Experience Homes Group vs. Other RE Companies

You might be asking, who is Experience Homes Group and why should I list my home with them? That's a great question. First, let me address some common assumptions seller's make when selecting a real estate agent.

You might be thinking that a larger, more well known real estate firm is the better choice.
After all, they must have more buyers and resources to market your home, right? The brokerage firm itself may be more visible but what really matters is the agent you choose. It is true, larger brokerage firms have more resources for more print advertising. They can advertise your home in newspapers and magazines where your home will be a small, single photo ad in a sea of other homes. The odds are slim that the buyer of your home will come from a print ad these days. Over 90% of home buyers start their search on the Internet and many of them search for homes on the MLS web site or one of the many real estate web sites where every listing is featured equally, regardless of firm size or name. Over 85% of the homes sold in NH in the past two years were sold by an agent other than the listing agent.  In fact, the 15% of homes that were sold by the listing agent, took an extra 37 days to sell and sold for 2.6% less. So what does that say about individual agent's print marketing?

  
So if a large firm doesn’t have an advantage with print advertising, then surely they must have an edge when it comes to Internet marketing. Not really. Because of listing syndication provided by our local MLS, EVERY property listing can be syndicated to multiple real estate web sites like REALTOR.com, Trulia, Zillow and Yahoo! Real Estate. And since 90% of home buyers start their search on the Internet, no one has a secret stash of home buyers who they can control what listings they see.

 
What is more important than the size, location or name of a brokerage firm is the individual agent themselves. Each agent had a unique background, skill set, and business model.  Their approach to property marketing is different as well. Most agents have come from previous industries where they were sales people or held other, similar positions. Many were not marketers and very few came from the Internet industry. Why is this? Well for one, the Internet is still a relatively young industry. The average age of today’s REALTOR is 56 years old. They have been working far more years without the Internet vs. with it.  Second, because the Internet industry is still young and rapidly evolving, people who are experts in things like online marketing, search engine optimization, and social media are not getting laid off and looking for a new career in say, real estate.

Most agents will only market your home using resources that are either paid for by their brokerage firm or are little or no cost to them. Why is this? Don’t they want to sell your home so they can get paid? The typical agent wants to see if the low cost methods will ‘work’ first.  This way if a buyer comes along before they have to spend their money on advertising, then they don’t have to pay that expense.

I need to list with the office closest to my property.
Many people seem to feel that the brokerage firm with a physical office nearest their home is the best choice. After all, the must know the area the best, correct? True. They may be very knowledgeable about the local area, what is going on in town and so on but how does that help sell your home?  It can help when it comes to pricing your home but all agents have access to the MLS data when it comes to comparables. And what about the real estate who lives 30-45 minutes away from the office and takes a listing another 30 minutes in the other direction? The location of the primary office is far less important than the individual agents local market knowledge and more importantly, how your home will be marketed and exposed to potential buyers.  Most of those buyers will show up with their own Buyer’s agent who is going to be able to advise them with their local market knowledge so one of the biggest goals of the seller’s agent should be to market that home!

The agent with a “team” must be the best. After all, more heads are better than one.
Real estate teams are great when it comes to managing tons of listings. Properties can be shown at a moment’s notice. In most real estate teams, different people have different jobs and this lets each person do what they do best. There is the listing agent, the buyer’s agent and the transaction coordinator who all do their part to make for a smooth transaction. Sounds perfect, right? What about the property marketing?

Most real estate teams get so busy focusing on transactional activities that marketing gets delegated to a junior team member or worse, sometimes an administrative assistant or intern. In the case of smaller teams or even the individual agent with a single assistant, the property marketing may be handed off to an office level staff member who manages the marketing for the entire office.  There are even situations where the marketing is handled out of the office altogether, either by a corporate marketing department or a third party consultant. In just about all of these cases, the person putting together your property marketing has not set foot in your home! I can tell you from firsthand experience, it is very difficult to write copy and market a home you have never seen in person.

At Experience Homes Group, I personally oversee ALL aspects of your property marketing. When I list your home, I ask lots of questions, learn about your home’s unique features, why you bought it, what you love about living there, what the history of the property is and then develop a marketing ‘story board’ for your home. I work with you to identify who the buyer will be, what their interests are and where they currently live. This is the basis for targeted property marketing. How could this be outsourced?

The agent who carries the most listings at one time must be the best, right?
Most agents take just about every listing that comes their way. They figure the more inventory they have, the better the chance that something will sell and they can get paid. Many will take an overpriced listing in hopes that the seller will lower the price with them later.

Experience Homes Group takes a different approach.

I want listings that have a good chance at selling and will result in a satisfied client. If I take your listing, you can be assured I have determined there is a good chance it will sell. Also, by not taking every listing that comes my way, I have a lower number of seller clients at any given time and that means more of my resources and personal attention is dedicated to selling your house.  If agent A has 30 listings and agent B has 10 listings, that means agent B will focus that much more of their time and resources on marketing your home. Think that would help?

Learn more about how Experience Homes Group will market your property.