Finding Motivated Sellers of Off-Market Properties
Learning how to find motivated sellers is a critical skill for real estate agents and investors alike. Of course, your goal is to find these sellers before they list their property. It might sound tricky, but with this advice, you’ll be able to locate them first and easily make contact.
What Motivates An Off-Market Seller?
Several situations can motivate property owners and put them in the mindset of wanting to sell quickly. In general, a “motivated seller” is willing to sell at or below market value because they want to close the deal as soon as possible.
Many of the situations that may motivate a property owner to suddenly sell their home will be public information.
For example, divorce is a common trigger for someone deciding to sell, as are births and deaths in the family. Other situations are not necessarily public knowledge but are significant motivators, like the property owner getting a new job in a new town.
Some of the situations you should be on the lookout for include:
- Births and deaths
- Divorces and separations
- Financial hardships and foreclosure notices
There are countless ways these situations can lead you to a motivated seller. Frequently, a death in the family leads to a new person inheriting a property. That person might not want the property or have the means of caring for it, so they will likely want to sell it.
Even when a property hasn’t changed hands, any number of health or financial hardships could lead to the owner being unable to upkeep it. In these situations, outward signs of neglect could point to an owner who is willing to make a deal if someone purchases the property as-is.
Signs of a Motivated Seller
Regardless of whether a property owner is known to be in one of the situations above, you can figure out whether or not they’re a motivated seller by looking for a handful of signs.
- Price: If the seller is willing to list their home below market value, this suggests they urgently want or need to exit the situation.
- Terms: If the seller is ready to finance the property themselves with favorable terms or accept no money down, they will be easy to negotiate with.
- Timeline: If the seller wants to complete the transaction as soon as possible, they will sacrifice a lot to speed up the deal.
These are the signs to remember when looking for off-market property sellers. Generally, you can get a feel for a seller’s desire (or desperation) on the first phone call. From there, you know you have a solid lead to keep working with.
How to Find Motivated Sellers
Understanding the situations and signs is one thing; learning how to find motivated sellers is another. Fortunately, many tools and techniques help agents quickly find off-market leads.
ProspectNow empowers you to search properties anywhere, narrowing down your results by size, type, location, and other criteria. For example, bank-owned, short-sale, auctioned, and foreclosed homes tend to have highly motivated sellers.
You can even quickly compare the potential profit of a given opportunity by looking at ProspctNow’s comparables, sales, ownership, loan origination, historical valuation, and market fit data. This priceless information will save you hours spent scouring the internet for information on a potential property and allow you to devote more time to holding valuable conversations.
By combining property and owner data into one convenient interface, ProspectNow empowers you to prospect ten times faster. Once you find a property you’re interested in, the property owner’s contact information is provided alongside it. This means no more digging around third-party databases looking for names and phone numbers.
With data collected around the clock, ProspectNow can also predict the properties most likely to be listed in the next 12 months. This allows you to begin building relationships with leads now, whether they are motivated to sell right away or still thinking about their next move.
Tips for Contacting Off-Market Sellers
Here are some tips for contacting your leads once you find them:
- Come prepared with info: When you first contact a property owner, you need to be ready to answer several questions they may have honestly and straightforwardly. For instance, most want to know what you think the property is worth or how soon you could sell it. You might not have all the answers, but being unprepared won’t leave them with a good impression.
- Be the voice of reason: Motivated off-market sellers are often in dire situations, so you must be empathetic to their circumstances. However, you must try to cut through the emotions and get through to their rational side. Being the voice of reason and explaining how you can help them work through their situation will help you garner more interest in your services.
- Focus on building relationships: A property owner might not be interested in selling right now. But taking the time to get to know them and putting yourself top-of-mind means you’ll be the first person they’ll call if they decide to list.
Get Started With Your Off-Market Prospecting
If you’re looking for sellers who are motivated to close a deal, ProspectNow can help you find them faster. With constant data streams being processed by our proprietary machine-learning algorithms, we provide the most complete and convenient platform for agents seeking authentic leads.
Are you interested in learning more about how ProspectNow can transform your off-market prospecting process? Start your free trial today and explore the platform for yourself!