You Don't Need to do an Open House!

I will admit that most real estate agents do not agree with me on this topic. Some do, but most have not come to the same realization or don't want to for reasons I will document next.

I have been selling real estate full-time since 2005 and I used to do open houses. I did them because I thought I had to and that my clients would demand them of me.
But then I got smart and started thinking for myself. I started to really question if an open house was a good use of time and if it caused a house to be sold.

Let's be clear, in the past open houses were a needed thing. There was no internet on which to display beautiful photos, videos, layouts, etc. People had no clue what the house actually looked like.
Also, access to the home back then was trickier. The key to the house was often at the listing agent's real estate office so arrangements had to be made to see it. 
Today, lockboxes at each listing have made it easy to gain access for an agent.

Over time I began to take notice of what the people were saying when they came in the door of an open house. Sometimes they would come right out and tell me they were a neighbor just doing some snooping. Sometimes they would say they were just passing by and would not be buying for a few years. 
The general theme was that the owners had left their home for a good portion of the day so that people who were not going to buy their home could look around. What a HUGE waste of time that is. The agents time and the clients time.

So why do agents do them??? There is one simple answer to that question and the answer is BUYERS! 

Buyers are the reason agents do open houses and I am not talking about buyers for that home. Agents do open houses because they know it is a chance to meet new people and perhaps turn those people into their next client.
Agents do open houses for themselves.

Need proof? Here is a tried and true strategy implemented at most firms. When a brand new agent starts in the business, one of the first things the broker will tell them to do to get things rolling is to ask experienced agents if they have a listing that they can do an open house at.
Now think about this, a rookie agent who would know very little about that actual property will be doing the open house. Why would they do that? Because they want to try to meet people and get some business going their way.
This is completely agent centered and it makes the owners have to go find something to do for 3 to 5 hours.

Look, if open houses sold homes on a regular basis I would do them every weekend, but they don't. I did $10 million in sales last year without doing a single open house. They simply are not needed.

I feel liberated to now be at the point where I tell every listing client that their home will not have an open house. At first I feared their reaction, but overwhelmingly, clients appreciate not having to be gone while people who have no intention of buying their house take a little peek. This approach has cost me zero business.

Now of course, there will be some that will say their house sold because of an open house. Sure, it does happen from time to time. My point is that overall it is not a targeted way to sell. Overall it is a waste of time. And overall, the open house is for the agent.


Mark Charter has been selling since 2005. He is a Real Estate agent, licensed in the state of Iowa and serving Central Iowa. Mark is the Most Recommended agent on sites like Trulia.com and AngiesList.com in Central Iowa.
To learn more about Mark, please visit MarkCharter.com

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