Need opinions... would this help you sell your FSBO?

[udsweetpea]

I'm a mortgage loan officer looking for ways to help sellers sell their homes they are trying to sell on their own. I've composed the following letter, and I need your opinion on whether or not it might be something you'd be interested in if you're doing "for sale by owner".


Hello, I noticed your "For Sale by Owner" advertisement, and I would like to introduce myself and offer some FREE services to help you sell your home.

My name is Andrea XXXX, and I am a Home Loan Advisor with XXXX. We are a family-owned and family-operated business with a team of highly experienced loan officers. The FREE services we can provide are as follows:

* Pre-Qualification of potential buyers before they tour your home. This would help to ensure that the potential buyers are indeed qualified for a home loan before you take the time and effort to show them your home.
* Provide flyers with monthly payment amounts based on your asking price and several different loan options.
* Provide "Open House" signs and refreshments for open houses you may host.
* Provide a sign stating: "Financing Available through XXXX."
* And, finally, if you are in need of a mortgage for your new home purchase, we would be happy to help you with that as well.

These materials and services are provided to you at no obligation and at no cost to you.

My cell number is XXX and my office number is XXXX.

Thank you for your consideration. I hope to hear from you soon. Have a great day!

[Asha]

i don't know how i'd feel about steering potential buyers towards one mortgage company. i don't want to get blamed if things don't work out. its a good idea, but i like the idea of people having the freedom of choice.

[Oakley]

We sold our home FSBO and listed it on the MLS to get a wider audience. This was in West Palm, so it was a pretty hot market and easy to sell ourselves.

I don't know if we would have responded to your letter. Other than to ask if they were pre-qualified, we didn't care who the buyer worked with. We made our own brochures, and were not allowed to have open houses (gated community) or signs (as per the HOA).

BUT- what would have been a great help to us, and probably for other FSBOs would have been:
- MLS help (had to do a lot of research in order to lis it ourselves)
- Advertising (if MLS is not possible, etc)

I realize none of this falls into the mortgage broker category. :(

Good luck! I'm sure some people will respond to your letter!!

[udsweetpea]

Thanks for the suggestions!

Oakley My company has a bulletin board up in the lobby of our office (or we will when the office is completed). Should I mention that their listing can be posted on our bulletin board as many of our clients will be looking at it? Since you mentioned help with advertising, would this help?

[~queen~]

I sold my home FSBO and had a Mortgage Broker sheet with us that we handed out as people toured the home. However, I had to go out SEEKING one instead of one seeking me out, so your thought is a good idea.

However, I suggest some changes to what you are offering:

You need more verbiage in your opener about how loan officers can help in today's market more so that who/what you are. IMO opinion, people want to see upfront how they can afford the home, and you should be screaming - I CAN GET YOU INTO THIS HOUSE. Therefore, sell the homeowner that you can get people (anyone!!!) qualified to get into their home. And explain (not in detail though) some of your programs. Focus on how you can prevent a deal falling through at the last minute due to buyer financing (and those last minute headaches that come with it). That is what I wanted to hear. Acknowledge the problems that happen in today's market (use the Selling in a Buyers Market thread to get some real world examples) and show some ideas how you can overcome it.

Pre-quals don't matter. At all. As an FSBO, I want as many people to come through my house as possible, because I know that traffic = interest - and once the traffic slows down, I'm in trouble. So I would skip that altogether.

Instead of providing refreshments & signs, offer to make YOURSELF available to sit with them at an Open House and hand out your flyers and sell your services to someone touring the house.

Hope that helps!

[thedoorchick]

Every time I get mail that says something is "free," I'm immediately suspicious. That word would quite likely have landed the letter in the trash.

Now, I realize that you want people to be aware that you aren't charging a fee for the items included there, but as many solicitations as there are floating around in the mail these days, most people know full well that there's no such thing as a free lunch.

Personally (and I can only speak for myself), I would have absolutely no interest in promoting a particular mortgage broker to potential buyers of my home. If I did recommend one, it would be one I had an existing relationship with, not one who sent me a letter in the mail.

