We had a very successful Quarterly Zoom with our Mastermind Management Group last week. We ended with what each manager is using today to create urgency for buying now. Here is the conversation, edited only for typos.
Roland: A lot of you have said that creating urgency for buying now, has been a real struggle. So, I'd love to have a lightning round of what you're doing, that actually is effective in getting people off the spot.
Ed Petras | Davis Homes | VP of Sales & Marketing | Indianapolis, IN
Ed: We always have a deadline on whatever promotion that we're offering. We are also doing one-off negotiations, and I think the key there is creating some urgency by saying: “Hey, this is good through the weekend, and then after that, it expires. Or this pricing expires by a specific date.” Also, we are giving six points towards financing for working with our preferred lender, so, we are getting the lower rate out there; but again, with a deadline.
Roland: Right, perfect, so having a deadline to move forward now.
Jason, what about you, sir, on why now? You've got a vibrant and robust sales team, what are you finding effective?
Jason Harper | Hunter Quinn Homes | VP of Sales & Marketing | Mt. Pleasant, SC
Jason: Well, yeah, of course, we use the cost-of-waiting app that you provide to us and tell people what it's going to cost if they wait another 30 days. So, you need to lock in the price now. You can always go back and refinance and change your rate when they do change, but you can't go back and get today's price and great value next month.
Roland: Perfect, yeah, the whole rate-price relationship, that when rates are higher, prices stabilize, and when rates go down, then what's going to happen to prices? Also, so happy to hear that your team is using the App and the tools we are giving them.
Scott in the Springs, how about you my friend?
Scott Baughman | Premier Homes | VP of Sales & Marketing | Pueblo / Colorado Springs, CO
Scott: The 3.75% Permanent Rate buydown through Cornerstone is great, and what we tell people is we only buy a limited amount of this and as the rates continue to rise, I'm not sure when we'll buy our next block. We've purchased 12 blocks now, so we're over $24 million. So, we'll continue to buy them, but it's a great way to get people interested by saying: “This is only a $2 million block, when we run out I'm not sure if we'll get another one at 3.75%.” The other thing is, that every time we release one of our townhomes, the price goes up $5,000 for every other building. So, “We encourage you to move forward now because the only thing waiting will do is erode your buying power!”
Roland: That’s a phrase we used years ago, glad it still works. It sounds far more eloquent coming from you. I love it!
Hello Tammy, tell me, what is working for you with why now?
Tammy Sauls, CSP | Keystone Homes | Sales Manager | Greensboro, NC
Tammy: When the sales were going well, our prices went up. We have been very slow to improve the prices to come back down. But last month we did a price improvement. We increased our Realtor commission to 3 %, and we incentivized our agents. We give them some back pocket money to use for incentives. But if you didn't use that back pocket money, our agents got a bonus on it. So last month was our best month we've had all year long!
Roland: Congratulations. Yeah, that's fantastic. Absolutely. I believe you shared with me that for every thousand they didn't use up to $5,000, they got a $100 bonus, sounds correct. Perfect, excellent.
Whitney, how about you in Wyoming?
Whitney Hopkins | Smart Dwellings | Sales & Marketing Manager | Rock Springs, WY
Whitney: We really let people know, hey this pricing that I’m giving you right now is only good for this amount of time. Such as, it's only good for 14 days if you decide to go beyond that, we don't know what prices are going to do. We can't guarantee anything. We don’t want to be rude, but we want to make them aware to move forward now.
Roland: Perfect, that's not being rude, you're just being candid with them. It's a great sales habit to date everything and say good through a certain date. Well done for implementing this and for sharing that you can't guarantee it, If they come back after that date.
Jenna, how about you?
