Your Agent Can’t Tell Genuine Buyers From Tyre-Kickers

When you talk to previous sellers, ask them about the quality of the people who inspected your property. You see, you are much better off having ten people inspect, all of whom have the funds available and have expressed a specific desire to own real estate like yours, instead of having forty completely unqualified people through. It wastes everybody’s time and energy – you, your agent’s and the unqualified buyers. There’s nothing more disheartening to a seller than having big numbers come through, but no-one in a position to actually purchase.

Ask your prospective agent how they qualify buyers? What questions do they ask them? And how will they know if a buyer is a tyre kicker or a motivated ‘market educated’ buyer? Will your agent find out if a buyer can make a purchasing decision before they agree to a private showing?

And remember, the key to qualified buyers isn’t just in the agent’s questioning. It all starts with the right marketing advice to begin with, and that comes back to recognising the many nuances of your property and whom it will appeal to. A good agent knows this.

Tip: Here are just a couple of the questions your agent can use to qualify your buyer before agreeing to a private showing of your property:

1. “Mr. Buyer are you in a position to make a buying decision today?” if the answer is “no”, the agent should find out why (maybe they need to sell first or they haven’t arranged finance or they have just started looking or a combination of all three). At this point in time it may mean declining a private showing and instead inviting the buyer to the next open house. This question establishes the buyer’s ability to buy;

2. “Mr. Buyer how many weeks have you been looking for and what properties have you looked at?” A great question to establish how educated to the market the buyer is.

The Key:

If an agent starts sprouting large numbers of enquiry that’s fantastic. Just remember to ask what percentage of those that went on an inspection were really qualified buyers and not just ‘tyre-kickers’.