Relocation: Will You Facilitate It, or Hinder It?

Assisting someone with a relocation to the area is common in our business. Some of us specialize in this, or prefer to work with these buyers.

A relocation company may or may not be involved, which raises all sorts of other issues. That's a topic for another post.

Buying a home can be a challenge, and a major source of stress. Relocating from another area, a neighboring state, or across the country adds an additional complexity to the purchase process.

As a licensed real estate professional, will you facilitate the relocation, or will you hinder it?

Here are some things I have found to be important:

• Willingness AND ability to listen - you must be able to list to what the relocating buyer is telling you, or what they want or need.
• Ask meaningful questions - you will need to ask probing questions that elicit information so you can help the buyers, who may know nothing about the area and perhaps don't even know what questions to ask.
• Take careful notes - I'd say this is a good idea any time, but even more important when gathering the details about the move, the buyer's needs, timing, others involved (relocation company), and more. Relocations can get complex, and move quickly in some cases.
• Flexibility - this is critical, and relates to all aspects of the process - when you are able to show homes, the time you spend touring properties, the areas you cover, timing of the process (when buyers can come to town, how quickly things must move along), your ability to flex with the changes that occur with the buyer's move, dealing with someone in a different time zone, and much more.
• Knowledge - you really have to know your markets well, since you will likely get bombarded with many questions, particularly if the buyers know nothing about the area. AND you may need to become more knowledgeable about areas you don't know (great opportunities for acquiring information for localism posts!).
• Empathy - you really have to be able to put yourself in the buyer's shoes and empathize with what is happening...a move to a brand new area, with a new job (perhaps), possibly family disruption, and often a limited time frame to make it all happen. If you have experienced a relocation yourself I think this adds to your ability to really understand that is going on.
• Administrative Skills - there is lots to coordinate in any transaction, but a relocation can be even more difficult, especially if you have to deal with folks coming from a distance, different time zones, and communication that is not generally in person. Your ability to use the technology needed to coordinate all the paperwork effectively is key (email, text messaging, cell phones, faxing, scanning documents, and so on).

And certainly just doing your job as a REALTOR with a keen eye on your client's interests will enable the process to happen as it should.

Are you up to the challenge?

Relocation - will you facilitate  it or hinder it? You decide.