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Prospecting expired
listings can be the core of anyone’s business in the real estate
field. You can create a
system that will give you repeatable results for your effort.
Let’s look at these three very positive characteristics in
prospecting expired listings. They
are easy to find: The
expired listings come up everyday.
You will have a handful that you can work on, on a daily basis.
Expired listings provide a steady stream of new leads of people
to contact for listing appointments.
There are usually a few very heavy days in each month. You will need to set your schedule to take advantage of the
heavy days. The end of the
month is usually one of the heaviest times for expired listings; up to
25% of the expired listings for the month may come up on a heavy day. They
want to sell: The
expired listings were on the market at one time, unlike many other types
of clients you want to contact. The
clients had a plan laid out to sell and move.
Their plan did not work out, and in most cases they wish it had.
There will be some expired listings which were listed by clients
who are now tired of the process, but the majority of them still want to
sell. The
bulk of them are looking for an agent:
If the client still has the desire to sell, as most do, then they
are searching for a new agent. They
are looking for someone who can solve their previous problem.
Most do not know why their home did not sell, but they are
frustrated with their previous agent and sometimes all agents.
They will rarely return to their previous agent. The successful way to work expired
listings is the CAP system. Consistency Attitude Persistence The
first part is consistency:
You must consistently work the expired listings.
For you to achieve a large return on your time invested, you must
work diligently for a minimum of four weeks straight.
Expired listings cannot be started and stopped without losing
momentum. There is a rhythm
and a flow to expired listings. They
must be a daily discipline that you work on.
If you prospect them for two weeks, then take a week off, you are back to zero. I
did not prospect weekends, but I did diligently call Monday through
Friday. Your leads must build, and your
follow up must grow. When
you get down the road 30 plus days, you will begin to receive calls for
listing appointments from your work earlier in the month plus your
appointments from new expireds. You must work to create a pipeline of expired listing clients. The
second part is attitude:
Your attitude plays a crucial role to your success with expired
listings. You need to convey to the seller an attitude of compassion
and problem solving. They
are not just looking for someone to pound a sign in the ground. They are looking for someone to get their home sold.
They are looking for someone to solve their problem.
They feel that everyone else is the problem, when it really is
them and their price. They
can get even more resentful due to the high volume of agents that may
call them. The price is the problem 90% of the
time when it comes to expired listings.
You have to read the people you are meeting with regarding their
home. Too many agents who work with expired listings hit their
prospective clients with a ball peen hammer between the eyes about the
price. That will work with
some and fail miserably with others.
You must be able to adjust your delivery. You need to read the prospective
clients, but most importantly you need to exude an attitude of caring
and compassion for their situation while conveying confidence in your
ability to get the job done; sometimes the only way to get the price
down is to convince them you care and it pains you that they have to
sell for less, but there is no other way.
It is like the doctor who tells his patient she has cancer.
He does not like it, but he has to do it so he can cure her. The
last, and at times most critical, is persistence:
Your persistence or ability to stick it can have the most
positive results of all. Many
of the expired listings do not set appointments right away with agents.
Sellers will wait a week or two or a month.
The amount of calls they receive about their home drops
dramatically as the weeks tick by.
Do not be one of the agents who drop off unless the sellers have
low motivation or are unreasonable.
Be one of the ones left standing at the end of a week or two. Be persistent in your calling. Call them a few times a week.
All you are doing is trying to set an appointment. You
are not doing a listing appointment over the phone.
Just close for an appointment.
That is what the call is for.
You just want to be one of the three or four they interview.
If you keep that as your goal, you will get plenty of salable
listings. Focus on the CAP system daily. Work both today’s expired listings and the past ones daily.
Effectively follow up with your hot leads daily.
Remember consistency, attitude and persistence are the keys to
success to make six figures in prospecting expired listings. |
