4 Shocking Graphs and 8 Steps to Revising Your Real Estate Marketing Strategy

4 Shocking Graphs and 8 Steps to Revising Your Real Estate Marketing Strategy

The real estate market is FINALLY improving and it is time to drastically change your real estate marketing strategy.  We conducted a survey of 400 consumers who purchased or sold a home in 2004 AND in 2012.  Here are three major trends we uncovered and 8 key strategies to improve your real estate marketing & technologies to take advantage of these changes in the market place:

• US real estate market went through an unprecedented downturn from 2008-2012, but technology adoption key growing 
• The Internet and mobile technology adoption continue to accelerate and this is changing how consumers buy and sell real estate
• The US population is aging.  24% of the US population will be retiring in 20 years. Family formation drives home purchase and fertility rates are declining. One segment of the US population is growing faster than others and that is the Hispanic population.

I am hosting a webinar on on Wednesday April 17th at 1pm EST and 10am PST to go through the results of our study and talk through 8 key changes in your real estate marketing strategy.   Click here to register for the webinar. 

I know you hear this every other day, but below are four charts that should convince that the real estate market is changing and the way you market to and manage your real estate prospects needs to change as well.  No – I am not talking about social media or mobile marketing, but those are part of the broader challenge. There is a fundamental sea change occurring in how consumers approach real estate, how they research real estate, and how they select a real estate agent.

The Real Estate Roller Coaster

If you don’t have whiplash by now, I applaud you.  We have covered the real estate roller coaster before.  We have gone from real estate euphoria to real estate death spiral and now back to real estate euphoria in 2013.  (Of course, ActiveRain was the first to call a recovery in the real estate market in 2012 and this year, ActiveRain predicted the spike in the real estate market that we are currently experiencing.  More data and insight on the restate recovery on Real Estate is Back on RealEstate.com)

The S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index shows the major retraction in the market.  A deathly retraction of the market.  You can see that the real estate market dropped like a rock from 2008-2011.  We in the real estate industry thought that the world stopped.  But it didn’t.

Technology Continues On

Due to the challenges in the real estate market and the banking industry, real estate sales ground to a halt.  The builders stopped.  The real estate agents and real estate brokers battened down the hatches and prepared for a protracted downturn in the market.  Banks stopped lending.  We all felt it.

Technology and changes in consumer media have plowed forward.  Nothing stays the same, even if the real estate industry has suffered challenges.

Three companies continued charging forward as if times could not be better: Google, Apple and Facebook.  Google continued its domination of the overall Internet which it started in 1998.  Apple reinvented the phone with the first true smartphone, the iPhone released in 2007.  FaceBook started a new social media revolution in a college dorm room in 2007.  Coincidence? 

The results have been remarkable.  Now 78% of US  consumers are online with the over 55 population finally catching up with younger populations. 93% of Americans have a mobile phone, 56% of US consumers are surfing the Internet via mobile device and nearly a quarter of consumers are using an iPad or tablet.  Only using a desktop computer to access the Internet is unfathomable to anyone under the age of 30.  Facebook now controls 28% spent on the mobile Internet.

So the question is how has this affected consumers looking for information on real estate on the Internet?  

The Face of America Is Changing Too

America has kept on changing and evolving as well.  For anyone paying attention to the 2010 US Census or the current US financial challenges, the US population is getting older and we are living longer.  The Baby Boomers are retiring at an astonishing rate.  According to the Pew Research Center, 10,000 Baby Boomers are retiring a day for the next 19 years.  Up to 24% of the US population will be entering retirement over the next 20 years.  The retirement of Baby Boomers will dramatically chang the face of US real estate and the US economy.

From NPR

Simultaneously, the rate of new family formation is declining.  Home purchases are driven by family changes – people getting married and babies being born.  Fertility rates have dropped due to the Great Recession, starting in 2008.  Historically we have seen people have fewer children when there are financial troubles like a recession or depression.  The decline in new family formation can be seen across all ethnicities & races in the US. You can see from the chart below, the rate of new family formation among Hispanic families is significantly higher than all other ethnicities.  Correspondingly NAHREP is predicting that Hispanic home buyers will account for 50% of new home purchases by 2020.  The Hispanic population is going to be a MAJOR driver of the real estate industry 7 years from now.

So let me summarize the big changes happening:

• US real estate market went through an unprecedented downturn from 2008-2012
• The Internet and mobile technology continue to accelerate
• The US population is aging with only one segment growing, which is the Hispanic population

Have you changed your real estate marketing strategy to account for these changes?

We conducted a phone based consumer survey in 2004 and then recently repeated in 2012 asking consumers who have had purchased or sold a home in the past 12 months.  We asked them when they started thinking about buying or selling and why.  What sources did they use for research?  How did they select a real estate agent?

I am speaking on Wednesday April 17^th at 1pm EST and 10am PST talking about the results of our survey and 8 key changes that you need to make to your real estate marketing strategy.  

REGISTER FOR MY WEBINAR HERE.

I will post the 8 tips and presentation here on April 18^th so that you can download them and share them with you friends.

Check it out.  I look forward to seeing you on April 17^th.

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