This is me in the Arizona Republic (permanent link):
How to take away the objections to drawbacks in a home
I was looking at the web site for a For Sale By Owner home the other day. In the site menu was a heading called, “Drawbacks.” I thought this was an excellent idea at first blush, the kind of inspired salesmanship I almost never see.
The fact is, everything is a trade-off. Everything has advantages and disadvantages. This is not a secret. Buyers already know that every home they look at will have drawbacks.
What is inspired — what could have been inspired — is calling the drawbacks to the buyer’s attention. Why? Because then you can take away the objections.
Like this: “We know this room is small for a bedroom, so we pre-wired it for digital cable and two phone lines. That way, you can use it as a home-office and also as a guest bedroom.”
The buyers will see that the room is small, but by acknowledging and addressing the defect in advance, you can help them see around the problem.
I said the idea of a “Drawbacks” page could have been inspired. Instead, when I clicked through to the page, I saw this:
“There are no drawbacks! Come and buy this house right away!”
This is far beyond being uninspired marketing. This is the kind of ham-handed ignorance and arrogance we associate with Hollywood’s idea of a venal Realtor.
Since you know exactly what objections buyers are going to raise with your home, your best strategy is to acknowledge and address them in advance. This communicates that you are honest, that you are not trying to pull one over on your buyer, and it also gives you a chance to reframe objections in a way that can help to sell the home.
If you don’t want to admit that your home has drawbacks, say nothing. Every buyer’s biggest objection is the fear of being hustled into a bad decision. If you go out of your way to look like a hustler, you will scare buyers away even if your home really is close to perfection.
Technorati Tags: real estate, real estate marketing
Duane says:
Greg, interesting approach to marketing. If it could only be so simple, for the buyer to help them decide what homes to tour and choose. Honest “drawbacks” would be the kicker! Don’t foresee that in our futures though. Every home is perfect when listing these days.
August 18, 2007 — 12:55 pm
David Sherfey says:
Stan Barron is a master of this technique;
http://realtytimes.com/rtcpages/20040116_stories.htm
I think you need to need to have a significant amount of written descriptive text about the house for this to work well. Most RE descriptions are short, and a drawbacks page would be detrimental in comparison. Stan puts the drawback upfront in his write-up and then goes on to describe everything else about the house. Put it on the table, sweep it off – and then move on to the good stuff.
The trick is to get the seller to understand that this is a good marketing technique…or don’t take the listing.
August 19, 2007 — 4:46 am
Knox says:
Another example of uninspired marketing, albeit agent to agent marketing, is when the agent places the following message in the private remarks section in the MLS page,
“No need to preview this wonderful home. Bring your most discriminating client”
I always giggle at this and wonder how long I’d stay in business if I took their word for it.
I did, however, love the small bedroom approach that you mentioned. I can think of many occasions where a little forward thinking like this can head off future objections from potential buyers. Sitting with your clients, prior to their home going on the market, and spending just 30 minutes using this approach would most likely pay huge dividends in the long run.
August 19, 2007 — 6:02 am
Greg Swann says:
> I think you need to need to have a significant amount of written descriptive text about the house for this to work well.
Absolutely. We use written text to buttress the efforts of buyer’s agents. I’ve never talked about this, but one of our Black Pearls are what we call Docent Cards posted throughout the house, detailed discussions of what we see as the benefits and potential drawbacks of the featured item. We believe in the power of stories and conversations to sell homes, so we seed them wherever we can.
August 19, 2007 — 9:37 am