The Easiest Ways to Impress a Real Estate Client That Agents Overlook

One of the easiest ways to impress a real estate client is to answer the damn phone.

The easiest ways to impress a real estate client are so obvious yet so few Sacramento Realtors practice it. Or, at least that’s what my clients tell me. For starters, they always seem astounded over the fact I respond quickly to inquiries. Pretty much immediately, unless I’m on a plane somewhere, and even then, except for Hawaii, I still tend to still get WiFi. Which means I can answer my phone. For example, we had WiFi on the Capitol Corridor Amtrak train that runs between Sacramento and San Francisco when we went to the City last weekend to see the Afghan Whigs. I was able to chat with clients as we merrily chugged along the tracks. I also got great reception on the BART.

My car allows me to make phone calls by talking to it. I press a button on my steering wheel and direct it to make a phone call without my eyes ever leaving the road. Press another button on my steering wheel to answer a call. An agent told me the other day, I won’t say who, that she could not call anybody because she was driving. That’s one of my best times because my computer is not distracting me with email dings. I have two things to do, pay attention to the road and talk. I can do those two things at the same time.

I have said over and over that one of the easiest ways to impress a real estate client is to answer your phone when it rings. But I’ve seen agents look at their cellphone and say, oh, out-of-area, or No Caller ID, or I don’t know this person. And they ignore the call. What? It could be a seller who read a blog and wants to sell her home. It could be the fire department saying your house is on fire. It could be a hospital calling because your husband has been in a car accident. It doesn’t hurt to press the green button. You always have the option to disconnect.

Oops, the cell tower dropped the call, LOL.

A former client emailed me a lengthy message yesterday. About home warranties and I don’t know what. At first glance, I wondered who she was because her name is not on my usual list of correspondents, but then I thought, hey, I sold her home not that long ago. I responded to ask if she had intended to email me. Which she had not. She emailed me by mistake, it turned out. But she was so happy to hear from me and mentioned how much she misses my fast communication. Immediately responding makes clients feel valued. Like they matter as much as they really do matter.

Another of the easiest ways to impress a real estate client is to tell her the truth. I was at a listing appointment yesterday and the home was not exactly what I had been expecting. I had created a CMA (comparative market analysis) for this seller based on her description of the home and what I thought it would look like. It’s easier to break the news when the price is going up but when it’s going down, it can be disappointing news to hear. I like my clients to be happy, not sad.

So I try to preface the news with letting my client know a) I had bad news to share, and b) I was sorry to have to say it, and c) I knew she did not want to hear it. That sort of introduction gives people time to process and prepare. I had to tell this seller that a potential buyer would view her home as being a fixer upper (not that I, god forbid, see it that way). It needed too many updates to be comparable to the other homes that have sold at higher prices. I think people can tell when an agent is sincere and honest and when an agent is not. She took the news OK. Makes both of our jobs, hers as a seller and mine as an agent, much easier.

Which means there you have it. A meeting of the minds and to feel valued. If a Sacramento Realtor can convey that those two things to her clients, she’ll do all right in the Sacramento real estate business.