 |
|
Prepackaged Sales Meetings Facilitator Resources |
|
||
|
 Open Houses General Business Guerilla Marketing Buyers . . . Beware Sorry, Right Number Showing Nightmares Wit, Wisdom, and Sarcasm Property Management Issues Life with Animals The Darndest Things Mistaken Identities Home Improvement Cops! Car Trouble More Resources: Running Great Meetings Facilitator References |
Humorous Anecdotes: Open Houses Following in the Footsteps Kids learn pretty quickly. When her house was on the market, Daphne Hawk, a salesperson with King Thompson, REALTORS®, in Grove City, Ohio, overheard the following exchange between her eight-year-old son and his friend. Friend: I can stay only a little while. We're having an open house tonight. Son: You're selling your house? Friend: No, the open house is at school. Son: You're selling your school?
Stake a Claim As I was setting up signs for an open house, I approached a woman working in her yard. I gave her my card and asked whether I could stake a sign at her corner. She agreed, asking how long the sign would remain. I assumed she didn’t want it there very long, so I promised to pick it up at 5:00 p.m. I wasn’t prepared for her reply: “Oh, that’s good! We’re going out at six, and I couldn’t watch it for you after that.” But it got better. When I returned to pick up the sign, the woman was waiting outside. She asked, “Could I give your card to my daughter? She wants to buy a home.” Needless to say, I’m on the case. Iain McEwan Coldwell Banker Kettering, Ohio
Timing Is Everything That saying about being in the right place at the right time is something Richard Catlett, San Anselmo, Calif., knows something about. One day the Prudential California Realty salesperson was walking his dog in a rural area near a golf course located along an equestrian trail. He was hunched over looking for golf balls to toss to his dog when he happened to hear the conversation of two approaching horseback riders. His ears perked up when he heard a woman say, "We're thinking of calling Dick Catlett to sell our house." He popped up and said, "You won't have to call. Here I am." The woman almost fell off her horse. He got the listing that night. --Elyse Umlauf-Garneau
Dancing in the Street After holding an open house for three hours with no visitors, I was happy to see a salesperson I recognized finally drive by. But she didn’t even glance at my listing. Her car stopped in front of a larger, more expensive home down the street. I was desperate. As the salesperson and the buyer entered the other house, I grabbed a flag and a directional sign and ran to the middle of the street in front of the other listing. When the salesperson and the buyer emerged from the house, they saw me standing in the street waving the flag and pointing the directional sign toward my open house. “Sorry, but we need something a little larger,” the salesperson coolly remarked. Wearing my best grin, I continued to wave the flag and rock the sign from side to side. The buyer laughingly remarked, “We might as well take a look while we’re here.” That night I received a surprising phone call. The salesperson said the buyer liked my listing and wanted to make an offer. We completed the deal and closed 45 days later. Bill L. Burr RE/MAX Realty Centre Yorba Linda, Calif.
The Fastest Sale in the East As my partner and I left a seller’s home, we noticed that our sign was missing. We saw a Dumpster about 40 feet away and we decided to see whether somebody had dumped our sign in it. On the way, we met two builders who were renovating an old storefront, and they asked what we were looking for. We explained, and pointed out the house, and they asked whether they could see it right then and there. Within ten minutes they had decided to buy. That was our quickest deal ever. Stephanie A. Intoci American Star Realty of Richmond, Inc. Staten Island, N.Y.
Polar Broker Sandy Meyer knows perseverance. Boy, does she know it. Her company, Belmont, REALTORS®, is located in lovely, frigid Grand Forks, N.D. But temperatures of 40 below zero, wind chill factors of minus 80, and a record snowfall last winter didn't stop Meyer and her assistant, Linda Melchior from going about the business of marketing. A photo of them in the artic climate ran on a flyer that Meyer distributed to relocating prospects. And the caption read ''Relocating to North Dakota? Temperature 42 degrees below 0. ''Don't worry, we'll have the driveway shoveled out by your June arrival.'' --Christina Hoffmann Spira Humor, next page > |
|