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Homesellers have found themselves in quite a conundrum over the past two years as they’ve weighed the benefits of record home price appreciation against the risk of trading a sub-3 percent mortgage for a higher rate. Although moderating mortgage rates have eased some of those concerns, as evidenced by an uptick in new listings this summer, homesellers are still hesitating.
So, what’s a listing agent to do?
Keller Williams leaders Gary Keller, Jason Abrams and Jay Papasan sought to answer this question during a Wednesday morning Mega Agent Camp session featuring four leading broker-owners who’ve mastered MOFIR (i.e., Make Offer For Immediate Response), a key lead generation strategy in Keller’s SHIFT book.
“It’s okay to have long-term nurturing to generate leads. Of course, it is,” Keller said. “But at the end of the day, making an offer for an immediate response is the way your brain should be wired, right? Not make offers for someday response. Why would you do that? Right? Make an offer.”
Tim Heyl Group and Homeward founder Tim Heyl said the foundation of a successful MOFIR is a streamlined business focus and value proposition. Generalists, he said, have a hard time creating MOFIRs because they try to serve everyone instead of mastering a smaller set of skills that make them invaluable to a specific group of consumers.
“If you can make your brand about solving a very specific problem, you will own that market,” he said. “It’s very tempting in real estate to be a generalist of everything. Think about it: buyers and sellers come in all different flavors, and we wanna say, ‘Well, I can help all of you with everything,’ but then we become part of the noise of the other 20,000 agents in our market who are saying the same thing.”
“If you can be the guy that does ‘that thing,’ you will own that market; you will get referrals beyond belief. People will talk about you; people will click your buttons [and] people will come into your funnel,” he added. “But you have to be willing to lose some of the other stuff so that you can win on that.”
For Heyl, Jose Medina and Associates owner Jose Medina, and The Young Team owner Ryan Young, lead generation strategies center on cash offers and buy-before-you-sell programs for homesellers. These two programs, they said, solve two main concerns for sellers — getting the maximum value from their home and getting a quick, seamless closing process so they don’t miss out on their next home.
Young, who’s also the CEO and co-founder of seller lead gen platform Fello, said his team starts with offering homesellers a free home valuation. Valuations are low-intent; however, they help build a robust seller database and can be used to spark a high-intent offer — a cash offer.
“We do an upfront cash offer, we do a backup cash offer, and we do a worry-free listing,” he said. “The reason why we like the backup cash offer is because, if you choose not to take the upfront cash offer, we have the upside of listing your home traditionally, but with the protection or the safety net of that backup cash offer.”
“What we found is leveraging the cash offer message in front of all these homeowners in our databases is where we’re having a ton of success,” he added while mentioning Fello and Homeward’s new partnership. “We actually show what Homeward is willing to offer on every consumer dashboard with Fello. You get an email from Fello that says, ‘Check out your home’s value,’ and right below there, there’s a number from an actual preliminary offer from Homeward. It’s such a compelling message.”
In addition to cash offers and buy-before-you-sell programs, Medina said his MOFIR includes the Homeowner Enhancement Loan Program (HELP), a program that enables homesellers to get a small personal loan to make needed repairs before listing.
“We come into a house, and we notice they need new carpet, and they need new countertops,” he said. “We’re going to give them a personal loan to get that house up to the condition [where] it’s going to net them more money. It separates us from the other Realtors and puts us in the driver’s seat to get the listing.”
Stacy Esser Group owner Stacy Esser said she’s taken a different approach to MOFIRs that’s informed by 17 years of experience as a fashion and merchandising expert. Esser said she focuses on shifting homesellers’ focus from “How much can I get for my house?” to “How can you help me get more money for my house?” The second question, she said, gives listing agents the perfect opportunity to flex their strategy skills.
“We’re going to do something called the value-up method. Now I’m going to tell you about my strategy,” she said. “You guys are not salespeople. You are strategists. You’re going to go in and provide them a strategy of how you help them get more money for their house, and you start that valuable opportunity as early as possible with your database.”
“We go in, and we do a room-by-room evaluation. We identify their target buyer, and then we educate,” she added. “You all have to educate. We are professionals in this market. You just tell them something, and maybe they’ll listen to you. Maybe not. But [we] have to think like today’s buyer, to win like a seller, because today’s buyer is not who you were.”
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