Home Buying Process from a Woman’s Perspective (i.e. the decision maker)
It is no secret that in most families when it comes to decision making or for better terms – money spending- the woman “wears the pants”. If you are a home builder or real estate agent trying to sell these homes – you need to know the deal breakers in this process. So here is a glimpse inside the female mind when it comes to finding a real estate agent and a home, from the smartest woman I know, my wife Cori:
My loving husband asked me to write this blog- he wanted a blog about my home buying process and experience. I say “my experience”, because I am the one who does the leg work, decides where we want to be, looks at the homes, narrows it down, then has Mike come for final approval so I don’t feel so bossy.
Schools Rule
The first thing I do when home shopping is to decide what schools we want. I use GreatSchools.net to research schools in the area and to find the exact school I want my kids to go to. After narrowing down the schools, the home shopping starts.
Unfortunately, there aren’t websites out there where you can search for a home by a specific school (school district- yes- but not specific school). In order to narrow your search down to a school, you have to use a realtor. I get the zip code for the school I want and go to Realtor.com and I conducted my search there. I also tap into my social media resources- go on Facebook and say, “Anyone buy a home in _____ district? What about ______ school district?”
Give Me the Details…like now!
If I’m looking for a new home, I will search online for home builders, check out their website-focusing on floor plans, price ranges and locations. My husband teases that marketing was created for people like me. I choose services and products based on the website. I have two kids and not much time. If the site is confusing, I won’t stick with it to figure it out. If the information I need isn’t on the site, the chances of me calling to find out the basics are slim to none.
“Do you know who I am?” – Be Professonial and Follow Up
Once the list is narrowed down based on the information I find online, I will call for specifics or make an appointment. Again, I have two kids. If I don’t get a response in the following 24 hours, I will probably forget I ever called and I will mark you off my list. If I make time to contact you, it means I am ready to buy and I will not wait around for a response. Email is wonderful- I can get information while juggling kids, but phone calls are also great.
I once looked at over five homes by calling each listing agent and scheduling an appointment. Not one person was on time, let alone early enough to prepare the home for a walk through. If I am able to be there on time with my kids in tow, I expect the same courtesy. On the sixth home, when I got there the home was open and ready, the agent handed me info on herself and the home, she was able to answer all my questions and right there on the spot she became my agent. Everyone is busy, timeliness is vital.
Another thing that drives me bananas, are agents and sales people who don’t know the answers to my questions or do not get the information to me in a timely manner. Know the basics and if I ask an obscure question, no biggie, but get me the info and soon!
Most importantly- follow up- it really does work. If I contact you, I want to hear from you. AND I will remember you. I will go about my day- think of a question to ask you, forget that question and then I get an email from you and BAM, I remember.
The internet was invented for women like me. I can get more done with my kids. If you are in the places where I am, I will see you. If you have a good website, good follow-up and helpful sales people, I will love you!
Lose the “Dumb” Phone
Are you looking like Zack Morris from Saved by the Bell. Time to lose the “dumb” phone and upgrade your primary communication tool.
I even wrote this whole post using the WordPress app on my iPhone. Grabed a screenshot of the Zack pic, tweeted out the link, sent to facebook and posted on linkedin. A true miracle of modern technology.
Leave your comments below. What do you love most about your smartphone?
(on a side note, I use my iPhone so much my wife has threatened to flush it down the toilet multiple times. Guess that is the side effect of a connected world. Does anyone else experience this?)
Is Follow Up a Lost Art? Survey says…
Is follow-up a lost art? Can you guarantee your agents are responding and following up with your prospects, the ones you paid $1,000′s to get to walk into the door? In this short video I review a study conducted on this topic (details below) You be the judge. If you are wondering what is going on with your internet leads, it’s time to secret shop your agents. Submit a lead from your website and listing services, not once but several times. Track the response time, quality of the message and how many times they follow up. You will be surprised.
Take a look at this at this whitepaper released by Red Tree Resultants and Qgenisys. They conducted actual on-site evaluations acting as motivated prospects to learn if there would be adequate follow up on the visit to try to persuade the prospect to become a purchaser and what builders and developers can do to improve their market share. What they found out:
- Despite spending millions of dollars to attract them…In only 36% of the visits did an agent bother to follow up with the prospect who visited the community and expressed immediate purchase interest.
- In only 14% of the cases did agents follow up with personalized information about the community that reflected anything they discussed with the prospect.
- Builder agents from the higher-priced homes/communities actually followed the prospect more aggressively than did the lower-priced homes/communities.
- Of all homes visited during our research, unless a prospect followed up with the builder, nearly 60% of all prospective sales would have been lost due to lack of follow up by the builder or the builder’s representative
- We estimate that up to 75% of builders’ emails, both from sales reps and marketing teams were caught by our researchers’ spam filters.
Their findings clearly show that after spending all those marketing dollars to get potential buyers into their homes, motivated buyers were largely ignored and received almost no relevant follow up from the builder’s site agent. On-site builder agents allowed prospects to walk out the door, but also allowed them to slip through their fingers with little relevant follow up…or in many cases ANY follow up after the visit.
The Conclusion – Builders who implement the changes we have recommended here will be better positioned than those that do not to take advantage of the inevitable turn around that will eventually come in the housing market.
Thanks to Brendan and his team for the timely and powerful info.
Contact:
Red Tree Marketing Resultants
Weekly Hotlinks
Photo by joshbousel
I hope to see many of you at IBS this year and you need to mark your calendar for our seminar: Attracting Today’s Buyers Online: Building Success With Connected Customers
Be sure to let me know you are coming – it is a great topic.
Here are some of great reads from this past week:
- The Brand You is Dead. Long Live The Brand You Build. Talks about the importance of creating value in your personal brand – not just having one for self promotion. Good stuff!
- Wondering about Twitter – check out this prediction – Why Twitter Will Go Mainstream In 2009 with 10 reasons to support it.
- This article is from 2002: As the Going Gets Tough, The Tough Go Online Yes, that is from 2002 – message translates to today…gotta love business cycles.
- On the predictions train: Seven Predictions for 2009 Internet is still the victor.
Here’s to a successful and prosperous new year. Look forward to your comments on these articles. What do you think about Twitter?
Encounters are the new “Visits”
Myers Barnes has a great post over on his blog – Visits are Out. Encounters are In—And Encounters Can Occur On-site or Online.
He comments:
In the old economy, prospects shopped by the process of elimination. They would drive around, build their short list and eventually settle on their new neighborhood and home. In today’s economy, new homebuyers shop by the process of exclusion on the Internet. They build their short list and then visit only the neighborhoods they are seriously considering. In building a list of places of interest, they will have many encounters. Each time they log on to your website, it’s an encounter. So they could easily have had 10 encounters with your new homes/homesites before you ever get the first opportunity to meet and greet them.
I can’t agree more. A good percentage of our prospects will spend more time on our website than we will! When researching one of the largest investments a person will make, the website and other listing sites become a “power tool” for the prospect putting them in driver seat.
Don’t give them a reason to eliminate you. Keep your site fresh, up to date and full of useful information they are looking for.
