Top 5 tactics to get started with off-market prospecting

When we talk about ‘off-market’, what do we really mean? In simple terms, off-market homes are homes which are not publicly marketed. A very smart estate agent once said, “Every home out there is actually for sale…it’s only the motivated ones that put ‘For Sale’ signs up in their front gardens.”

So what we’re actually talking about is finding homes for our clients ‘off-portal’. Imagine a world where you, the estate agent, puts a buyer and a seller together pro-actively without using Rightmove or Zoopla. A world where you can show them 99% more homes than are shown on the portal.

You become the door-opener, the enabler. And their trust in you goes through the roof. You win their instruction because you’re able to solve their real problem. And you win the onward instruction too. And often, a cascade of instructions then follow.

Which all sounds fantastic – but where do you start?

We’ve got a few suggestions to help you on your way.

1.  Start an ‘on behalf of buyers’ campaign for your database. If you have some serious buyers waiting for their ideal home to come up for sale, drop the owners of all the homes around that meet their criteria a letter on their behalf. Sharing the story of a serious buyer in a real situation could tempt owners who have been considering selling to take the first step and get in touch.
2. Leverage your sold properties with a ‘recently sold’ campaign. If you’ve made a recent sale in a popular neighbourhood, target similar houses in the area with a personalised letter to the owners and see how many calls you get.
3. Leverage your previous sales with a moving day anniversary campaign. Remember Mr & Mrs Jones who completed on their 3 bedroom home a few years ago? Now they’ve lived there for a while, they may be starting to consider up-sizing to a 4 bed. Find out which clients on your database have a moving anniversary coming up, and send them a note congratulating them and offering a new valuation, to see how far their home has come in the last couple of years.
4. Target your most transacted streets. If you have a certain street which has proved the most popular, which always sells quickly, or is the most searched for by your buyers, tell the owners on that street just how popular it is. Hearing that they have something highly sought-after could be the nudge a current owner needs to consider selling!
5. Flex your messaging depending on your audience. If you’re contacting people who came to you as buyers and offering them a free valuation, for example, you’re not offering them anything they need. If a client comes to you as a buyer, talk to them about off-market sales from a buyer’s perspective. If a client comes to you as a seller, talk to them about off-market sales from a sales perspective. Reach out to your database and offer them the help they are looking for.

For more support getting started with off-market strategy, check out our ultimate guide to off-market prospecting.