What can estate agents do if homes aren’t selling?
Right now, there’s a lot of talk: about property taking longer to sell; about buyers not committing; about the market being a generally tougher place. So what can you do when it all slows down?
Well, you have to keep moving. Your bills won’t ease off, thats for sure (unless you’re planning on redundancies) which means you still need to pay the rent, rates, phone, electricity, IT support and whatever else you’re committed to.
So it’s vitally important that you keep doing business. And to do that you need two things:
LOTS OF NEW INSTRUCTIONS
Whether or not property is flying out the door, you need to keep up a level of new instructions to draw in as many new enquiries as possible. On Rightmove, most buyers begin their search by filtering out properties that are more than 14 days old. While they might go on to expand their criteria, you really want to appear in those first results to get the enquiry before anyone else. Then you can introduce other properties you’re marketing, and hopefully monopolise the time of good buyers to minimise their contact with other estate agents.
So it’s essential that you keep on winning new business and I would strongly suggest shoving leaflets and letters through as many doors as you can. If you can’t say you’re selling things thick and fast, you can at least show your commitment to getting people moved through your constant enthusiasm and expertise.
Of course, you probably could say you’re selling things thick and fast if you get…
LOTS OF PRICE REDUCTIONS
If the market is being sluggish, you can either sit around and do nothing, or you can have a go at getting things moving. Getting a meaty price reduction (at least 5%) can often kick a property’s fortunes into gear and gives you an excuse to get back in touch with previous viewers. You can also contact other applicants whose budget might previously not have stretched to the property in question.
If you were to call every homeowner whose property you are marketing, I reckon you’ll get about half of them to reduce IF you can give them good reasons for doing so, and you genuinely feel it will get their move underway. The best method is to sit down with your team and go through each instruction one-by-one and come up with a price you think it will definitely sell at, along with any other ideas you think will help get it sold. You have a real opportunity here to remove any obstacles.
As for the other fifty percent of owners, some of them may choose to take their property off the market until things improve (which is no bad thing), while others might consider a price reduction later on, particularly if you can give them examples of sales agreed with the reductions you previously got. And once you’ve got your market going again (which will happen – you just need to find the right new price level), you can start sending out leaflets and letters saying you’re selling things thick and fast. Which will lead to…
MORE NEW INSTRUCTIONS!
And the great circle of life begins once more. Good luck!