Old school techniques of generating new rental & resi sales listings seem to get less fruitful as the years have gone by.
Roll the clock back to the mid-2000s, and a few thousand leaflets through the letterboxes of a lovely housing estate or a newspaper advert that said 'Landlords Wanted' would get a flood of vendor and landlord inquiries and some listings to boot.
Why are listings hard to come by in 2021?
In 2006, there were 9,500 Estate Agents in the UK, and they sold 1.66 million households.
You didn't have that much competition.
Roll the clock forward, and in 2019, 19,500 Estate Agents sold 1.17 million properties. This means the average UK Estate Agent sold 174.7 properties a year in 2006 and only 60 properties in 2019. To add salt to the wound, the average fee has been reduced from 1.6% to 1% in the same time frame.
Meaning for Letting and Estate Agents, there are:-
• Too many competitors
• Not enough properties coming to the market
• Overvaluing
• Fees slashed
For Letting Agents, the number of rental properties has nearly doubled in that time, yet the number of Letting Agents has quintupled.
It's a nightmare being an agent.
However, over the last few years, I have spotted those specific agents in certain towns that do not seem to have these issues.
Why are some agents getting great listings and outstanding fees?
They were getting the pick of the crop regarding listings and fees, both for resi-sales and lettings. They were seen as the 'go-to person of their local property market’, the agent the newspaper editor rings up every week for comment.
So, I looked at what they were doing, and they were doing two specific things.
And in return, they were reaping the rewards of decent listings and fees, happy staff, a good-sized rental portfolio, a significant sales pipeline, and exchange income. Even more importantly, they were enjoying their job, they enjoyed getting up in the morning, and people looked up to them.
So, what were those two things?
Well, to start with, the things they weren’t talking about were themselves, their agency, their market share pie chart, or their agency services. Instead, they spoke about the two things every homeowner and landlord is interested in.
1. The value of their property
2. The next property they wanted to buy
I find it fascinating we are the gatekeepers to the second most exciting topic in the world to every Brit - the property market, yet we never talk about that in our marketing.
What I want to do now is look at the specific solutions for both Letting and Estate Agents.
The issue is particularly hard for Letting Agents (don’t worry Estate Agents – I will come to you later – yet you will learn a lot by reading the next section).
Most Lettings Agents will say, “Just get a landlord sat in front of me, and I will get their business". If you want a landlord to talk to you, the first issue is finding those landlords, but nobody walks around with a badge on that says, ‘I’m a landlord’.
Even when the tenant hands their notice in, it is the existing agent that is in control. What often happens is the property goes back onto the market until a new tenant is found even before the landlord is aware. And, even when they are aware, the landlord has better things to do with their life rather than take time off work to see if there are any new or better-Letting Agents in town.. and anyway, all you Letting Agents are the same, aren’t you?
I believe the relationship that most landlords have with their Letting Agent is the same as the relationship that people have with their bank. People don't love their bank; in fact, most people don't even like their bank. It's just they can't be bothered to swap banks, be it apathy, or too much hassle, etc., I believe most landlords feel the same way about their Letting Agent – you are all the same, and it's too much hassle to swap anyway.
However, these agents were making landlords want to come and talk to them before their tenant handed in their notice by talking about these two things.
1. The value of their property
2. The next property they want to buy
Over those months (between the landlord meeting them and the tenant handing in their notice), the agent built a relationship with that landlord, never asking for the business, always interested in them as a person, and talking about the two things the landlord was interested in (no I won't repeat myself !!).
Then there would come the point where that landlord would say to themselves, 'Do you know I really like that agent called Bob/Sue, he/she is always accommodating.. next time my tenant hands in their notice, I will try them ‘’ .. and the rest is history.
You will never get a landlord's interest until you get their attention, and you will never get a landlord to take action until they make a decision.
So how do you get a landlord to decide they want to come and talk to you before their tenant hands in their notice?
Getting the landlord's attention is easy, but it's the obtaining and keeping of the landlord’s interest that’s the make-or-break issue here.
Yet, if you talk about
1. The value of their property
2. The next property they want to buy
You will be on to a winner (do you see a pattern emerging?).
There is nothing more attractive to a landlord than if you talk about the local property market as it relates to the value of their property and the one they want to buy.
Remember, a landlord in Kingston only cares about Kingston property, whilst a landlord in Portsmouth only cares about the Portsmouth property market.
e.g. Why have property values increased by 32% in Kingston over the last five years whilst property values in neighbouring Richmond have only increased by 21%? Why have yields in Portsmouth risen to 5.5%, whilst in nearby Southampton, they have dropped slightly to 4%?
