Real Estate Business is not rocket science. Yet it requires a certain amount of dexterity. If you aren’t able to find out about the nooks and crannies of the information in real estate, then your knowledge remains woefully incomplete. This is a loophole and one that can cost you in the long run. If you have to grow your realty business then you have to focus on a lot of business aspects. One of them is focusing on the expired listings – the properties that were in the market but failed to sell.
Targeting Expired Listings
So here’s something that the experienced veterans in real estate do to expand their domain. They target the homeowners / property owners whose properties did not sell. These types of properties are not anti-realtor. They are good properties which can be sold at a good price, if and only if the seller knows how to package it according to the market conditions. These property owners have already hired an agent before, and they most likely will again hire one. What’s more, they might have more urgency to sell this time around. After all, their property did not sell when they first listed.
Concentrating On The Pain Point
There could be all sorts of reasons for the property owner to dispose off the property. According to the Floyd Wickman – Real Estate Training Guru, while there are a number of reasons for property owners selling off their property they want to do it in a hurry the second time around. They are anxious after the failure during the initial listing. So, they try their best to move the property forward. Not only that, they are ready to pay more commission for its sale. So the agent / broker / dealer who helps them sort out this problem gets an additional bonus. There are some points to keep in mind here.
If they are selling to relocate for a new job, then they will need swift service. That’s because they may have to move to another state or country, and have a date of joining. We have seen that when we provide them quick, hassle-free service, they respond positively.
Marriage or divorce could be a cause of selling off a property. So we try to empathize with their situation. If possible, we try to carve out the least amount of bottlenecks during the pitch and sale process. If they are planning to have a baby and need a bigger house, then we show them whatever is best for them and at a reasonable price.
Maybe they already own another home and are loaded with payments, then they need to sell the property to financially sort themselves out.
If the selling party has invested six months on the market with their previous agent, without any success then they may be under pressure. We use this to your advantage, but ethically of course.
Expired listings are the warmest leads and the best opportunity toget some good listings in the market.
A Brief History Of Expired Listings
In the 1980’s and 90’s, in the US, competition for expired listings was extremely intense. We can’t blame them either. The times were roaring back then. Prime areas like Washington D.C, NYC and LA were fertile ground for listings. The best trained agents pursued the property owners with full vigour. After all, they knew the money was there. Forgive me for saying this, but these agents a pack of wild dogs who had just tasted blood! In fact, you will find it hard to believe, but an agent who specialized in expired listings could easily get around 3 to 5 listings per week. If he / she knew the right questions to ask, had the right techniques for making hot / cold leads. But then there was a drawback in such aggressive marketing methods. Answering machines, voice mail, caller I.D on phones, the Do Not Call blockers on cell phones affected re-list their homes. Approaching expired listings suddenly became excessively a lot labourious task than it had been earlier. You had to ensure that the listings did not go somewhere else. After tons of labour, you built a database of active sellers. But there was barely time left for making calls to prospective sellers and buyers.
Basic Hot And Cold Calling Skills
Before we start pursuing expired listings we need to ensure that the following skills are in place:
Cheerfulness – Positivity helps you to sell more and makes your client more enthusiastic about the deal.
Zero Defensiveness – Never be defensive of yourself or about the property while you are completing a deal.
Clarity – You should know what you are speaking.
Try to become close to them but not uncomfortably close either – You need to have a personal bond with them, but remember one thing – they are not family.
Building The Right Competitive Attitude
The right attitude is always helpful in business. Now that one has a basic idea of calling customers, you now need to to put them in action. But it is of no use if you do not have the right mindset. And yes, experience matters a lot. Basically, there exist four kinds of property agents, and as expected they have different traits. But how will this piece of information help you? Well if you are a property seller you need to know this because then you will discover how the right property agent can help make a difference to selling your assets.
The Unconscious Incompetent – This class of real estate agents are short on both, knowledge and experience. This is a blessing in disguise because the level of confidence at this stage is good. But the problem at this stage is that the agents fail to convert deals into leads.
The Conscious Incompetent – After a few failures and hard knocks, the agents wake up to the reality of their skills. This is the stage where they should learn voraciously and reflect a lot. Naturally, at this stage, the agent is quite depressed 🙂 They are ready to take the smaller return clients because they have a long way to go.
The Conscious Competent – The agents in this class have wired the basic skills in them and are patient enough to play the game like a pro. The confidence level is good, but not at the peak. They can handle all kinds of deals, even the richest customers.
The Unconscious Competent – This class of agents practice their selling skills in an adept manner. They keep on repeating and practising their love for selling until they are able to handle all kinds of clients.
Recording What You Need To
If you are able to collect and analyze all the data surrounding a deal, then you will be able to work out the best statistical data that can help you to expand the domain of your business. Keeping your pens ready or simply record a call helps you to have all the necessary details for easy retrieval later.
Importance of Listening Skills
Real estate professionals need to listen to a lot. They are programmed to sell, so they speak a lot too. Otherwise, convincing the client is extremely difficult. Their speech is full of persuasion. And if they don’t speak up how do they tell the client about the benefits of a property. So, hate it or like it, an agent or a broker needs to speak. But we know what harm it does? It makes them bad listeners. Not only that, many of them do not know when to zip up and keep quiet.
We believe that pressing the pause button is extremely important when dealing with the property owners of the expired listings. Keeping quiet at the right junctures will result in a smooth transaction. A wrong move, a slip of the tongue could be a disastrous bottleneck and the whole deal could fall apart at any stage.
Improving Your Customer Service
Customer service is crucial for every business. If you do not tend to your customers after a sale, then nobody is going to return to you for a second deal. Customer service is all about providing the client with an experience they can never forget. If you can address their problems and provide a worthwhile solution, then you have a repeat customer in your pocket. This is good for business in the long run.
Parting Shot
You dear reader are now armed with knowledge about how we at Gupta & Sen conduct our business. There is one more thing that we are very cognizant of. As real estate professionals operating as a part of a broader industry we need to be alert of our competition and respect them. Play the game ethically. We never underestimate competitors or berate them in any manner. That’s because each of our competitors have their own network, reputation and goodwill in the market borne out of years of hard work and brand building.
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Chloe is a real estate advisor with Gupta & Sen. With a combined experience of over 15 years in varied industries, she is a vocal and knowledgeable ally for buyers and investors who want to make informed choices when buying a property in India. With superlative communication and marketing skills, Chloe handles our PR, real estate marketing strategy and client management.
