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3 Strategies to Prevent Your Real Estate Deals From Going South

Apr 10, 2023

In recent months, more than 15% of home sales fell through nationwide, according to a Redfin analysis. If you’re a Phoenix, Las Vegas, or Tampa agent, you’re undoubtedly familiar with this, as these cities have the highest number of incompleted real estate deals.

According to a survey from Cinch Home Services, the top 5 reasons for these derailments include:

The buyer walked
The buyer’s mortgage application was denied
Seller backed out
Home inspection issues
The home didn’t appraise

Don’t wait for your deals to start falling apart. Being proactive rather than reactive will help avoid some more common problems.

1. Vet the buyer

According to the aforementioned Cinch survey, 42% of derailed deals in recent month’s resulted from a denied loan application.

Buyers’ agents should thoroughly vet their clients to ensure they qualify for a loan and are prepared to financially complete the deal.

Listing agents might want to consider requesting “… a recent pre-approval letter from the lender, written within the last 30 days,” suggests a Boulder, Colorado agent at realtor.com.

Additionally, ensure that the buyer has a lock on the interest rate. “Buyers that have a mortgage rate lock are more likely to close the purchase versus those that still need a rate lock,” according to zondahome.com’s chief economist Ali Wolf.

Jason Gelios, author of “How to Think Like a Realtor,” offers up some signs for a listing agent to be on the lookout for that might indicate that the buyer isn’t as strong as you might hope. These include:

A small down payment
Requests for credits or concessions from the seller
A pre-approval letter from an unfamiliar lender

2. Tighten up those contingency timelines

Not too long ago, we were engulfed in a hot, hot, hot sellers’ market, so much so that the word ‘contingency’ almost became obsolete.

“Now, the supply and demand balance has changed,” Aly J. Yale at money.com reminds us. “Buyers have leverage, ushering in a new age of contingency-laden deals.”

“Homebuyers now will agree to buy a house and be doing the inspection, and then back out because they found another home they love more,” cautions a Redfin agent in Las Vegas.

Before accepting a contract, counsel your client to counter with a request to shorten any overly-long contingency timelines. The less time the buyers have to shop around for another home while still under contract on your listing, the better.

3. Consider a pre-sale home inspection

Nearly 40% of failed real estate deals can be blamed on home inspection results.

We get it: Many agents hesitate to recommend a pre-listing home inspection to their clients. Some say it’s because it presents additional disclosure items. Whatever the reason, the truth about the home will come out in the buyers’ inspection report anyway.

Be proactive so your client has the full picture of what she’s facing when the buyer’s inspection results come in. This allows your client to fix or replace anything you’re sure will be an issue for the buyer.

At the very least, you’ll have time to strategize how to handle negotiations if there are problems with the home.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine with rich, full-color content and a sharp, professional aesthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12-Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do and when. Four key market segments include niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks these boxes but is also a business-building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. – Click Here

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan allows you to enter your business goals for this year and get a breakdown of how many prospects, listings, closing, and so on are needed to reach your goals. – Click Here

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Become-A-Listing-Legend-3D-Book-White-274x300.jpg

Ready to take a vertical leap in your real estate career? If you’re looking for inspiration…and the tools and methods to dominate a market and go to the top in real estate…you’ll find them in this free book. – Click Here

3 Simple Rules to Gain Your Market’s Attention and Get Them Calling

Mar 29, 2022

Before you launch your next direct mail marketing campaign, make sure to add these rules to your list of must-do’s.

Rule #1 Provide a Compelling Call-to-Action

Retailers have an easy time with calls-to-action. Offering a percentage off, free shipping, or buy-one, get-one-free are all popular examples.

What about real estate agents though? What kind of call-to-action can you provide that might compel a recipient of your postcard to contact you for more information?

The following are a few examples that are attention-getting and have the potential to engage homeowners and get them requesting more information.

• Free Downsizing Review and Strategy
• Free Home Equity Analysis
• Free Vacant Home Sales Strategy
• Free Home Price Analysis

The Call to Action Series of postcards is shown above. To learn more about sending a one-time mailing, Click Here. To learn more about sending a recurring campaign, Click Here.

