7 must-read real estate and sales books from 2020

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As a real estate author of three books and a life-long student of the industry, I try to read as many books as possible. Each year, I craft a list of the best real estate-related books published that year. 

Last year, I had many eager authors contact me with requests to include them on this year’s list. My general criteria for consideration are as follows: 

• The book needs to have published within the year of review
• It must be widely available in print 
• The book must have generated a decent amount of sales

Not all books that I have read made the final cut. In fact, this year, there were quite a few that I decided to leave out due to lack of quality. Without any further ado, here are the real estate books from 2020 from newest to oldest.

Katrina Madewell, Nov. 18, 2020 

Forget constant cold calling — the best salespeople build their networks and book of businesses through relationship-building. They genuinely get to know their customers by investing their time and energy with integrity, honesty, excellent communication and insightful listening. If you’re in sales or just thinking of a career in sales, this book is for you.

Michael Hellickson, Sarah Santa Ana, Tara Hellickson, Oct. 29, 2020 

Assistants, agents who have an assistant and anyone contemplating hiring an assistant need to read this book. Everything, including how to hire and train your admin and checklists and systems they can implement in your business immediately, is included in this in-depth bible for real estate agent assistants.

Rebecca Donatelli, Oct. 7, 2020 

Young Professionals Network (YPN) leader, Realtor and national speaker Rebecca Donatelli recounts her path to leadership, volunteering and success in the real estate business, including her experiences and challenges along the way — good, bad and ugly.

Michel Friedman, Sept. 30, 2020 

Based on 30 years of experience selling real estate and attending seminars, Friedman shares the proven path to 50-plus transactions per year that he has taught to thousands of Realtors throughout his career. The book includes a wide range of techniques for doing business and scripts for objection handling.

Joe Sesso, Sept. 12, 2020

A sequel to the original best-selling book Secrets of Top Selling Agents, this book is based on interviews with some of the industry’s biggest names. It covers four main topics: lead generation, real estate investing, building a real estate team from scratch and creating a super-producer mindset. Expect all-new content with actionable insights that are relevant to real estate agents today.

Leigh Brown, July 24, 2020 

Leigh Brown believes in living an authentic life. Keeping it real, she conveys this throughout this transformational book. When reading, you’ll get an understanding of how we became dependent on social media, learn how to start reconnecting with people in real life and brush up on communicating the information you’d never share on social media with friends. Enjoy more profound, fulfilling relationships.

Chelsea Peitz, Feb. 2, 2020

Social media is a hot topic in real estate, often covered on-stage and in online articles. Peitz shares her real-world experience and examples in an easily digestible format, including illustrations, worksheets and additional resources. 

While reading the book, I tested out a few of the recommendations and was shocked at the amount of engagement those posts got on Facebook.

Bonus book

Although not available yet, I did receive an advanced copy of Ron Howard’s next book Profitability and Performance Pitstops. In 2018, I reviewed Howard’s Create Demand and Stop Chasing Business, an easy read full of useful ideas for building a high-volume business without the chase. 

With Profitability and Performance Pitstops, Howard packs 400-plus pages with ideas, models and concepts to build a big and profitable business. 

Howard shares the right behaviors to adopt, key operational models and team-building ideas. I enjoyed different perspectives from the successful coaches and profitable team leaders Howard interviewed and some of our favorite authors’ big ideas. If you’re looking to build a real estate sales business with a core of profitability and performance, this is a must-read.

Hungering for more? Here are a few other recommendations from readers, contributors and staffers:

Brandon Doyle is a Realtor at Doyle Real Estate Team — RE/MAX Results in Minneapolis and co-author of Mindset, Methods & Metrics – Winning as a Modern Real Estate Agent. You can follow him on YouTube or Facebook.