[Hello Kitty]

Every time I get mail that says something is "free," I'm immediately suspicious. That word would quite likely have landed the letter in the trash.

I agree with this, and I think others have given you helpful suggestions on what else to include. I would definitely take out the FREE (esp in all caps), your line about no obligation/no costs is easy enough to understand.

[snowzilla]

I have to be honest - any advertising like this would have gone straight into the garbage can, without being read. When we were selling our house last fall, the number of unsolicited "offers" that came in regarding everything from moving services to mortgage lenders was astounding. We pitched all of it.

[udsweetpea]

Now, I realize that you want people to be aware that you aren't charging a fee for the items included there, but as many solicitations as there are floating around in the mail these days, most people know full well that there's no such thing as a free lunch.

But that's what the reader I guess is not understanding. It is absolutely free. I'm not trying to get their particular business... I want their buyers' interest.

snowzilla May I ask why it all went in the trash? Why didn't you want people to genuinely help you?

~queen~ Thanks so much for the tips and helpful things I should include. I had every intention on sitting with these people at their open houses but forgot to include it in the letter. Would it make the letter too long if I went into a few of the loan programs we offer? Why wouldn't pre-quals matter? Don't you want to know if the people walking through are pre-approved or not? Thanks again for the help!

[thedoorchick]

But that's what the reader I guess is not understanding. It is absolutely free. I'm not trying to get their particular business... I want their buyers' interest.

Maybe instead of saying "no such thing as a free lunch" I should have said, "you get what you pay for." They're "free" services, but what's the upside to the seller? I've bought and sold several houses and my response to a letter like this would have been much the same as snowzilla's. I get plenty of mail from realtors and other professionals, though I haven't yet from a mortgage broker for some reason, and it all goes in the trash. I hire professionals to help with our real estate business through referrals, not through letters of advertising.

Another aside, I'd be a bit annoyed if someone took advantage of my FSBO ad to advertise their services to me. This is like the other thread where you were asking about sending letters to friends and family with advertising. I would feel more than a little used.

[thedoorchick]

Why didn't you want people to genuinely help you?

This wasn't addressed to me, but it did make me think two things:

- What exactly is the help? Honestly, there is nothing in that letter that I would consider a benefit to me as a seller. The only thing that might be remotely construed as help is the refreshments and it's not like that's foremost in a seller's mind. Of the five bullets in the letter, three are obviously a benefit to the mortgage company, not the seller of the house (flyers, signs advertising the mortgage company, a mortgage for the seller on their new home).

- No one sends a letter of advertisement just to be nice. They all want something. Otherwise, they wouldn't spend time and money writing letters to total strangers. People who give me genuine help are my family and friends. When I receive letters such as this, the notion of the sender being "genuine" with the offer of help is quite far from my mind.

[lawyerlee]

I would not be inclined to take you up on this, but I do think that ~queen~'s suggestions would increase the likelihood that a FSBO might be interested in what you can offer. I think the seller needs to see how what you're offering would benefit him or her, FWIW. :)

[snowzilla]

This wasn't addressed to me, but it did make me think two things:

- What exactly is the help? Honestly, there is nothing in that letter that I would consider a benefit to me as a seller. The only thing that might be remotely construed as help is the refreshments and it's not like that's foremost in a seller's mind. Of the five bullets in the letter, three are obviously a benefit to the mortgage company, not the seller of the house (flyers, signs advertising the mortgage company, a mortgage for the seller on their new home).

- No one sends a letter of advertisement just to be nice. They all want something. Otherwise, they wouldn't spend time and money writing letters to total strangers. People who give me genuine help are my family and friends. When I receive letters such as this, the notion of the sender being "genuine" with the offer of help is quite far from my mind.


I do believe thedoorchick nailed it exactly. For one, you're not doing me a service out of genuine selflessness. You're in the business of getting clients, and you want me as a client, to help earn your paycheck. (And is it safe to assume you're on a commission structure of some sort?)

Why didn't you want people to genuinely help you?

Why are you assuming that I don't *want* somebody to help me? I may simply not be interested in your particular company, or the particular service you're offering.

