How fast is a fast response time?

By
Real Estate Agent with Exp Realty - Atlantic County

It continues to amaze me what some agents consider a fast response time. In our office all emails are pushed to the agents blackberry and most agents call or email with in  minutes if not seconds. We can clearly identify home sales that occurred because of our rapid resonse philosophy.

Yesterday I decided to look for an agent that would accept referrals for an area that I receive leads in but do not work.  At 9:15 a.m. I sent out  an email to numerous agents who work in that area. I received dozens of replys throughout the day. Some were with in minutes from blackberry's but I guess the one that prompted me to write this post is the Re/Max agent who wrote with such enthusiasm 12 1/2 hours later. Go home, the party's over! 

When the market shifted from sellers market to buyers market we all noticed that the sellers were not making the shift, they wanted just one more sale in a sellers market...theirs. While the market has shifted from sellers market to buyers market, I'm not so sure that real estate agents have made the mental shift. Every month we receive our real estate magazines and usually there's a story about 5 must have tech toys, but what good are they if the agent doesn't actully use them.

In todays's real estate market (and going forward ), the buyer has come to expect some level of instant gratification. For our office that means a quick phone call response or a quick email response. Here's what a buyer does on the internet...they write "contact me" on 2 or 3 sites and whoever does so first wins.

If you're going to work with buyers you better realize that first contact better be fast contact. If you're not pushing your emails to your phone, you should.

As fas as the 12 1/2 hour response guy...sorry but I would never give a referral to someone with that level of service.

What's your response time?

Posted by

Steven Perry Schafer, Realtor
Exp Realty Atlantic County NJ
RealtyFlyer@gmail.com
My Real Estate Website
Phone: 609-604-6098

Comments (8)

Richard Shuman
The Only B.S. I Have is from the University of Massachusetts - Lake Mary, FL
Real Estate Broker - Orlando Area - Love Referrals

I see it all the time. I don't know why everyone doesn't carry a PDA and respond right away. My voicemail says I return most of my calls I miss with 15 min. People are shocked when I actually call them back right away!!!

Oct 30, 2008 11:18 PM
Charlie Ragonesi
AllMountainRealty.com - Big Canoe, GA
Homes - Big Canoe, Jasper, North Georgia Pros

You have to respond quickly . However in the mountains signal becomes an issue . If the playing field is equal for all I guess within an hour or 2 is fine

Oct 30, 2008 11:23 PM
Richard Iarossi
Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage - Crofton, MD
Crofton MD Real Estate, Annapolis MD Real Estate

Steven,  I try to respond within 15 minutes.  After 12 hours, why bother.  Did everybody in your request respond eventually?

Oct 30, 2008 11:30 PM
Steven Schafer
Exp Realty - Atlantic County - Egg Harbor Township, NJ
CDPE, SFR, ABR, SRES

 

Charlie,

You missed the point...it's the customer who decides what if fine for them. If they are into instant respone they will email everyone on the first page of google. That instant response..(see my post blackberry 101) stops them from emailing 4 more agents.

No disrepect to bad signal intended. You can only do what you can do, but suspect that I would say exactly that in my voice mail, that you are responsive and that you must be in a part of the mountains without a signal and that you will call back as soon as you move to an area witha a signal.

Steven

Oct 30, 2008 11:31 PM
Steven Schafer
Exp Realty - Atlantic County - Egg Harbor Township, NJ
CDPE, SFR, ABR, SRES

 

Richard,

Now 1 day later, I am still receiving emails. A friend of mine wrote me and she got angry with me when I said to her that I couldn't give her leads because on her voice mail she states "leave a message and I will get back to you within 24 hours".

Now I think everyone deserves to define their own business model....I'm just not giving leads to anyone who doesn't have a rapid response philosophy.

Steven

Oct 30, 2008 11:39 PM
Cherimie Crane
Cherimie Crane & Associates - Beaufort, SC

Steven,

I have always taken this very seriously. It seems to be "first come first serve" so I do my best to respond within 15 minutes when at all possible.

Oct 30, 2008 11:56 PM
Kathy Fey
Fey & Associates - Dacula, GA

The early bird gets the worm!  Totally agree that it is paramount that agents return all calls and emails as soon as possible.  Agents who have a voice message saying that calls will be returned between X time, lose clients.

Oct 31, 2008 12:56 AM
No longer
Altavista, VA

Steven you are right on target response time is everything!  Like you I push my emails to my blackberry and it has most definitely generated faster replies to my clients.  Thanks for the post!

Oct 31, 2008 01:00 AM