Jenna Parker | Stevens Fine Homes | Director of Sales & Marketing | Wilmington, NC
Jenna: Okay so expirations on incentives we all know that's a good one. One new thing I’ve done, as customers have been waiting for the next collection, where maybe the new sites are all on a tree line or something considered more desirable, and customers say they want to wait. I’ve gone ahead and sent our salesperson an email with the home site premiums for the next collection which were 10 to 20 000 dollars higher than the previous! This has then caused two sales today of people wanting to lock in the current collection. When the clients on the fence were able to see the price difference, they went ahead and bought in the current collection of homes.
Also, we have given certain buyers "first dibs". I don't normally list our townhomes until they're around drywall or cabinets, but what I did for a few buyers because my salesperson was having trouble getting them off the fence, as we basically gave them first dibs on the home. And, you know, we were able to say: "Hey, if you will sign within 24 hours since you've been so patient, you're going to get it at X price. Otherwise, you know, my director's going to be listing it two days from now at $5,000 higher." It caused those buyers to jump and really kind of given a little boost to our agent there, who was struggling a little bit mentally because she was having trouble getting these people off the fence. So, both of those have worked really, really well.
Roland: First dibs, I love it!
Lisa, I know that your market in Saratoga Springs is booming, so not sure what you need to do for why now?
Lisa Licata CBR, SRS, CRB | Sterling Real Estate Group | Director of Sales & Marketing | Licensed Associate Real Estate | Broker | Ballston Spa, NY
Lisa: We're not doing any incentives or anything like that. You know, knock on wood, we are doing very well here. But what we do is play off of the resale market and the lack of inventory. We remind potential customers of multiple offers and tired of paying $30, $40, $50,000 over the stated price on used houses, whereas you can get a brand-new home with all these guarantees of price and quality, versus a used house. But that's reality, we're using the resale and lack of resale inventory to our benefit. And we've seen a huge increase in our sales using that strategy.
Roland: Very smart. I wish all new home salespeople would do that. We're talking about the lack of inventory that's out there to reinforce that now is the right time to buy, this is perfect.
Fred in Austin, Texas, how about you, sir? What are you using for why now?
Fred Herrejon | AHA Dream Homes | President & CEO | Austin, TX
Fred: Well, so what we're trying to do right now is keep pushing the rate buy-down. I'm exploring now the forward commitment, or these other programs just that we have four houses ready to go, to see if we can go on a 3.99% permanent fixed rate. One lender was telling me that there's a builder in Dallas working with that program with them, the builder had 17 homes that were struggling but sold them out quickly at 3.99%. So, I have one particular house at least, that I'm just going to bite the bullet and go 3.99% as a resource to sell it now.
Roland: Thank you for sharing that.
Cassie, what are you doing on why now?
Cassie Smith | Chesapeake Homes | VA Sales Manger | Virginia Beach, VA
Cassie: Yes, in a community that has been selling mostly designer showcase homes, we needed something to help generate more pre-sales so just today we introduced a Design Gallery Incentive. This incentive will give a buyer half off their first $20,000 that they spend in the design gallery on any luxury interior choices. This incentive is limited to ONLY 2 opportunities to help create the urgency of Why Now. And don't wait as once they're gone, they're gone. I told our team to use a small whiteboard and put on there, ONLY ____ opportunities remaining on the table near their maps. I saw this when the MMG was visiting Wilmington and it certainly gave a good visual impact to creating the Why Now and helping engage their curiosity and not wanting to miss out.
Roland: Makes perfect sense, visual aids to create urgency.
Rhonda, how about, you in the “On Your Land” world, where it can be harder to create urgency in some cases?
Rhonda Mele | Wayne Homes | Director of Sales | OH, PA, MI, WV
Rhonda: Yeah, we're in our 50th year this year, so we're running incentives just like everybody else, but we're kind of tailoring it each month to something different, to celebrate our anniversary. But something else that we've been pushing really hard, that is working pretty well is, (and I think I told you this the other day), Roland is your app. So, using it, yeah, to show our new home consultants and our sales managers, on average our prices increase about 5% per year. So doing a calculation of what that would cost versus if the interest rates were to drop 1% kind of comparing the difference in payments and using the customer's motivation tied back to that.
