This Nashville Market is crazy right now. Even though it seems like our inventory is super low, I have found myself booked with back to back showings, with multiple clients in this strange season. Apparently there are just enough houses to keep showings moving along. In the last 7 days, Ive been inside over 20 homes with 3 clients. I have an out of town buyer coming in October and another three clients gearing up to buy before the holidays. At 20+ homes a week I cant keep anything straight without help.
According to an article on realtor.com, on average, buyers will see 10 houses before they go under contract. I have had buyers purchase the first house they saw, and I've had buyers that see any number of houses over the course of years. Just looking for the right fit!
September has been a great month for open houses and showings, we've nailed down new construction and existing home contracts. We are working with buyers for everything from first time home buys to investment properties! With the the favorite houses moving quick, we are averaging more showings per buyer when buyers aren't ready to jump. This amount of work can be overwhelming for myself, and frustrating for the buyers. I find myself getting the Sunday Scaries (every day of the week) when I'm the least organized. I know can't be the only one.
6010A Louisiana Ave, Nashville, TN 37209 MLS #2187916, Listed by Allen Perry (615) 738-1550 Keller Williams Realty 30 Burton Hills Blvd. , Suite 400 Nashville, TN 37215 (615) 425-3600
There's a few tricks I keep handy, to keep things running smoothly! At the risk of writing a whole novel about real estate, I'm going to focus this post on just managing multiple bueyrs. More specifically: keeping track of all the showings!
It’s really important to me, to keep the buyer's activity casual. What I mean by that is, they don't need to be doing my job. If my buyer is sending me more listings they want to see, than what I am providing to them - I'M NOT DOING MY JOB. This does not mean I set an auto notify and hope they browse through and tell me what they like. When a buyer does occasionally send me something I haven’t shown them, I want to be able to say “Yes I saw that, I noticed it doesn’t have the bedroom number and square footage you desire, is this something you’d now like to consider?”
758 Rhonda Ln, Nashville, TN 37205 MLS #2168377 Listed by Chris Elrod (615) 305-0072 Zeitlin Sotheby’s International Realty 580 Franklin Road Suite 300 Franklin, TN 37069 (615) 794-0833
Tools I use to keep things organized:
Homesnap (Messaging)
Penultimate Notebook App on Ipad
Google Calendar
1. Homesnap: When I'm in an active home search with a buyer I connect in two ways. I'm regularly sending listings from hot sheets based on their specifications, and I connect through Homesnap. Homesnap is the single best app for searching (in my opinion). Buyers and Agents can connect on Homesnap and use the messaging service within the app to keep track of showings. We are seeing realtime info from MLS on Homesnap.
Once the buyer has narrowed down their big needs, location, size, price - I do set up the autonotify. However, the notification only comes to my inbox. It's my job to sift through what actually fits and narrow down all the junk that appears in front of me. I try to keep shared listings in as few places as possible between the buyer and myself, so that we both have an easy quick reference. Homesnap makes it easy to keep the listings in one spot with their in-app messaging with buyers.
Penultimate Screenshot from Ipad, syncs to my Evernote app on my phone and desktop!
2. Penultimate by Evernote: When I'm setting up showings, I use the Penultimate App (or any notebook app) to make a list of what I'm seeing. I prefer Penultimate, as I can create a different notebook for each buyer and it automatically syncs with the Evernote app on my desktop and smartphone. Spoiler alert, I wrote this blog in Penultimate. Penultimate also keeps the date for each note taken in the notebook. Here's what a typical showing schedule will look like on my ipad:
3. Google Calendar: My next action, is to create a Google Calendar event for the block of showings. For Daniel B's block, I blocked 11-1. Location input is our first address, where we initially met for the day. Daniel then followed me to the next listings (COVID, YALL). In the description I input each address and MLS number. I can share this with the buyer, and they will have a snapshot of what to expect on our travels during the showing block.
The combination of these tools, helps keep my brain and my work organized. I am able to refer back to my notes and calendar to answer questions quickly for buyers about houses we have seen. Boxwood Properties is a small boutique business, we have a low number of full time agents and admin. We all put in 110% effort to cater to our clients. This is the way we like it, and this is what our clients have come to expect.
I love to hear from other agents about how they handle the workload. What are you using to keep yourself organized in this market?