Give Your Clients Time To Get Used To The Agreement

We already know how intimidating an Agreement involving hundreds of thousands, or even millions of dollars can be to the typical Buyer and Seller. One of the worst things that an agent can do is wait until the point of contract to bring the agreement to their client’s attention.

Get your Buyers and Sellers used to seeing the Agreement, and even used to the terms of the Agreement at the very beginning of the relationship. The Agreement can be a great tool to use for learning purposes. You can teach your buyers and sellers about each of the important provisions of the contract and simultaneously have them get completely used to seeing and using the contract so it is never intimidating. With continuous exposure, the contract becomes just another part of the process, alleviating the intimidation it can bring if you wait until negotiations. Ask questions like:

Can I confirm your address?

Are you familiar with Escrow Deposits and how they work?

Do you understand inspection periods?

Have you heard about how appraisals are working?

Are you familiar with how this Agreement was crafted between the BAR and Realtors?

 

By discussing the key elements of the contract at the beginning of the relationship, your clients feel more committed to you and the process becomes much easier. Take advantage of this opportunity to simplify the process.

Seller Argument #19- The “Hire A Full-Time Professional” Close

How often do Seller’s choose to work with an agent that really doesn’t work in Real Estate on a full-time professional basis? It is important to point out to your prospective seller’s that this can be a critical mistake. A good way to show the difference between what you do and what other agents do, is to review the way you spend a typical day.

Depending on how many listings you have, another great consideration can be the amount of time that an agent can actually spend representing a seller depends on how many listings the agent has, and how spread out those listings are. For example:

If a competing agent has 20 listings, you could argue that if that agent worked full-time exclusively on selling those listings only and never worked with buyers, their time would be allocated based on 40 hours per week divided by 20 listings. Arguably, your competitor could only be spending about 2 hours on each listing, if they were being fair to every seller.

Now, compare that number to the amount of time you can spend representing the seller if you only have 5 listings. It would be 40 hours divided by 5 listings, or 8 hours per week on their listing. Point out that you can spend 4x times the amount of time your competitor could spend. Even if they were better than you, they aren’t 4x better than you are.

This Argument can also be applied to an agent that is driving all over kingdom come to service listings that are geographically separated. If your competitor has to cover 4 different towns, and you work exclusively in one town, or your competitor covers the whole town, and you work in just one specific neighborhood, you can argue that you can spend 4x as much time representing them, when compared to your competition.

Both of these approaches embrace the philosophy that it is always better to focus your energies an inch wide and a mile deep.

Buyer Argument #19- Hire An Expert Close

   Many agents love to point out how many of the buyers they work with aren’t loyal to any one agent. These agents believe that buyers aren’t worth the trouble because you can’t trust them to do the right thing. In fact, it may just be that the buyers don’t really see a difference between working with one agent as opposed to any other. Your goal in working with any client should be for them to understand and appreciate the great value you bring to them as buyers.

The best way to do this is to share with your buyers your intimate understanding of market trends, economic indicators and negotiation expertise.  Simple analysis of key indicators such as:

Supply Trends

Demand Trends

Consumption Rates

Price Trend Variations

 

Can have a huge impact on how you are perceived by your clients. When you are convey valuable information about market trends and the economy, it is critical you take two additional steps.

First, Be sure to apply the specific facts to your clients personal situation. Make certain that you show your clients the direct impact these trends could have on them.

Second, Be sure to point out how important it is for your Buyers to have professional representation by someone  who not only tracks these trends, but also understand them and can apply them to the client’s needs. A great statement to make is: “You can appreciate how important it is for you to be aware of this information, can’t you?  It never ceases to amaze me how so many agents call themselves professionals, yet are unaware of critical data and information that has a direct impact on their buyers. Can you imagine making a decision that involves hundreds of thousands of dollars and not having this information shared with you? It doesn’t make sense, does it?

Once you’ve shown your Buyers the value that you bring and how much more professional and knowledgeable you are compared to your competition, it becomes very difficult for your Buyers to buy from any other agent.