Zillow announced recently that they've stopped buying homes!

In their press release, they said they had supply chain issues and labor shortages, which is interesting because when you look at what they actually did in Q2 and Q3, where we've had kind of the same issues going on, they actually doubled the amount of homes that they purchased during that time compared to last year.

So why would they go from twice the amount they were buying last year to stopping on October 18th?

Some people are saying that one reason might be they're seeing market changes, just like we've been talking about. They're seeing a lot more listings coming to market which creates pricing pressure and competition. So they may not be able to come in and pay these high prices and then resell it at an even higher price. Because Zillow runs a flipping operation, right?

So we're actually seeing that. I've got a lot of students and a lot of parts of the country that...

Brian Bogaert is an active real estate investor who also loves working with REALTORS. During this podcast Brian explains why leveraging your talents is the key to building long term success. He also dives into why real estate agents have an unfair advantage in the investment world compared to stock brokers and why financial freedom isn’t just good for you it’s good for your clients. During the  conversation we also dive into how working in the investment side of the business can lead to creating “serial clients” that have the potential to buy and sell multiple properties over the year. Don’t miss this podcast!

I got a quick note on feedback. This came to me from one of my friends that works with me, Adam McGrew. He started doing this a couple of years ago and I thought it was brilliant.

We're always asked for feedback when we do showings. Number one, give the feedback because the shoe's going to be on the other foot. When you are selling a listing and they show your house and you're going to ask for feedback. And if they don't provide it, it's going to be frustrating. So always give feedback.

But now you want to go further than that. Meaning, when you're giving feedback, it actually can be a pre-negotiation tool.

This is how Adam uses it:

Instead of just saying, "Oh, it's a nice house, but they chose another one" or something super simple that's not meaningful, Adam gives a detailed text.

In the text, he gives an insightful analysis of the home, how it compared to other listings, what the buyer noticed as they're walking through the house...

Are you doing a weekly call to all your sellers? If you haven't started doing this, this is something you need to be doing. And as you take new listings, you need to just create this expectation that you're going to call them every week.

My preference is on Monday. I want to get the week started off right. And having my Monday morning power hour, where I call sellers, is super important in my business plan.

So why do we make calls to our sellers every Monday?

Because we need to earn the right to be able to ask for price adjustments, condition improvements, or incentives if they're needed in order to get the property sold.

The market's changing and not every single listing you bring to the market is going to sell instantaneously anymore. Often we're going to have to make some adjustments in the condition, price, or incentives we're offering.

Here's how you handle that conversation with the seller:

I'm going to start by saying, "Hey,...

As we begin to price property, it's important to understand the difference between comp-based pricing and competitive-based pricing.

Comp-based pricing is what REALTORS typically do when they do a CMA, they do a comp based pricing analysis. What they do is they look at properties that have sold three to six months ago, very similar to what an appraiser does. And normally in a typical market, that's very effective. But we're not in a typical market.

When you're doing that today, you could have an inherent flaw in your data. And here's what it is:

Back in April and May, all indications point to the fact that we probably hit our apex point of the market. Meaning that home sales were indicating at 23-26% appreciation rate compared to the year before. So that was the peak acceleration of our markets.

Since then, we've been moderating. And what that means is that people aren't getting 23-26% compared to a year ago. Now it's down to about...

If you want a great marketing message that you can put out to your audiences today. I'm going to give you one right now.

And it's not from me. It actually comes from the NAR Economist Blog. If you haven't checked that out, check it out. I pull a lot of data out of there all the time.

But they had this great example of how much equity someone would have built up over a 30 year period.

And so they took an average home price and they went back 30 years ago and said, what was the average home price? What would be your guess?

The average home price 30 years ago was $103,333 — an odd number, but that's what it was.

Then they took somebody that put 10% down back then, had an average payment based on the interest rates at the time, and figured out how much equity they would have built up through equity appreciation and paying off their mortgage.

So what would they end up with net worth today just from their house?

The answer is...

How long do people stay in their homes? It's an interesting question. And it's a question that's related to marketing for us.

Prior to 2008, the average person stayed in their home five years before they moved on. So quite a bit of turnover there.

From 2008 to 2016, that number moved up to eight years.

And now that number has gone even higher — it's now 10.6 years.

So why are people staying in their homes longer? Well, there's lots of reasons.

The Great Recession had an impact. Super low interest rates have an impact. Having less inventory in the markets for people to move up to and change homes has also made a big impact.

But one question we should know and ask our clients is how about our local market? How about with our own sphere? What does that look like for the people that you're actually doing business with?

It's a great text. It's a great social media post to ask this question:

"The average homeowner spends 10.6...

When do listings peak? In other words, when does the total number of listings hit its apex every year?

Well, it's an interesting question and it's definitely been affected by COVID.

Let me break it down for you:

In 2017, the peak was August.

In 2018, it was October.

And in 2019, it was September.

What do you think it was though for the COVID year 2020? And we're still in COVID, but at the beginning of the COVID years:

That number was shockingly (or not so shockingly) April — as March was when it was starting to gain some steam and when we had the shutdown. April was the peak of listings last year, and then it fell off from there pretty dramatically.

What do we expect for 2021 though?

We can't look at the seasonality of real estate anymore. The seasonality of real estate, where we used to know that spring and summer was the peak. And then it came over the top and fall and winter was the slow period.

That's not going to be true...

We know that Google is the number one search engine. But what's number two?

As you think about that question, let me give you another a stat that's really going to blow you away:

One-third of Americans -- according to a Harris poll survey -- say that they plan to move after COVID ends.

Think about that.

Think about the power of what that could do to the country in terms of real estate relocation.

So circling back to that first question I asked though, what is the number two search engine?

The answer is YouTube.

And here's what you can do, which is really, really interesting.

When you dive into YouTube today, search for your hometown. Be hyperlocal as we call it and do this quick search: "moving to [your hometown]."

Or you do could another search, which is: "relocation [your hometown]" and see what the results are.

You might find, like I've found, in area after area, after area, after area is that there are very, very little results...

Eric is a high energy, driven, and “No Excuses” salesperson who sells a product that he is absolutely passionate about. Watch, learn, and listen as Eric explains how he deals with rejection, how he had to establish a powerful "Why," and what he does to stay motivated.