After last week’s series on documents for your listing presentation, we’re moving toward activities and documents for AFTER you have the listing.
With a new listing, you have one of the most valuable assets in real estate. How do you immediately increase its profitability by more than 100%?
Why do I say more than 100%? Because if you represent the buyer on your own listing, you are doing virtually the same amount of work in working two ends of the transaction as you would in working one. You are eliminating the overhead on one side of the transaction so you are doubling your money with half of the effort.
This could be a substantial increase in your net profit and should be sought after as a high priority in your career. Many real estate agents coming off the high of just receiving a great listing believe they only have to do the traditional servicing aspects and then wait for an offer to come in. I was successful for my clients because the week after taking a listing was when my office really stepped up.
You need to be prepared at the listing presentation to increase your chances of a double-ended transaction. Being prepared means having signage in your car that you can immediately put up as you walk out the front door. This will increase your chances of real estate watchers in the neighborhood who will immediately call you for a showing.
Since you have probably already demonstrated how their property will look on your website, it is time to call your assistant and have him or her upload this information to the new listings section of your website. Why go to all the work of promoting your website to the seller and then not use that work immediately to attract buyers who happen upon your site and see there is a new listing in the neighborhood?
Another high priority is to have “just listed” cards that have a standard design available to go out within one or two days of the listing. This is for the same reason as putting up early signage and a pre-MLS submittal website posting on your own website. People in the area will create the buzz and find that buyer for you, hopefully prior to the property even hitting the MLS. Being prepared for marketing prior to MLS publication is important in finding that net profit-producing buyer for your listing.
Don’t forget to contact your database. Email your clients the information on your new listing. The benefits of joining my E-mail newsletter was my clients received new listing information before it hit the MLS. Not only did my service increase my real estate newsletter subscription rate but it also enabled me to find interested buyers who would leave me their E-mail address for “hot off the press, pre-MLS” listings.
You can also contact the “have and want” sections of your database that match with the parameters from your new listing. These “have and want” sections can include neighborhood, price range, bedrooms/bathrooms, etc. You should immediately E-mail the information to those who fall within the same requests matching your new listings’ offerings.
You can substantially increase your percentages of earning both sides of the commission, if you beat the MLS submission by putting up early signage, website submittals, just-listed cards, and database appropriate E-mails.
This is a grey area in many MLS boards and regions so PLEASE GET YOUR BROKER’S OR MLS APPROVAL BEFORE DOING ANY OF THE FOLLOWING ITEMS.
- In other blogs, we discussed how we can add “sizzle” to any property of a seller who does not want to list the property because of items that first need to be resolved. My solution is to put up a sign that reads, “SOON TO BE ON MARKET, TAKING NAMES NOW FOR SHOWING APPOINTMENTS IN _____ DAYS. CALL WALTER SANFORD 815.929.9258.” This process allows you to collect potential buyer leads while you are waiting for the seller to resolve their challenges prior to listing. You could probably talk the sellers into your showing the property earlier if you had a truly motivated buyer.
- This situation can be taken one step further by actually asking the seller if they would like to delay the MLS submission. This process can be done with a “hold, do not show agreement” on any of your local agreements that allow an MLS submission. If you are able to obtain an MLS submission delay legally, then you will have more time to implement the initial marketing ideas mentioned earlier prior to the MLS submission.
- Of course, it is always prudent to take advantage of the legal time in which you must submit a property to MLS after you have taken the listing. It is just plain stupidity to submit any property to the MLS before it is time. It is always important to play by the rules in a cooperative MLS so please take every legal advantage you can in delaying MLS submission. Do not cross the line into playing unfairly.
- Another bonus of leverage in having a listing is you have all the cooperative agents in the area using their time and overhead to show buyers your properties! This is why most top agents prefer to work the selling side of the business rather than the buying side of real estate.
Increase your chances of selling the property yourself, but remember that you have a great leverage of an unpaid sales team showing your property after its MLS submission.
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