I love marketing. I love working out who your ideal customer (property buyer) is
I love marketing. I love working out who your ideal customer (property buyer) is, planning how best to attract their attention in the first place, keep it (very important!) and ultimately help them decide that this is the right property for them. Its what got me into real estate in the first place, and its one of the things that keeps me pretty happy staying in one industry for north of a decade so far (and likely much longer to come).
Of late however, I find myself cutting around my beloved marketing and dealing with a number of sales off-market – i.e. without formal advertising, no open homes, just a connection of buyer and seller, dealt and done.
In what can fairly be described as a hot market, why on earth would I circumvent one of my favourite parts of the process in selling a home, particularly when competition is often the thing that drives the best results in the market? In a word – time. The best preparation often requires time (and money) and for some owners, even knowing there may be a higher result out there if looked for, a price today that lets them focus on future endeavours rather than worrying about something right now, is worth something.
Similarly, while for the majority of us the preference is to find a home that you can just walk in, unpack and enjoy, there are others that would either be satisfied with a property with fewer bells and whistles and a lower price tag, or as is quite often the case – the opportunity to make those changes yourself, rather than having to pay for the fact that someone put in brand new carpet (that you will subsequently pull right back out to replace with tiles).
As a buyer, off-market transactions can be both a gift and a curse, mostly depending on whether you are on a shortlist to find out about them. If you have been in the lucky position to “know a guy that knows a guy” then it can be a shortcut around competition and a way to just pay a price and guarantee securing a property. If you’re not on the list, then it can just add to the frustration of seeing ANOTHER property missed out on, even if you didn’t even know it was an option.
My favourite off-market deals? Ones targeting a specific buyer, prior to a launch that’s imminent. Its an opportunity to actually achieve a stronger result with less time and effort, but doesn’t preclude you still working with the market anyway.