It’s Sunday afternoon, do you know where your REALTOR is?
You will find Ray and I holding open houses.
Why do Ray and I hold Open Houses? Do they work? YES, open houses sell houses!
The following is just one of several Open House stories that have happened recently. On her way to somewhere else she saw the open house signs; she had no real intention of buying which she stated several times in the less than 30 seconds she was in the house. (seriously, I remember thinking, “wow- that was fast and rather odd.”) She left. THIRTY-EIGHT days later she owned the house. What I learned later at the inspection, she called her real estate agent as soon as she left the house. If the Open House sign hadn’t been in the yard that day that may never had happened. This happens time and time again. That is EXACTLY why we hold Open Houses!
We say no to things like Sunday motorcycle rides with friends, beach days, volleyball games because Open Houses are that important! Our number one goal is to sell the house we are holding open. We want to give the home as many opportunities to show itself off as possible. Naturally, we have high quality photography done for our listings and use those “glamour shots” in the MLS system, which then feeds to over 800 websites across the globe (no exaggeration that is one of the many tools Coldwell Banker Res RE provides their agents). No doubt photography has become the new curb appeal. For sure we have a sign in the yard (unless the community has rules against such things). We run social media ad campaigns, so it shows up on news feeds, shopping sites, and home pages. (The other day I was doing some on-line shopping and one of our listings was on the right side of the website in the pop-up ad section. I took a picture and sent it to our Seller exclaiming “look at your house ad on-line”. They loved it! That was pretty cool!) We send postcards out to hundreds of people saying, “new HOME on the market!”. We attend Realtor events and promote the property. We send out emails to agents saying check out our new listing. With all that, what we really need is people to walk in the door. The more people seeing the home the better the chance of finding the “ONE”- the buyer. Ray and I have a contest between us each Sunday, the winner is determined by who has the most visitors to their open house. The loser must make or buy dinner. I have had groups each individually sign in to help me win my dinner. Ray and I do have fun meeting the people that stop in; from the so-called “nosey neighbors”, to the “I-already-have-a-Realtor-I-don’t-want-to-talk-to-you-“types, and everyone in-between. But getting a SOLD sign on the house is what the seller has hired us to do. That is why we hold Open Houses. Come see us—our Open Houses are always posted on our Facebook page, find us #MaryRayWestbrook.