Professional Report

terstate at 70 miles an hour, it’s hard to be productive and safe at the same time. That’s when he listens to audiobooks.

Norm Khoury, SIOR, CCIM, a senior vice president for Colliers International in Cincinnati, Ohio, works the I-75 corridor from Northern Kentucky, through Cincinnati to Dayton, and he also listens to books on tape when he wants some down time when driving. On the other hand, when he wants to keep busy, he has alternatives. If it’s a particularly crazy week and he has a lot of driving, he might hire a driver or have a junior broker take the wheel.

Most of the time, however, he is in his automobile by himself, which is why he travels in a late model car with advanced Bluetooth communications. “With the built-in phone book I can call up anyone by name voice command. That saves me a lot of time,” he says. “I can call my office, team members and others without looking for a phone numbers, without taking my eyes off the road.” He adds, "good technology in your car covers a lot."

As for apps, Khoury, too, is a big fan of Waze and the in-auto GPS system. The Loopnet app is also useful.

Mostly, he says, “you need to have a plan; you need to know where you are going before you get behind the wheel. Many times you are on the way to an appointment, it could be 20 miles away, you plug it into your GPS and it takes you to the wrong place or the streets are one way. I look at a map and know where I’m going before I get into a car unless I’ve been there several times and know the route well. I don’t want to get lost or experience a road closure, which happens on the interstate many times.” Khoury plans out his week in advance, even making appointments with himself.

“Recently, I had to take a conference call around lunch time so I went to a parking lot,” he recalls.

“I had the documents with me. I just pulled out
my iPad and did a national conference call. It
was between appointments. I had the documents
on my iPad, I just pulled them up. An hour and
40 minute conference call. I had three showings
before that call and a meeting afterward.”
About phone calls, Khoury has his office phone
forwarded to his mobile phone. “My Bluetooth
system is advanced, he says, “Most of the impor-
tant numbers are pre-planned. I know where the
rest-stops are, the parking lots, good restaurants
some place where I can do a call.”
One final recommendation from Khoury: “I
don’t always drive the same route. I encourage
everyone to go a different way because you nev-
er know what you will see. It’s a really good way
to learn the market. There’s always a new devel-
opment or expansion on an existing building.”
Another SIOR broker who espouses thorough
planning if one is going to be spending hours in
an automobile is Mike Spears, SIOR, CCIM,
president of TNRG in Houston, Texas.

“To be productive it’s important to plan as to what you are going to be doing in the car,” he says. “If you driving, you can’t do paper work, but if you plan ahead, you can make phone calls. I make a list of everything I need to accomplish that day. If I have 10 phone calls to make then I will identify beforehand the times I should call while I’m driving.” Listing is important to Spears. “I make a list of people that are prospects as well as all my calls that I have to do during the day,” he explains. “I write them down even though I have my phone. You don’t want to have to scroll through the phone – that’s not safe. Use the voice recognition on your car. When I’m at the office I don’t need to be making certain calls at the moment unless they are vital. If I know I’m going to be traveling an hour, going out or coming back, I know I can get those calls done. So, I can focus on more important things that have to be done at the office.” The most important app for Spears is just the GPS in his automobile. If he has many stops during the day, he’ll e-mail his car all of the venues. He uses Waze as well.

“I may know how to get to all of those sites, but the navigational systems will tell you the traffic situation,” he says. “I can look at it and see if