I personally do not like being "shopped for" in my home - whether it be by unsolicited junk mail, or telemarketers, or door knockers. If I want a product or service, I'll go out and look for it on my time. We throw pretty much any or all unsolicited mail into the recycle bin. Just being honest! :)

[thedoorchick]

After my last two posts, I felt compelled to come back and say that I am really not trying to be bitchy, or negative, or a downer. It quite simply comes down to the fact that if I get solicitations in the mail, from whomever, they generally go in the trash. That's just the way it happens, and I venture to say that I'm not alone. It's nothing against you, or your company, but most people just don't respond well to cold advertisements. That's not to say that they have no value; apparently they work sometimes, or no one would bother to send them. But it would just not be a way to get my personal business.

edited for grammar

[jennylou]

They'd go in the garbage for me too. If I need a referral for a loan officer, I have more than plenty to choose from that I have personal references for. :)

[jajacobsen]

And, just adding one more thing: If I were a seller doing FSBO, I am already in a battle to get people through my front door. The LAST thng I want is to scare off any potential buyers with some pushy mortgage broker in my house talking to them.

I'm not saying you're a pushy mortgage broker, but I don't know that from your letter that is something that runs through my mind, so it would be an impediment to many FSBO home owners in inviting you into their home. Yes, it may help the small percentage of customers who have not pre-qualified or have their own lenders.

But for those customers who have already done their homework, the exact type of customers I actually want to be looking at my home, having a broker in my house might distract them or meake them feel extra pressured and so I would be leery of having that on site.

Let me tell you what would be helpful from my own experience. DH and I found a house when we were casually looking and were not pre-qualified. The sellers realtor referred us to a really great, really easy to use mortgage broker who pre-qualified us and provided us a lenders letter over the phone that day. That was a huge help.

We ended up buying the house and using him for my mortgage. And I have refrerred him to LOTS of friends because he did such a good job, and was fast and easy to work with. Offer that service to the sellers. Explain to them how you can qualify buyers and give them a stack of cards to hand to anyone who dioesn't have their own financing set up.

Seriously, and I am probably not telling you anything you don't know, but establishing a great relationship with several realtors will provide greater return for your efforts as they can send you many clients over the years versus teh same effort in a FSBO situation where at most, you will gain ONE client every few years from a seller. And have hosted a lot of open houses, etc. Use that time and effort and money to woo realtors.

Just providing some really candid feedback.

[mamax2]

O.k., I didn't respond before because I'm not your target audience (I am a Realtor), but jajacobsen really summed it up and is pointing you in the right direction:
Seriously, and I am probably not telling you anything you don't know, but establishing a great relationship with several realtors will provide greater return for your efforts as they can send you many clients over the years versus teh same effort in a FSBO situation where at most, you will gain ONE client every few years from a seller. And have hosted a lot of open houses, etc. Use that time and effort and money to woo realtors.
Realtors are your bread and butter. Why not call on Brokers and ask to be invited to their weekly sales meetings? Bring breakfast, some freebie stuff w/your name/logo and give a little pep talk (NOTE: we really like to hear stuff about how the market is getting better and how the rate environment is helping that ;) ) Who knows, maybe in time you can even develop some affiliate relationships with certain brokers.

On the matter of direct mail. I think the responses you're getting here are candid and let's be truthful, most direct mail IS thrown away. It has nothing to do with the actual message or offer and everything to do with the fact that 99% of people are conditioned to do this.

I used to work in a mass direct mail operation and out of millions of offers, we anticipated a response rate of <1%. Apply that to what you're doing, which is obviously on a much smaller scale, and, well, you can see that it might be a lot of work for not a lot of return. That said, why is direct mail done? Because it's cheap! So, there's absolutely nothing wrong with you soliciting FSBOs, but it's probably not worth a tremendous amount of your time or budget since the ROI is likely to be very small.

