I wanted to share with you some creative ideas that I recently read about for helping increase traffic at open houses and hopefully sell more homes:
1) Agents can offer $5 gas cards as a small gesture to acknowledge the car ride over to view the house.
2) For pet-friendly homes, REALTORS® can allow potential buyers to bring their pets along. This is a great way to motivate passionate pet-lovers who see their pets as family members.
3) Agents can give out quarts of gourmet ice cream. Not only is this a special treat to fight heat, it also forces potential buyers to head directly home, avoiding any other open houses on the way, so they can put their ice cream in the freezer.
4) REALTORS® can provide shoe shines during an open house. If buyers have to remove their shoes anyway, why not offer this service?
If you try any of these ideas, please let me know if you have any success.
Good luck and have a great day!!!
How cute these ideas are. It really is harder to get open house traffic these days!
Great ideas, not sure about them bringing their pets. If there was an accident who would be liable?
We recently knocked on 150 doors in a neighborhood to promote an open house and from that we got 17 people to the open house that we had on Sunday. According to one of the neighbors that we talked with they are hearing from other neighbors about the home.
Thanks for the tips...who has to eat the left over ice cream? Kind of a new way to "build your business" :)
17 people at an open house? That's great. And it's all because of good old fashioned leg work.
Chuck - Perhaps you could walk the neighborhood and give out the ice cream to neighbors while telling them about your listing. If not, you can send me the leftovers.
Unique ideas for an open house, I had custom candybar wrappers made with a picture of the house for sale and all of my information on the back. They were wrapped around hershey bars, they went over very well and my information went with the client. I also put a business card inside.
We have seen the bars at weddings but not an open house....love it!
We also do the candy var wrappers at open houses and other events. The key is exactly what Ray does. Be sure to put a business card inside the wrapper. People throw away the wrapper but will be more likely to keep your card.
Great ideas ,I have been having such a difficult time getting people to
my open houses, I will surely try a few of these ideas.
Thank you ,Elaine Mecchella -Century21 Hearst Realty
Great post to get the ideas flowing! I do gas cards as well. My best turnouts have come from door knocking prior - it really does work!
Elaine & Leesa - Thanks for stopping by and adding your thoughts. Door knocking in the neighbor is a great way to get word of mouth advertising. Some neighbors will show up out of curiosity while others may know people interested in moving to that neighbor. Keep up the good work and come back to share your successes.