  Now. . . waiting on RFP's (Request for Proposal) from different companies.  Don't worry as I already let the city know that I will keep checking in.  

The light appeared in the middle of the tunnel, and I was able to get properties sold, including homes.  Paid some bills, came up with ideas to further strengthen the brand, and all that real estate busy work that needed to be done.  Hired a great assistant, Sariah, who is great at marketing and willing to put up with my craziness.  We're talking about crazy ideas.  She went with it and we were able to produce some amazing things. 

Finally, I created a system for my past buyers to know what the value of their homes are on the anniversary of their purchase.  That has been on my mind for several years and with ChatGPT I was able to come up with a form that is easy to use and understand.

Open Houses were advertised more efficiently. Ordered branded Starbucks cards and give them to the first 5 people who attended. Sold one house because of doing an open house.  

I was convinced to go to the Fernley Spooktacular event on Halloween. Ordered 2 cases of Dum-Dum's.  If you haven't seen 2 cases, let me tell you that it is a lot of candy.  Then we needed a table cover with our logo, bags for some of the Dum-Dum giveaways, rubber/plastic wrist bands, and so much more.

Our first Adopt a Senior event, where the community was able to assist 16 seniors.  My favorite moment was when I went up to someone's door to present their gifts to them.  The man was dumbfounded about receiving gifts from Santa as he had no idea he was getting anything. I will tell you that I bought a lot of wrapping paper, gift boxes, gift bags, tissue paper, tape, ribbon, and so on.  It was a little overwhelming for me as the back room was complete chaos with all the gifts coming on.  But SO worth it in the long run.

Then I had to come up with raffle prizes for the 4th of July Bingo event.  Luckily, I had thought ahead and bought baskets at estate sales.  Coming up with the ideas for the baskets was me walking down the aisles at Walmart, grabbing an item, and then coming up with more ideas to include with that item.  It was fun.

Then I finally finished the C-REPS course that I had started in 2024 and gave myself until the 31st of 2025 to finish.  Took the practice tests and failed horribly at them, decided whatever, and took the actual test and passed with an 84%.  Taking the course and passing the tests sets me up to provide BPO's to lenders and possibly obtain some listings.  Learned some new calculation methods for appreciation/depreciation and how to do better research. It's been stated that one always needs to keep learning to keep the brain alive.

Being able to do all of this brought the sunshine back into my life as this is what I enjoy.  Yeah, it's stressful at  moments but I wouldn't trade it for anything. Okay, maybe I would trade it for a large boat full of money.  But then I would just be able to give more.

So, what is coming for 2026?. . . 

I'm going back to having a word of the year, and this year it is 'Intentional'.  I feel the word best fits the direction I'm going this year.

I have big goals and January and February are already looking to be good months.  A lot better than last year and this will be my 4th year in my own brokerage.

One goal I have is huge when it comes to dollar volume of sales and I've only once hit the goal. So, what do I do?  Set the goal even higher.  Why not?  It gives me something to strive towards. 

Find two agents to join the brokerage.

Other than that I will keep on keeping on, which I handle well.  Am I always stressed, heck yeah, but that is who I am and believe me when I say there are different levels of stress.  I am at the stress level that keeps me from getting sick, coming up with 'brilliant' 'crazy' ideas, having fun while doing it, while also creating chaos where it needs to be created.  My name is Tammy and the T stands for trouble, tenacious, trustworthy, and bluntly truthful.  

So, in the end, only good things are coming to me in 2026.  Onward and upward is the only way to go and I feel that I have the energy, excitement, and systems to get me there.

If you have read this to the end, I wish each and every one of you a great 2026 and that whatever your endeavors are, that you succeed in getting there.