How to Successfully Condition the Client to Property Market Facts

Some listings will sell or lease faster than others.  In saying that, the facts and feedback that you can put to your client will help in conditioning their thinking to the trends of the local property market. 

If you have an exclusive listing, then you should devote time to it and the client owning the property.  Conditioning is a key part of moving a listing to a successful negotiation momentum.

Just about every client will have an inflated view of market conditions.  They should be helped through their false information and property expectations.  Market evidence and good feedback from listing activity locally will help them understand. 

Whilst every client will want a high price or rent, the buyers and tenants in the market know the facts and the trends.  Local business and investment sentiment quickly feeds into the property sectors and precincts.

Real Estate Negotiation Skills Refined

To encourage a lease or a sale, your skills as a negotiator should be refined and improved constantly; at different times of the year the property market trends and pressures shift, as do the interest levels and expectations of buyers and tenants.  If you control the listing, then you must work with the current market conditions to get a positive outcome for your client.  Your commission depends on it.  Deliver effective and relevant listing feedback to your clients so they can adjust to market conditions.

To make this concept work with your clients and their listings here are some ideas and strategies to use:

1. Inbound marketing responses – when a marketing campaign for a listing or property starts, you will soon know if you have got the target market’s interest. The first 2 or 3 weeks of any campaign are the most important.  Test your marketing and advertising strategies, learn from the feedback that is coming to you, and watch the other listings of the same property type.  You will soon know what is working and what is not working from a marketing perspective.  Track the calls that are coming in and show the client how the trends in calls for their property are comparing to other property campaigns.
2. Inspection results – when you hold an inspection, take notes of what people are thinking and saying. That 3^rd party evidence is quite valuable as you seek to condition your client to market conditions.
3. Enquiry rates – chart all your numbers in your database. Those numbers will be calls in, brochures sent, follow up calls, inspection numbers, website hits, and direct mail results.  Statistics are valuable as ‘proof’, and they will give you plenty of leverage with the clients or prospects that you are working with.
4. Competing properties – take photos of existing competing listings. Get the facts of how those properties are being marketed by the respective agents, and just what the results of marketing may be in each case.  Some of those properties will have been on the market for a very long time; look for the marketing indicators and pressures.  Understand why that property hasn’t moved, and advise your client accordingly.
5. Price or Rent changes – whilst every client has a perception of price or rent with their property, the ultimate results and offers in each case are driven by local market sentiment, business volatility or stability, and investment conditions. Show the client what has been happening with results and trends on prices and rents.
6. Time on market – all of your listings locally will give you valuable trends to work with in time on market. You can compare the time on market with the methods of sale or lease, and the marketing methods used.  Have your administrative staff monitor the time on market indicators with all of your exclusive listings (open listings are not the same – so don’t bother tracking open listings).

So all of these things are valuable as you give listing feedback to your clients and prospects.  When you have the facts, it is hard for your client to refute market evidence.  That helps in the client conditioning process; ultimately that can help you convert more transactions.  Listing feedback is a valuable strategy to adopt in property marketing.