And this is where I can bring in the Estate Agents again; a landlord is just a homeowner that doesn't live on the property. Just as I said above, there is nothing more interesting to a landlord than if you talk about the local property market as it relates to the value of their own property and the one they want to buy – the same thing could be said about local homeowners, as they too are interested in the value of their own home and the next home they want to buy.
By talking about the local property market to the local landlords or local homeowners, you will get their attention and interest.
Drip feed that information to the whole of your database (especially those in your archive – remember 50% of homeowners move every six years and 18 weeks, yet only one in eight homebuyers goes back to the Estate Agent they bought their house off) and also in Facebook groups based on your town .. and you will soon become the most interesting person in your town when it comes to the property market.
That is what these agents were doing.
So how do you do that?
I have taught hundreds of Letting and Estate Agents the skills and techniques to talk about the local property market.
Listing Generation Tip #1
One of the most impactful posts you could do, ideally on video, yet it could be in written format, or even podcast, is doing your town's Top 30 streets countdown.
First, go to Zoopla, click on the house prices function and type in your town (or postcode district, e.g. NG31), then press search.
On the next screen (titled Browse House prices) scroll past both the grey box that says, 'market activity and the uSwitch advert, and you will find all the streets in alphabetical order in the searched area.
There is a purple box/bar with all the streets below in alphabetical order. Have another look at that purple box/bar, and you will see a header called ‘Zoopla Estimate’. Click on this once, and now all the streets will be put into price order. Now you have your countdown.
So how do you then style the video/podcast/written article of the Top 30 streets?
I teach people the ‘123 method’, and it goes as follows (assuming in this case the town is Grantham)
Introduce yourself by saying something like, "Hi, it's Chris Watkin, from Chris Watkin Estate Agents, and I love Grantham so much, I'm doing a countdown of the 50 most expensive streets in Grantham. Today, I am at (say) number 26."
Next, you need to get the facts and figures about that street. When you click on the actual street name on Zoopla, it tells you the average value of a property on that street and the number of properties on that street. You should mention the type of properties that are on the street and even mention the most recent sale. This is all information that all agents should know it's readily accessible from both Zoopla and Rightmove.
Finally, we tell people why we like the street by finishing off with a comment like this, “I love this street because it is close to the Church Park, Costa Coffee is just around the corner, and you're in the catchment area to XYZ primary school. Next week I will be at 25, where I will be at the north end of Grantham. Let's find out if your street is at number 25?"
Then post that video directly into local Facebook groups as you. Note I do not use the word 'share'; I mean actually physically post into the groups (even if you have to do it a number of times and also you should be posting as you as a person, not as your Estate or Letting Agency). Why? Because people buy from people and you are less likely to be blocked from posting
Listing Generation Tip #2
The second type of post you could do is to talk about house prices in your town.
Look again at that Zoopla Market Summary box, and you will notice there are four figures with drop-down menus to change the type of property and the timescale.
These are wonderful to compare property prices in one town against another.
For example, you could compare house prices in your town and how they’ve risen over the last five years compared to the eight neighbouring towns around you in the last five years. There are eight social media posts. Or another example could be you can compare what has happened to property prices for semi-detached houses in your town in the last year compare to say flats in your town.
I’ve worked out you could post twice a day for a month and still never run out of stats to compare and contrast. Because that is the real art to this - compare and contrast.
At the end of the month, the Zoopla numbers get refreshed, and you can go again.
Listing Generation Tip #3
Thirdly, and this one that’s rather ‘left field’.
Why don't you highlight what you consider are the best buy-to-let deals local landlords could buy in your town? But this is the bit that will really go against your natural instincts; they have to be on the market with your competitor agents.
This really does go against the grain as you are promoting another agent's properties but by doing so, you are coming across as a trusted advisor and not 'I'm the hard salesperson'.
I've been teaching agents to do this for over eight years, and if there's one thing that I can guarantee is that you will attract landlords to you if you highlight buy-to-let deals on the market with competitors. Now I must stress, that you have to mention the name of the agent selling it, and you have to tell people in your posts to go and view that property with the agent. Otherwise, you will get on the wrong side of the law.
Do you need to ask permission of the agent or the homeowner? No, as long as the property is in public view and in the public domain.
CONCLUSION
These are just three techniques that I have taught hundreds of Estate and Letting Agents over the years to attract new clients and listings to them. I 100% guarantee you they work, however, they do take a while for them to work, so it requires hard work and lots of patience.
I do have a YouTube Channel with over 1,600 videos, where I have videos and training which show you other techniques to attract landlords and vendors to your agency.
Can I thank you for your time and trouble reading this article? Should you feel you want to pick my brain on anything in this article, do not hesitate to send me an email at christopher@christopherwatkin.co.uk or my mobile, which is (07950) 147572.