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By John Boe

RISMEDIA, April 8, 2011—While you may not always get what you want, you will always get what you expect! Surprisingly, the power of belief and expectation work just as effectively on your feelings of self-doubt and limitation as they do on your thoughts of success and achievement.

Think thoughts of defeat or failure and you are bound to be discouraged. Belief is an incredibly powerful state of mind. Your belief system not only defines and shapes who you are, but it also determines your potential. Henry Ford was correct when he said, “Whether you think you can or think you can’t – you are right.” Your belief system, like your computer, doesn’t judge what you input; it simply accepts it as the truth.

Earl Nightingale, cofounder of the Nightingale-Conant Corporation, concluded that life’s strangest secret is that you become what you think about all day long. If you want to know where your predominant thoughts lie and what you believe, look at what you are experiencing in your life. Your thoughts are creative by nature and express themselves through your emotions, which in turn, drive your actions.

Everything you say, both positive and negative, is literally an affirmation. Consider this well-known quotation:

“Watch your thoughts, for they become words. Choose your words, for they become actions. Understand your actions, for they become habits. Study your habits, for they will become your character. Develop your character, for it becomes your destiny.”
- Anonymous

Many years ago, I heard about an eager, new insurance agent who had just received his license and was looking for prospects. He met with a successful businessman who had agreed to provide him with referrals. As the businessman handed the insurance agent 10 referrals, he asked him to contact the prospects immediately and get back to him with the results.

Two weeks later, the enthusiastic salesman dropped by the businessman’s office to give him feedback and ask for more referrals. The insurance agent was pleased to announce that he had been very successful! He proudly stated that he had already contacted and sold insurance policies to seven of the referrals and was still attempting to contact the other three. After thanking the businessman for giving him the 10 prospects, he asked him if he had thought of any other referrals.

The businessman smiled and said that he was very busy at the moment and surprised the insurance agent by handing him a phonebook. The businessman informed him that the previous 10 prospects were not his personal contacts, but rather names that he had selected at random out of the phonebook. He suggested that the salesman go ahead and get the next 10 prospects out of the phonebook himself!

The astute businessman taught the new salesman an extremely valuable lesson in the power of belief and expectation. The salesman had made those sales on the belief that he had been given 10 preferred prospects. Therefore, he was confident and eager to contact those leads and expected to make the sales with little or no difficulty. What is your belief about your market and what expectations do you have for your success? Yes, belief is indeed a very powerful state of mind!

John Boe presents a wide variety of motivational and sales-oriented keynotes and seminar programs for sales meetings and conventions. John is a nationally recognized sales trainer and business motivational speaker with an impeccable track record in the meeting industry. To have John speak at your next event, visit www.johnboe.com or call 937-299-9001. Free Newsletter available on website.

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Market value is the amount prospective buyers are willing to pay at the time homeowners are ready to sell. Now you may ask – how do I find out the market value of my home? Well, the best way to ensure that you get the best price is to obtain a Comparable Market Analysis (CMA). You can get a CMA from your qualified, professional real estate agent.

The market analysis will include homes in your area that are currently on the market, expired from the market, pending a sale, expired and already sold within the last three to six months. Of course, the best indicator of your home’s value is the price for similar homes in your area that have already been sold. The comparison is based on the proximity to your home and the similarity of characteristics such as lot size, square footage, number of bedrooms and baths, other home amenities, etc.

It’s a good idea to sit down with your agent to discuss how each factor of the market analysis affects your home’s value. You can consider current listings to identify the competition, recently sold homes to indicate what buyers are willing to pay, homes with a sale pending to show the current demand and expired homes to suggest what buyers are unwilling to pay. Quality real estate Web sites may offer tools that help you determine how some of these factors affect your home’s value, but an agent is always the most reliable source. Some Web sites will simply interpret data from places like a county auditor site, but not take other important aspects into consideration. To ensure accuracy, work with an agent.

Suggestions for what to do are always accompanied with what not to do – and there are a few “dont’s” when deciding the value of your home. Avoid the urge to price your home based on factors that don’t affect the market value. Those factors include how much money you need to buy your next home, how much you paid for your current home, how much you paid for home improvements, the value of similar homes in different communities, area appreciation statistics, the cost to build the same home today and personal attachment.

Discovering how much your home is worth is the first step to ensure that your home is priced correctly. So, take the time, do the research and talk with your real estate agent. Together you can decide what the best price is in today’s market.

via For Sale: Single Family House in Pataskala, OH, $750,000.