Jerry Rossi's summary of the 2009 buyer

Watch this video by Jerry Rossi. He has a solid view of the characteristics of the 2009 buyer. Many of his points are about the characteristics we have been discussing but his overall message points out the need to provide pertinent information to capture the buyer lead. Pay close attention to his first listing video.

The Practices of Follow Up

Successful agents are driven with determination and commitment when following up with leads. The more consistent the follow up the greater the chance the professional will have of converting the prospect into a client. Be careful of success and of being too busy for follow up. Being disciplined is a critical part of successful follow up. If you consider these tips when designing and implementing a follow up system you will have SUCCESS!
Time Management
· Following up with leads has to be a routine – set specific times daily to follow up with prospective customers and clients.
· Don’t let follow up time suffer from being busy. Set aside time daily to follow up even if it isn’t the same time every day.
· Lead follow up is your number one job when you’re not out actively performing duties for your buyers and sellers. It is a mind set of tenacity and determination.
Discipline and Organization
· Believe in the fact that consistent follow up is a proven method leading to success. Use an easily to follow system for follow up and stick to it.
· Organization begins with keeping the information you have on leads in one place. Don’t get confused between one lead and another by being disorganized or haphazard in organization.
Documentation
· Use a system to capture critical information like a prospect sheet and use it with every lead. Use a system that is easy for you and makes you feel comfortable.
· Keep notes on each lead with details from each conversation. Review these notes before each contact with a lead to help redevelop rapport and refocus on key information.
Set Your Expectations
· Expect rejection! It’s ok. Determine your no to yes ratio to keep yourself encouraged. Using that ratio and your average commission determine how much each no is actually worth. Have fun with this!
· Understand rejection. Many times customers use the word no to mean, “I need more information .” Sometimes no means, “I’m not ready yet.”
· If you don’t ask you’ll never be rejected. Ask for business a lot otherwise you’ll never get to a single yes.
· Understand your prospects’ needs and wants by asking probing questions and listening to their answers. This valuable information will help you be of exceptional service and stand apart from the competition.

Follow Up...A Key to SUCCESS

Following up with prospects is a key to being successful in real estate. Having a system that allows regular, consistent, and expected contact with your prospects is a must. When designing a follow up system consider the following five pricniples to get the most from your follow up routine.
1. Reach out on a regular basis. Consistently contact your leads and focus on building your relationship. The more a prospect hears your name, the more likely they will remember it. If you remain in contact with a prospect, they will be more inclined to work with you because you made an effort to stay in touch.

2. Make yourself memorable. Make yourself stand out among other sales associates. Give your prospects a unique item; tell them something interesting about yourself (hobbies or other interests outside of real estate); wear something distinctive so it's easy for potential buyers and sellers to remember you. Provide your prospects with a higher level of service than your competition so you stand out from the rest.

3. Make it personal by being a student of your prospects. Knowing details about your prospects' lives helps you to have a more natural flow to your conversations. People feel more comfortable with someone who can talk to them about leisure activities and common interests. Also, your leads will be very impressed and flattered that you took the time to learn something about them.

4. Give something of value. The purpose of each contact with a prospect should be to offer them something to help them with their real estate needs,and ultimately lead to them working with you. Offer to provide them with new listings that meet their needs, meeting with your Gold Services Manager, the Weichert Brochure or one of the other Weichert Tools at each contact. Get to know the inventory and stay current on the local market statistics such as average days on market, absorption rate, and median sales price in your area so you are ready to talk abut these helpful facts with your prospects.

5. Write it down - Use a system to schedule and organize your activities. Don't let disorganization keep you from following up with your prospects. Put a system in place to organize notes on your prospects and prompt you to call them in a timely and regular manner. Whether your system is online or paper based, the discipline of recording what action to take and when with each prospect will keep the relationship alive. When your prospect is ready to make a move, it's you they will turn to since you were the professional who kept in constant contact, focusing on their needs.

FSBO Statistics

In researching For Sale By Owners, I found on the National Association of Realtors site some interesting statistics that I'd like to share.

Did you know?. . . the typical FSBO home sold for $187,200 compared to $247,000 for agent-assisted home sales.

FSBO Methods Used to Market Home:
Yard Sign . . . 50%
Friends/neighbors . . . 29%
Newspaper ad . . . 31%
Open House . . . 25%
Listing on the Internet . . . 21%

Most Difficult Tasks for FSBO Sellers:
Getting the right price . . . 15%
Understanding paperwork . . . 18%
Preparing/fixing up home for sale . . . 15%
Attracting potential buyers . . . 9%
Having enough time to devote to all aspects of the sale . . . 7%

Source: 2007 National Association of REALTORS® Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers

Do you have what it takes?

