Selling real estate

Last week I had the opportunity to talk to Mr. Dioscoro Lim Garing, Jr. or popularly known as Jun Garing to friends and colleagues and to the real estate business. And quite unexpectedly, the experience and insight he gave were just too overwhelming despite the very brief engagement.

As I know him, to attribute Garing as the Tom Hopkins of the Philippines would be an understatement. Garing’s quality, professionally and personally, bears no hint of a typical American sales guru that usually preaches in slogans than concepts.

The soft-spoken and ever humble, Jun Garing is a Filipino who understands the ordinary Filipino emotion and psyche. For him, selling to Filipinos does not have to be always a matter of business proposition alone but being able to connect and empathize how most Filipinos “feel” about what they are buying.

I can glean from our conversation that Garing does not want to be distinguished for his dramatic success in real estate sales, but rather, he prefers to be remembered for what he learned from such success.

His book, “Superb Selling Secrets” (The Filipino Art of Breakthrough Selling) places values first before value proposition when one sells to a Filipino. According to Garing, you will learn in the book that much of the wisdom he gets is also from Dr. Felipe Landa Jocano, an anthropologist and Professor Emeritus at the Asian Center of the University of the Philippines.

Garing encourages salespeople to take pride first for being a Filipino borrowing the words of Dr. Locano that: A Filipino is like a mythological bamboo who sways valiantly with the winds of misfortune only to rise unscathed when the tempest is over to meet again the warmth of the morning sun.”

Another of Garings insightful words: “Ang talino biyayang Panginoon, magpasalamat ka. Ang yaman at karangalan bigay ng tao at lipunan, magpakumbaba ka. Ang yabang ginawa ng sarili, mag-ingat ka.” (Talent is from God to be thankful for; wealth and honor are from people and society to be humble for and; pride is from oneself to watch out for.)

If you’re into the real estate sales industry, I recommend Garing’s book for its unique and contextually significant approach to the Filipino sales process and culture. Or if you want to personally hear from the guy himself, shoot me an email for a schedule of his lectures, trainings and other engagements here in Cebu.  

Here’s another of Garing’s tips I’d like to share for people in the industry:  

Do not procrastinate: BE PROMPT! Do not evade the challenge: FACE IT! Do not magnify the problem: SOLVE IT! Do not hide your talent: SHOW IT! Do not envy the success of others: STRIVE! Do not lag behind: BE THE LEADER!

By the way, I have sought his permission to publish some of his learnings in this column. So you expect in the next couple of weeks Garing’s words of wisdom here. Isn’t  that exciting?   

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Speaking of real estate, information from the grapevine says that there’s a soon-to-be launched website that will allow brokers, developers, property owners to create property listings in the site easily.

My source says that the interesting part of the site is its ability to also post pictures of the property, provide descriptions upload documents and a powerful search function that allows any buyer to find properties according to location down to the barangay level. People that list in the site can also avail of “virtual business cards” to send contact details to their prospects anywhere in the world. The site is believed to be the first of its kind in the Philippines.

I will publish some of its details here as soon as I have the full confirmation and permission from the site owner himself to allow us to put some of their site’s information here. 

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