In today’s market, the listing agent is “KING”. The reason is very simple. Florida’s population grew by 300K people, the second-largest increase in the country last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That number does not include the estimated 300K Puerto Rican Americans that came to Florida after Hurricane Maria hit last September.
This growth is putting a strain on an already dwindling Florida inventory that has decreased significantly in the past year. It’s Economics 101, supply and demand. He/She who controls the supply can greatly benefit from the demand. Every lead is valuable and exclusive. The principles of the 7D Theory can guarantee you have the highest probability of converting the lead to a listing.
When a lead is assigned to a sales associate, that information isn’t shared with any other agents. It’s an “Exclusive” lead!
The leads that are provided are heavily researched and contain very motivated sellers. 80% of the leads generated in our system will be active for sale within 6-8 months. Information on the subject property and the owner are used to increase your success in conversion. Data collection of the subject and home owners is continuous until the lead is converted.
Exterior Inspections
The purpose of the Exterior inspection is twofold:
- Verify that the contact information is correct
- Determine the distress phase of the owner
The exterior inspections help you gain information on the property and owner, so you can gain rapport and credibility during communications. It will also help you to ask more detailed open ended questions in the future.
Converting leads into listing is all about understanding the “mind set” of the owner and having a solution to the problem when the owner is ready. Vorsight, a business development company found, “at any given time, only 3% of your market is actively buying/selling, 56% are not ready, 40% are poised to begin”.
A distressed home owner that is in debt may not be ready to deal with his/her issue today. However, when the bank sends a lis pendens (intent to foreclose document) they may reconsider. Contacting the distressed homeowner, being available and having a solution is 95% of the program.
The key to converting leads is also how the agent controls random variables. There are some things you have no control over. However, you should take advantage of the variables you can control. Anyone can go to the county clerk of courts and pull a pre-foreclosure list.
But if the contact information on this list isn’t correct the list is useless. Verifying contact information is a random variable that can be controlled. The exterior inspection is validation process for the lead.
At best, bad data is costly to maintain and ineffective to use. More importantly, bad data could lead to inaccurate business and marketing decisions that do more harm than good. – Internal Results
Confirming Contact Information
Your leads will include the “Subject” address and “Mailing” address. The Subject is the home to which you want to list and the mailing address is where the property appraiser says the owners live. This information is often times incorrect for a variety of reasons.
Go to the Subject address and always park on the street. Be mindful that this is someone else’s property and you do not want to trespass. Always have proper identification on you such as your business cards and your pocket real estate license. Look for signs that people are living in the home.
Ask and yourself these 4 questions:
1. Is the home vacant or occupied? If the Subject and Mailing address are the same and the home is vacant, we know the information from the property appraiser is incorrect. This means additional research will be needed to trace the home owner.
2. Where bank or preservation notices or lock boxes posted on the property? Notices are usually post card sized stickers from maintenance companies that proclaim the property is vacant. Lock boxes are usually a tip that a preservation company is maintaining.
3. How would I rate the landscaping? Rating the landscaping can sometime give you a tip to the distress phase of the owner. The rating should be based on what the average lawn looks like in that neighborhood. Unkept lawns and pools are clues that the owners have given up fighting the bank.
4. Where the utilities were On or Off? Electricity and water are basic necessities and humans cannot live without these utilities. If they are off the property is more than likely vacant.
Next Step: Log all the information gathered into the ZOHO CRM – Customer Relationship Manager in the Inspection Research section. Add any notes that you might think are relevant to determining occupancy such as discussions with neighbors. You can also add basic information about property defects and the neighborhood as a whole. When you conduct an exterior inspection, you are going to take a picture of the outside front of the home. Try to get the roof and the lawn all in the same picture. This picture will help you when you need to refer back to the property later.