[udsweetpea]

Thanks for all of the tips and advice and candid respones. I do work with several realtors who refer a lot of business to me. It's just hard to get my foot in the door being a brand new loan officer. I've read so many articles in broker magazines about loan officers getting so much business from FSBOs and letters like the one I posted, so maybe they're going about it in a different way. I'm not trying to get the seller as a client (although they can use my services for their loan if they want), but I'm trying to get business from the people interested in their home. My parents (who own the company I work for) have sold 5 FSBOs on their own and came up with this letter, but maybe they have a different view. Who knows.

In my position now for over 6 months, and our office was supposed to be completed 5 months ago and still isn't, so I'm quite invisible and only trying to get my name out there. I realize a lot of people already have a lender they'll be going to for the rest of their lives, but I just need to start somewhere. I'm simply in the process of trying to find the best way to succeed.

mamax2 Thanks so much for the tips! I've been trying so hard to get the realtor referrals, but it seems like the ones who have been in the business for a long time want nothing to do with me. I have found a few young realtors straight out of "realtor school" so that has worked out well. For the other realtors, I've been offering to bring lunch to weekly meetings and everything else you suggested.

Thanks again for all of the responses. Please be candid and honest with me... I need you to be :)

[thedoorchick]

Along the line of establishing relationships with realtors, another thing that you may or may not have thought of is establishing relationships with people in the local real estate business. Most localities have a landlord association and a lot of networking goes on there. Those are the customers you want, because they will come back again and again if they are satisfied. Our current broker has done over a half dozen loans for us over the last couple of years. People who are in the business of buying and selling property will give you a lot more bang for your buck than the person who sells their own home about every 5-10 years.

[udsweetpea]

thedoorchick Thanks for that! I'll google the landlord association for the area. What do you think would be the best way to handle landlords and attracting them to my company's services?

[Sophia]

I have to agree with a lot of the previous posters. I'd see it as spam and immediately toss it. I prefer to use companies I've worked with before or that friends/family recommend.

[mamax2]

I have found a few young realtors straight out of "realtor school" so that has worked out well.
Well, if that's working for you, I'd capitalize on it! A lot of pre-licensing courses absolutely suck. I think this is especially true if they're taught by a brokerage and not a Realtor association (I've done both in different states and it makes a BIG difference, IME). I've found the pre-licensing teachers often know very little about finance (because, after all, we're trained NOT to give advice and to refer everyone to a loan officer, inspector or lawyer ;) )and they welcome guest speakers in pre-licensing classes. That might be another good avenue for you. And, of course, the free breakfast/lunch. Who doesn't love to be fed?! Best of luck to you, you seem like you're hungry for business and a genuine/helpful person, I hope you do well and if you lived closer, I'd work with you!

[udsweetpea]

Thanks so much mamax2 for the encouraging words! I really appreciate it :)

[Sha259]

I know I am late in posting, but I just wanted to come in and give you a little support Andrea. I think that you have gotten some really good advice here, especially about relationships with realtors and landlord associations.

I also wanted to say, as someone from the area, not to be afraid to expand your territory. I am not all that familiar with mortgage brokering, but I would think that you should be able to lend to anyone who needs a loan right? If that is the case, then you are in a prime area to get realtor and landlord contacts in Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, and Bucks Counties. That is a huge customer area, and people are always buying and selling homes here. That way, even if you delt mainly with newer agents, at least you would have a better chance of finding more of them. Real Estate is still a booming business in SE PA, so I am sure things will work out for you.

Good Lock!!!:D

[udsweetpea]

I also wanted to say, as someone from the area, not to be afraid to expand your territory. I am not all that familiar with mortgage brokering, but I would think that you should be able to lend to anyone who needs a loan right? If that is the case, then you are in a prime area to get realtor and landlord contacts in Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, and Bucks Counties. That is a huge customer area, and people are always buying and selling homes here. That way, even if you delt mainly with newer agents, at least you would have a better chance of finding more of them. Real Estate is still a booming business in SE PA, so I am sure things will work out for you.

Good Lock!!!:D

Oh gosh, I wish we were licensed in PA since this is such a good market here! Unfortunately, we're only located in Delaware (yeah, I drive to Delaware), and its not such a great market there. I keep pushing my father/boss to get licensed in PA since the housing costs are so much higher here. Thanks though, Shamena!