Keep in mind, however; the number of hoops you force your prospects to jump through to take advantage of these offers does impact the response rate, according to Bob McCarthy at DMNews.com. The more they have to do to receive that offer, the lower the response rate.

Rule #2 Utilize Standout Designs

“One strategy we use to get our highest response rates is to make the call-to-action the centerpiece of the direct mail piece,” McCarthy claims.

Whether you choose to include an image representing the free offer or use text to describe it, mention it boldly and repeatedly. Your message (its length and graphic requirements) determines the size and style of the medium.

Plan on keeping it plain and simple? A standard-sized postcard may do the trick, although jumbo, panoramic, and mega-sized postcards stand out in mailboxes, which makes for a genuinely lasting impression.

If it is graphics-heavy and you include substantial copy, using one of the larger postcard sizes (jumbo or panoramic) becomes even more important.

Choose a font that is easy to scan as people sift through their mail. As direct mail experts, we recommend using a sans serif font, such as Arial, rather than Times New Roman or another serif font.

Consider varying the font size throughout the text. For example, you can highlight important items with a larger version of the font you choose.

Additional design tips to keep in mind include ensuring your headline is bold and compelling, yet short and specific. Use lots of white space to make the piece appear to be easily digestible.

Subheadings are important, as they help guide the reader through the text.

Don’t forget to use high-resolution photographs, and avoid placing text over photos. Last note, ensure that your call-to-action stands out and that your contact information is easy to find.

Rule #3 Track Your Results

Tracking your results is vital to long-term marketing success.

In fact, the only way to continue to improve your marketing results, and achieve a higher ROI, is to understand what has worked and hasn’t worked in the past.

Of course, the easiest way to track your marketing is to make it a habit of asking each person who calls how they heard about you.

Another way is to make your free offer unique for easy tracking. When you receive incoming calls you will know immediately what marketing piece inspired their call based on the offer they inquire about.

One more popular method used by agents is to create a dedicated landing page on your website. The URL should be unique to the campaign, so you are able to learn your exact response rate (number of responses divided by the total number of pieces sent).

Marketing experts vary when quoting an “average response rate” for direct mail.

The most recent figure puts it at 9%. How close or far you are from that figure depends on how closely you follow the guidelines outlined above.

PLUS: When you have time…below are some marketing tools to help support your success.

1. Put Your Real Estate Business a Step Above with Your Own Branded Magazine

Homes & Life Magazine is a customizable magazine, with rich, full-color content, and a sharp, professional esthetic. It includes compelling, direct response-driven articles written by real estate industry experts, combined with engaging lifestyle content. Send out Homes & Life Magazine in Just Minutes – No Minimums Required. Or we’ll ship it to you.

Homes & Life Magazine is the ultimate “Coffee Table Lingerer”! …and, it costs less than sending a greeting card! – Click Here

2. The Free 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan

The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, niche Markets, geographic farming, sphere of influence, and past clients. – Click Here

3. The BusinessBase, SOI building system

The most effective thing you can do to build a real estate business is to become more visible, more likable, and remembered more often. The BusinessBASE™ not only checks all of these boxes, but it is a business building machine. In two easy steps, you can begin to build a robust sphere of influence that will provide you a lifetime of repeat business and referrals. – Click Here

4. The Free Interactive Real Estate Business Plan

5. The Become a Listing Legend Free eBook

6. The Take a Listing Today Podcast

Watch the ProspectsPLUS!, Take a Listing Today Podcast for actionable content to help you get more listings. – Click Here

The Secret to Converting Leads

Lead Incubation

Jun 20, 2018

More words of wisdom from Dean Jackson (the king of real estate marketing). In today’s article, he explains his innovative approach to converting leads over time. Dean Jackson is the founder of GoGoAgent and Listing Agent Lifestyle.

Playing the long game

I’ve heard many agents complain when they try different sources to generate leads, for a few months, and get nothing out of it. Unfortunately, the point being missed with this way of thinking is the real payoff with lead generation is in playing the long game.

