In today's Agent Insights post, Karen Fidler - a Real Estate Broker and Owner out of Orange County and Lake Arrowhead, CA - provides tips for how to delight your sellers.
Here’s Karen:
We all want our clients to love us, but we can easily make it a reality. Sellers are already a bit different from buyers. They have made a decision to move, they have an asset and they are putting their home out there for opinion and viewing - all the while hoping someone loves it as much as they do… and will offer a fair price for it.So, how can we as agents get our real estate sellers to fall in love with us?
Like this:
- Be honest with them about the comps for their home and provide a realistic listing price.
- Do a thorough walk-through and ask questions, so that you can best present the home and it's unique qualities.
- Understand the neighborhood.
- Present pre-listing options such as home inspections and termite reports… pros and cons.
- Talk about what to expect with offers based on the current market and how their listing price could be affected by it.
- Prepare them for low ball offers and how to respond to them.
- Discuss the information you will receive from buyers (ie: offer, proof of funds, deposit, FICO scores), so they realize how solid an offer might be.
- Prepare an agreed upon plan for showings, notice and times/days available and also whether or not there will be a seller controlled lockbox or stationary one.
- Help them understand and realize that they should NOT talk with buyers and/or agents without your presence.
- Make sure they understand the contingency period and any possible negotiations which could happen during that time, such as request for repairs.
- Always attend important events in the escrow process such as home inspections, termite inspections and appraisals.
- Lay out the timeline and possible delays during escrow.
- Make sure they know when closing is likely to occur and when each milestone is reached in that process.
It's not that hard… we are being considerate and doing our job. Doing our jobs the right way can get our clients to fall in love with us.
See the full post and more from Karen at www.search4ochomes.com.