It really is a new real estate market in the Twin Cities. First came the so called bubble, compounded with an additional glut of inventory, plus the fact that buyers have been watching the prices drop. The National Association of Realtors does a fabulous set of promotions in conjunction with the local Minnesota Associations plugging the obvious that it couldn't be a better time to buy real estate. Call your local Realtor today.
So what is going on with all the buyers? Where are they? Are buyers really liars? The answer seems simple and illogical. "BUYERS ARE SPYERS". They are litterally watching and spying on the inventory. Our most recent call backs on our Direct Response Marketing calls literally had some of the following comments from potential buyers. "Yes, we've been watching that listing for the past few months, we're wondering how far they might come down in price". "Yes, we're aware of the property, and we noticed that the sellers have moved out".
Buyers are thinking that the market still has room to fall and many are playing the waiting game. Shame on them, particularly when the market recycles favorably again as it always does. Why buy when the market starts heating up and most people buy up in price. It's like a dog chasing it's own tail. So what the top agents do in distinguishing their listings and bringing them to the top of the heap for the potential buyers? What do they do beyond placing the home on the MLS? The Star Tribune and the Pioneer Press have long been the top two rags that buyers utilized as their primary resources. I congratulate the long standing traditional brokerages that have also moved away from those sources in that buyers are utilizing the internet to find homes. Edina Realty has literally dropped their sunday full page ads. Coldwell Banker will be doing the same shortly. My former brokerage RE/MAX has moved from a front and back page Sunday booklet to only one page and it is completely driven by the individual associates paying for their contractual spots. I can see that page disappearing slowly as the independent ads are starting to fill in larger spaces. The same story is beginning to happen with The Anoka Shopper, Blaine/SLP Life, Coon Rapids Herald and so on. All of the paper resources that have been so successful in the past for Minneapolis, St. Paul, Blaine, Coon Rapids, Anoka County, Hennepin County areas just don't really work any more. Some Realtors are liking the Real Estate Book, the Home Seller Magazine and the Star Tribune Extra Magazine because of their potential longer shelf lives and their ability to be published on the internet.
According to the publisher of the New York Times, Arthur Sulzberger; the New York Times doesn't even expect to be in print in a few years. My goodness, can you imagine? The Internet has become the main resource for buyers. Special thanks to Realtor.com for launching those great search tools just a few short years ago. Today a number of great internet resources have taken the internet market by storm: Zillow.com and Trulia.com for example. If your realtors are not in the internet game with these valuable resources, then the sellers are being left in the dark. Sounds illogical, when almost everything is on the mls and most buyers purchase a home with a Realtor. Unfortunately, most buyers find their home on their own utilizing the Broker Reciprocity sites, Zillow.com Trulia.com, Realtor.com etc etc. In fact, they are even waiting for the homes to be posted on the Broker Reciprocity sites for Open Houses. As recently as a year ago, 70% of buyers began their search on the internet. By the time you read this over 82% of all buyers utilize the internet to buy their next piece of Real Estate.
Hiring a Blaine, Minneapolis, St. Paul Realtor(s) who is internet savvy and has the technology to network and capture potential buyers on their sellers behalf is fundamental in todays real estate market. Internet Marketing has been the only successful strategy in today's Minneapolis and St. Paul Metro Real Estate Market. You would think most real estate agents would have Search Engine Optimization SEO services or skills, not to mention at least a web site. Lead generation websites, take a lot of time and hard earned money. Savvy agents drive a lot of internet traffic to their websites by Blogging on National Blogs such as: Active Rain and Blogger.com. Blogging, drives heavy traffic to the agent sites and ultimately to their clients inventory. Buyers want FREE Information and lots of it. They don't want to give up their personal information, email, phone numbers etc to simply get property information, search for homes, prices, details, pictures etc. The more user friendly information agents provide the buyers, the more likely they will engage that agent if that property interests them. Case in point; today, I called a buyer who just made an inquiry on our Direct Response Ad. I made the call only 10 minutes after her inquiry. The buyer had already looked up the property within 10 minutes on their favorite web site and called the realtor hosting the inventory on their Broker Reciprocity site. Moments later, I called her and she thought she called me the listing agent. I notified her that I was the listing agent and would be happy to help facilitate her needs as soon as possible since she was not under contract with an agent.
Buyers will reach out on the internet first to find Minneapolis Homes, Blaine Homes, St. Paul Homes and All Metro Area Homes by reading Blogs and utilizing Search Engines. A Blog provides both Buyers and Sellers with the resources they want without having to call someone. Once they have the information they need, they'll make the call to the Internet Savvy Realtor.
Frank D'Angelo - Broker
EXIT Realty Executives - EXIT Realty is Growing!
(763) 548-1444 (Single Number Reach Technology)
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