Rob McMillan, WA rural property manager at AWN, Bibra Lake, was last Friday named the inaugural inductee into the Real Estate Institute of WA (REIWA) Rural Hall of Fame at the annual REIWA rural conference at The Vines Resort, Swan Valley.
REIWA rural committee chairman Mark Murray said Mr McMillan satisfied the awards criteria in every way to be an outstanding first-up awardee in what is intended to become a regular REIWA accolade.
The five criteria were:
- Exemplary character, impeccable professional and ethical standards.
- Significant track record of professional achievements in rural real estate.
- Leadership and contribution to the industry including to the goals of REIWA.
- Commitment to ongoing personal professional development and that of others.
- Leadership and contribution to the industry including to REIWA goals.
Demonstrated legislated, market and industry knowledge. According to those who nominated him, Mr McMillan commenced employment as a stock agent about 1970 with Western Livestock Ltd, after working as a jackaroo in South Australia and the Great Southern area.
After training in the Midland Saleyards and the Woolstores in Fremantle, he was sent to Kojonup as a stockie.
As was the norm at the time, that included everything from selling a client's sheep or cattle, selling farm merchandise, insurance, marketing their wool through the firm and listing and selling property for the land department.
Mr McMillan later forged relationships with the elder statesmen of the real estate industry - Jack Lee, Brian Buzzard and John Farris - who provided a long lasting impression, especially Mr Lee's stories of how property sales in the depression era helped Elders remain viable.
Mr McMillan vividly remembers his first sale - the top service station at Kojonup sold to an Italian timber miller/farmer so he could keep his younger wife occupied and his first farm sale, a 900-acre (364 hectare) property on the Kojonup-Boyup Brook border.
This was followed by time in Morawa where he married his wife Kate.
It was the start of a 10-year drought in the region and he sold a lot of livestock but also managed to get people to drought-proof their operations by finding properties in better rainfall areas for them to purchase and then retain their livestock.
At this time Stuart Fleay joined Western Livestock from Wesfarmers and Mr McMillan formed a great bond using Mr Fleay's experiences as a learning curve, especially in the art of building rapport and contacts.
Along the way he also found help from unlikely allies from both Elders, in Dudley Jones and Alan Bell, and from Wesfarmers, in Colin Philpott.
They were all men he used as examples of how a real estate agent should act and could aspire to be.
Mr McMillan is always available to anyone from his firm or any other to help and mentor and always enjoyed seeing one of his proteges going on to better themselves, often remarking how he had a hand in their development.
In 1987, Mr McMillan attained a certificate in real estate practice which gave him a triennial licence and, in 2005, he purchased a real estate franchise in Busselton.
Here he became a part-time trainer, after attaining his Certificate IV in training and assessment.
As a regular trainer, he has since influenced many diploma and registration students in their career pathways, many of whom continue to seek advice or talk to him over a cup of coffee.
Mr McMillan takes pride at seeing his successful country agents from Broome to Esperance and enjoys catching up and listening to them.
Testimonials portray him as a stickler for impeccable professional and ethical standards, delivered with the good-old country values of loyalty, honesty, integrity and friendship.
Qualities he is no doubt carrying forward in his role as the inaugural licensee for AWN Property and the WA rural property manager at AWN, Bibra Lake.
