My real estate coach, Bill Renaud, asked me to pick the five listings that I thought would sell next.  After some research and thought, I picked five listings.

A week later, Bill called and asked how many homes I had sell in the past week and I told him four.  He then asked how many of those four were in the five that I had picked to be the best listings and the ones that would sell next – all four of them.

He was not surprised because that is what he thought the answer would be.  He asked how I came to the conclusion that those would be the properties that would sell next.  I said it had everything to do with second and third showings.

It has always been a theory of mine that very few people look at a house one time and then buy.

On Hilton Head Island and probably in most places in America, people go out and look at a number of homes.  They then eliminate some and develop what we commonly call a “short list”.  They would come back the next day and look at the few that are on their “short list”. 

I had a home listed in Sea Pines that in one week had three different third showings.  When all three of those people purchased other homes my seller was devastated.  He thought that someone was going to buy his house.  I told him not to worry and that it would sell within the next week – and it did.  He asked how I knew it would sell that quickly.  I told them that he was the second choice to three different people, so I assumed that soon you would be someone’s first choice.

I had a home that was listed for over a year with approximately 75 showings and no second showings.  When I asked the seller what this told him, his reply was that we had not found the right buyer.  I responded that this was not what this was telling us – I thought it was telling us that the public is looking at this house and for whatever reason – namely price – people are finding better houses that are priced less and those are making it on their “short lists”.  After some consideration, he finally figured out that this was probably correct, he adjusted the price and two weeks later the house was sold. 

The two most important factors that will get you on a person’s “short list” are usually price and condition, the third being location. 

Someone told me, “that makes sense, I did not marry my wife after the first date, even though she was on the “short list”.