The correct approach is to look at your lead generation process, not as a short-term expense, but as a capital investment. Do not add unnecessary and misguided pressure to the action of generating leads by expecting to recapture your money in 30, 60 or even 90 days.

It’s time to amend your perception of the value of a lead over time. And begin to cultivate your leads over 12, 18 and even 24 months (regardless of lack of response). Then you will begin to build a true capital asset. And this asset of unconverted leads will become an incredible treasure trove that will continue to pay dividends for years.

A case study

A great story defending the above philosophy is of agent Tony Kalsi. We tracked lead conversion results on Tony’s listings for four years in a “Getting Listings Case Study”. And we discovered 21 transactions he achieved over the four-years were from leads he had generated in the first year that he had continued to cultivate.

If Tony had written off these 21 leads as “duds” due to not being able to convert them quickly, he would have missed out on – I don’t even want to think about how much money!!

I’ve heard story after story like this from agents who understand the long-term approach to converting their leads. They patiently educate and motivate their lead list, then watch the yield from that portfolio continue to pay off year after year.

Being conscious of your marketing dollars has its place. However, focusing only on what you can achieve “right away” from your marketing dollars and discarding the rest is a mistake. And this mistake will cost you longterm valuable assets.

Every new lead that you add to your “lead portfolio” is a potential future client. Some leads may convert quickly, but many more will convert over time, even years after your initial contact.

From “dud” to dynamite

If you have leads gathered over the years that you’ve identified as “duds” due to not converting quickly, I have a great marketing campaign for you. This campaign has the potential to bring many of them back into the fold.

Gather together an email list of your so-called “dud” leads and send them the following email. Put their “first name” in the subject line of the email and then ask them one simple question in the body of the email. “Hi ‘insert person’s name’, “Are you still looking for a house in ‘insert city or neighborhood’?”.

That’s it.

That little email and nothing more. Send that email to all of the dud leads you’ve generated and neglected for 90 days or longer (or you feel have neglected you). And you’ll be amazed at how many people respond “Yes, we’re still looking.” You’re also going to be surprised, not in a good way, at the number of responses you get from people that say, “No, we’ve already bought.”

This second response will break your heart, but don’t sulk, just make a mental note that YOU can not predict when a prospect will be READY to move forward. This knowledge will become a reminder to not prejudge your leads. But instead to take the long-term “asset management” approach to nurturing your leads as the treasure trove that they are.

Begin cultivating and nurturing your lead portfolio today by sending out the Ever Thought About Selling postcard from the Listing Inventory Series to at least 100 prospects from your lead list.

To learn more about the other incredible tools and resources Dean has available for agents go to GoGoAgent.com and ListingAgentLifestyle.com.

Need help targeting the perfect niche of sellers or buyers? Use our mailing list tool to create the ideal list (it’s easy) or call our support team for assistance at 866.405.3638!

PLUS: When you have time…here are 3 free ways we can help you CRUSH IT in 2018!

1. The Free 2018 Real Estate Business Plan.

Treat your business like a business it is vital to long-term success in this industry. Some agents may put together elaborate business plans, yet there’s something powerful about keeping it simple. Check out our one page Online Real Estate Business Plan – Click Here

2. The Free Online ROI Calculator.

Consistency and automation are the keys to success. Discover how effective direct mail marketing can dramatically increase your bottom line. Enter your statistics in our Free online ROI Calculator and click the ‘CALCULATE MY ROI’ button to see your results instantly! – Click Here

3. The 12 Month Done-For-You Strategic Marketing Plan.

The Real Estate Marketing Planner is a powerful 12-Month-Guide that strategically defines what marketing to do when. Four key market segments are included, Niche Marketing, Listing Inventory, Geographic Farming, and Sphere of Influence – Click Here – Click Here

Also…check out these cool tools 🙂

Three Click Postcards – Just snap a home photo & create a postcard all from your mobile phone

MLSmailings.com – Automated Just Listed, Just Sold Postcards

Market Dominator System – Become a neighborhood brand