More Open Houses = More Homes Sold?

by Jim Newell

I surprised myself this morning. I thought I’d look at the number of open houses that Carpenter Realtors’ agent are holding so far this Fall, thinking that the last few weeks’ numbers had been holding up pretty well despite the seasonality. So I compared numbers for past Septembers.

Lo and behold, our open house counts are holding up very well against previous years, especially considering how the market’s been acting. Just this week, our total is up more than 50% from the same week last year. Our ads in the Indianapolis Star are consistently larger than previous years’, with more open houses and more agents selecting the prominent photo ads for their open house.

Asking a few agents’ opinions on this, I’ve found that many are still actively looking at a rebound in home sales and want to be upfront. Their open houses give them a chance to connect with their sellers’ neighbors and meet a number of fairly active buyers, both in a non-threatening “sales pitch” way. Plus the home sellers know that their Carpenter agent is putting some effort into selling their home in a tough market. We still hear stories from sellers whose previous agents rarely contacted them, failed to offer market activity updates, didn’t advertise and simply didn’t “work” for their business.

So yes – it’s nice to consistently have more open houses for sale than anyone, have a larger presence in the Sunday Star (300,000 copies, a half-million readers!) and have all our open houses syndicated to more online sites. It’s great to have agents who are re-engaging with the market now – when it’s showing signs of a rebound. It just bodes well for them being the first to see a rebound and the most successful coming out of the downturn.

Yeah, I’m gonna have a good weekend.

By the way, I used the term Lo and Behold and got curious where it came from. Thanks to phrases.org.uk, I found that its meaning is that it’s ”an exclamation, drawing others’ attention to something. Used especially to announce things that are considered startling or important.” The word ‘lo’ as used in this phrase is a shortening of ‘look’. So, lo and behold! has the meaning of look! – behold!. So there … phrase used correctly and now you know its meaning!

Posted by: Jim Newell