by Neil Jenman
Reading time: Apx 5 mins
Something is happening in the real estate world. And it’s something that has not been seen in most areas for many years, perhaps decades.
Tough times are here. And it looks like two things are on the horizon. Times may get even tougher. And they could be tough for a long time.
Last week I saw something on the face of one of the country’s best agents that I have not seen for a long time.
Fear.
This agent was genuinely frightened. After years of listing properties, placing them online and receiving a deluge of enquiries from eager buyers, he is now getting nothing.
“Buyers have disappeared,” he said. “It’s like they’ve gone into lockdown.” We are listing some really good homes – all at what we believe are attractive prices. But, in almost all cases, we are getting no response. Nothing.”
As he kept talking, he grew more miserable.
“I have never seen anything like this,” he said. He lowered his head as if defeated. There was a long pause.
Then he asked me: “What am I going to do?”
My answer was simple and to the point: “You’re going to have to start selling,” I replied.
That’s right. Selling. As in S-E-L-L-I-N-G.
For too long – years (or even decades), in fact – agents have rarely done any selling. Property markets across the country have been so hot for so long that homes sell themselves. As all agents have known – and experienced to their delight – all they had to do was win a good listing and a sale was sure to follow.
But not anymore.
Especially in areas where prices are falling and where enquiry levels have dropped to near zero.
Despite yesterday’s RBA hold, a succession of interest rate rises plus changes to the tax laws for investors plus global uncertainty have combined to create what seems like a catastrophe in the real estate market. Some agents have gone as long as three months without making a single sale.
Negativity has taken hold.
Agents are frightened. Buyers – if they can be found – are taking longer to make decisions. Statements like, “We think we’ll wait and see what happens,” are common.
And one of the most common questions that agents are asking of each other is: “How do we create urgency in buyers?” Yes, gone are the days when agents can tell buyers that another buyer is interested. These days the reply from a buyer is likely to be, “Let them have it.”
Many home sellers are taking their homes off the market. They’re saying, “We’ll wait until the market picks up.”
Attitude – it’s been called the most important word in our language.
So, the first thing I told this agent was that he needed to fix his attitude.
Many years ago, the legendary Canadian real estate trainer, Bill Nasby, famously taught agents, “The market is between your ears.”
Bill was right.
When I owned my real estate office, we struck dark times. Interest rates soared into the high teens. Prices fell. Negativity was everywhere.
But I constantly told the salespeople: “Whatever goes on outside our office does not have to go on inside our office.”
In other words, don’t let this negativity affect you. No matter what the market conditions, there are still plenty of people who need to sell and buy real estate.
And what sellers need more than anything else in a tough market is agents who know how to sell. Now is the time for agents to live up to what their licenses state as their profession – salespeople. That’s agents who sell. Not agents who complain. Not agents who blame the market. The market is between your ears. Now is the time to sell.
In my agency we resolved to succeed no matter what the market. Negative talk was outlawed. We filled our mind with positivity.
We read books – especially great sales books by great authors.
Our favourite book was Og Mandino’s, “The Greatest Salesman in the World”. We learned the ten scrolls by heart.
Our most common scroll was the one on persistence.
It went like this: “I will persist until I succeed. I was not delivered into this world into defeat, nor does failure course in my veins. I am not a sheep waiting to be prodded by my shepherd. I am a lion and I refuse to talk, to walk, to sleep with the sheep.”
So, the first thing to look for in an agent if times are tough in your area is an agent with a positive attitude.
One who says something like, “Times might be tough, but I am tougher.”
The worst agents have the same three-step formula for making sales. First, do lots of advertising (at the sellers’ expense). Second, if the home doesn’t sell, drop the price and increase the advertising. Third, repeat this dropping process until the sellers surrender and sell.
In such cases, sellers would be better off dropping their agents rather than dropping their prices.
The big point to remember is this: Good homes hold their value. The easiest thing in the world to do is to drop your price.
Anybody can sell any home if the price is low enough.
What you’re looking for – as a home seller in a tough market – is an agent with a positive attitude and a high level of skill. An agent who doesn’t use the spend-your-money and then sit-on-bum and hope approach.
You need an agent who gets excited about your home and can transfer that excitement to buyers.
After all, good salesmanship has often been called “the transference of enthusiasm”.
Remember this: The quality of a home is more important to buyers than the price.
Sure, there are plenty of bargain-hunting buyers around now. But if you are the owner of a truly lovely home, then low-paying buyers are simply not the right buyers for you.
You need an agent who will follow-up buyers. And not with emails or advertisements. But with effort. Effort such as making phone calls and speaking directly with buyers.
Here’s a great tip for today’s home sellers: Before you hire an agent, make sure you mystery-shop that agent. Call the agent and enquire about one or more of the homes they have for sale. Listen carefully to how the agent responds to your enquiry. Ask yourself: Is this the sort of agent I want handling the sale of my most valuable asset?
It’s often said that in life you get one of two outcomes. You either get results or you get reasons for not getting results.
Reasons is a polite word for excuses. You don’t want excuses. You want results.
And you certainly don’t want to be paying an agent thousands of dollars for advertising costs if all you’re getting in return is a barrage of excuses.
Any agent who keeps talking about “the market” is likely to be an excuse-making agent. That’s not the agent you need in a tough market.
As we constantly say, the best agents are those who never ask for any payment – not for any reason – until your home is sold and you are convinced that the agent has done their best for you.
You can sell your home in a tough market. All you need is an agent who’s tougher than the market. An agent who’s positive, who works hard and who takes the time and makes the effort to chase up the buyers.
And once they find the buyers who are interested in your home, the best agents then do something that most agents don’t know how to do – they sell those buyers on the benefits of buying your lovely home.
Right now. Today. And for a great price.
At Jenman Support, we are constantly assessing the merits of agents across Australia. If you need help to find a positive, skilled and tough agent in these tough markets, let us know. Just email us on [email protected].
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FOOTNOTE: If agents tell you that it’s important that you spend up big on marketing on major websites, be careful.
In our new book, QUESTIONS EVERY SELLER MUST ASK, we outline several ways that agents can find buyers without spending thousands of your dollars on advertising costs. Indeed, promoting your home on a major website should be the last thing you do, not the first.
Here’s the problem: In a tough market, too much advertising can damage the value of your home. After a few weeks, buyers wonder why a home hasn’t sold. They think to themselves: Either the price is too high or there is something wrong with this home.
If your agent doesn’t know how to find buyers without asking you to spend thousands of dollars with online advertising, tell the agent to go to their local bookstore and get a copy of the book, QUESTIONS EVERY SELLER MUST ASK. As we’re being told, it’s an “eye-opener”.
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