Do you have what it takes to be successful in real estate, to be an independent contractor working for yourself with nobody to answer to, nobody to call your boss? Take a few minutes to read through the folowing questions and comments written by Dan Miller.
1. Are you a self- starter? Successful people don’t sit around and wait for people to come to them.
2. Do you get along with different kinds of people? Are you conversational, get along with printers, secretaries, mortgage brokers, title people, appraisers etc?
3. Do you have a positive outlook? Focus on the positive. Optimism and sense of humor essential. Small setbacks are just opportunities to stepping stones to eventual success.
4. Are you able to make decisions? Procrastination is the main obstacle to good decision making. “How to Eat a Frog”- concept is to do what you look least forward to and do it early in the morning, of get it over with- out of the way. 80% of decisions made right away.
5. Are you able to accept responsibility? Be willing to listen to your client’s complaints, gripes, and accept responsibility for your mistakes.
6. Do you enjoy competition? Don’t have to be cut–throat, but enjoy competing for listing presentations for example. Even competing against yourself. Dan sets small goals for himself when he was a struggling student he would set small goals for himself like he would 20 cold calls before eating lunch- sometimes he would eat at 12pm, sometimes at 4pm. You could do 40 door hangers and go have a latte after it.
7. Do you have will-power and self-discipline? Without it you won’t succeed.
8. Do you plan ahead? Need a long-term plan to succeed. Know where you want to go and devise plan to get there. For example, I will do 3 find 2 new buyers a month. How to get there- what are the most effective activities to find new buyers- open house, networking, referrals, and postcards.
9. Can you take advice from others? You don’t have to have all of the answers- learn from others. Don’t have to make all of the mistakes yourself- take seminars, read marketing or business books, hire a business coach or mentor.
10. Are you adaptable to changing conditions? Change is constant- market changes, technologies change, relationships change. Do you adapt well and are you able to take it in stride and enjoy that each new day is not like the day before?
11. Can you stick with it? Most new ventures take longer than we would like for them to. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. Are you prepared to make a one year commitment to this business no matter how bleak it looks sometimes? Will you continue even if your friends or family tell you to throw in the towel?
12. Do you have a high level of confidence and belief in what you are doing? If you don’t believe in what you are doing, you won’t be able to sell it. Enthusiasm is selling what you believe in.
13. Do you enjoy what you are doing? Don’t think that you will be successful if you are in it just for the monetary rewards. You should get a sense of meaning and satisfaction from what you are doing.

Helping people buy and sell real estate is a rewarding job. Getting to help people live thier dreams can't be listed in the job description of a real estate professional. With all its rewards and glory, selling real estate isn't for everbody. Reflect on your answers to these questions to help decide if the exciting career in real estate is truly for you. Still think you have what it takes? Let's talk!!

Do your buyer a favor. Close the deal!

When I first started in real estate I took ALL the classes. Every time some sales guru came to town peddling the latest marketing system or the latest greatest technique, I was there shelling out my hard earned money. I was sure that they had the answers and could help me on my way to greatness in real estate.
I reflect now, shaking my head about some of the snake oil salespeople who I gave my hard earned money to see. Ouch! I would hate to add it all up. I also shake my head at how badly I needed to use some of the techniques that these sales gurus preached. I sure could have used a few good closing techniques. I wished I had used my newly learned techniques to close on a buyer or two.
When sitting with a buyer getting to know them, their needs, desires, motivations, I learned not only what my clients wanted in a home but also why they wanted these amenities. This didn’t just include number of bedrooms and types of room. As an exceptional real estate agent looking out for the best interest of my client, I learned about lifestyle needs, dreams, location desired. I dug deep. Taking all these variables I scoured the MLS searching for homes that didn’t just fit but were ideal. Carefully previewing each home, scrutinizing it with this buyer’s tailored made yard stick, I filtered my list of homes from ideal to perfect.
Excitedly I showed each of these gems to my eager buyers each home perfectly meeting all their criteria. Home by home we methodically went through the list with not one contract written. What went wrong? All the homes were exactly what the buyers wanted including the right price. Why didn’t the buyer buy?
Sadly, their agent in looking out for all his clients needs forgot to ask just one simple and short question. It can be said so many ways but went unspoken… “So, what do you think, do you want to buy this beautiful home?”
OR “Can you see yourself raising your children here?”
OR “Shall we put pen to paper on this one?” The list goes on.
Back then I felt that closing on buyer was wrong especially if they were my client. I felt it was a manipulative thing to do. Unfortunately, I was completely mistaken.
So often I personally go into a new situation knowing what I want to accomplish but don’t know how to get to the outcome I desire. If only an expert on the subject, someone I could trust would help me through the process. Usually, however, nobody does and I am left to figure the tough stuff out on my own. If only…
Transfer this to our buyers who are now faced with the largest financial decision they have ever made. Their agent, who just days before talked about best interest, trust, and loyalty is now mysteriously quiet while they inwardly plead for a lifeline. If only the agent would ask, “How are you feeling about this beautiful home? Would you like to make an offer?”
“Yes,” eeks the buyer. “Thanks for asking. What do we do now?”

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