So just kind of giving them a little extra reason of why not to wait for interest rates to come down, as everybody keeps kind of talking about, or like they think they're hearing. And then we're also with the incentive, you can use that either as money off of your agreement or you could use that to buy down your rate as well. So those things seem to be working pretty well over the last couple of months.
Roland: Great to hear it, yeah. So, it sounds like your own 50th anniversary and the incentive we're doing, as the reason for it. So that's a special time. And then thank you for reinforcing the app and getting facts across there that people's fear of the unknown, and you show them what really could happen with rates, what that means to them versus the great value they're getting now. That's perfect.
Blake, how about you sir?
Blake Reeves | Chesapeake Homes | NC Sales & Marketing Manager | Raleigh, NC
Blake: A ticking clock, this incentive is only good for the next few homes so it's a limited release. We'll do for example, a free third car garage, only on the next three sales.
Roland: Alright, perfect. So, an incentive that's only good for a certain number of homes as opposed to a date certain, which I think is awesome so that people can't game the system and come in on the 30th of the month. The incentive may be gone after that second or third sale. So that's a great way to create a sense of urgency and shake things up a little bit.
Jeremy, how about your team on why now?
Jeremy Jackson | JC Jackson Homes | Owner | New Bern, NC
Jeremy: I guess about two, three weeks ago, we were behind on sales, but we increased the incentives on the On Your Land division and they're all but caught up there. On the community side, I really don't have a lot of homesites available at this time. We've got limited incentives on what we do have, and the new home inventory thankfully is still extremely low.
Roland: Thank you Jeremy and thank you, everybody, for all your valuable input.
In case you are like me with a short attention span, here is a brief recap of each manager's “Why Now” Strategy for Fall 2023.
Ed: Deadlines on promotions, financing incentives, and even any negotiation.
Jason: Training the sales team, to build value for pricing now, use our free App NHSales+ to overcome people's fear of the monthly investment, and show them savings in writing.
Scott: 30-year fixed permanent Rate buy down to 3.99%! expensive but created the best year in company history.
Tammy: Incentivizing salespeople with the negotiation to not give it all away and have a vested interest in the sale and the company's profitability.
Whitney: Dating all pricing with a good through date.
Jenna: Putting in writing future collection premiums and prices and emailing to sales team, to cause customers to focus on the current collection. Also allowing customers to have “First dibs” on soon-to-be-released showcase homes, if they secure immediately, and showing them what the investment will be if they miss this opportunity.
Lisa: Using the lack of resale inventory to remind customers of the benefits of a brand-new home, with all of the assurances of higher quality and no bidding wars.
Fred: Permanent 30-year fixed rate buy down to 3.99%
Cassie: A topical invective on presales in a slower-moving community, for just the next two homes, to create buzz and urgency. Creating simple but effective visual aids to reinforce the message with customers.
Ronda: Leveraging the 50th anniversary of Wayne Homes, with all incentives being tied to this great accomplishment. Also, training the salespeople to dive into real mortgage numbers, using the free app NHSales+ to show customers’ actual numbers and the benefits of any special mortgage invectives.
Blake: Using time to create urgency with incentives only on the next few homes.
Jeremy: When needed incentives topically, that are removed when goals are accomplished.
I trust this has been helpful to hear directly from our mastermind managers exactly what they are using to create urgency and effective strategies for buying now. Notice how flexible and open-minded they are about trying new ideas, and always looking to mix things up to prevent them getting stale and keep urgency creating strategies fresh and effective.
Please email if you would like the free App that has been referenced NHSales+, or you would like information on how to join our exclusive Managers Mastermind Group MMG, or simply to let me know how I can help you in any way. Your success is our greatest pleasure.
Truly,
Roland Nairnsey | President | New Home Sales Plus
Roland@newhomesalesplus.com | 561-236-2400