We're Watching . . . And You'll Be Glad

Real estate agents and home buyers alike are feeling the squeeze from the lack of homes on the market. Don’t despair! For both real estate agents and home buyers, there’s a great untapped source for finding deals before they ever hit the market: your lender. If any of you are a bit confused by what I mean when I say “your” lender, I mean . . . well, us.

How do we do this, you ask? Two words: equity watch. For the real estate agent who helped their client buy a home, say, seven years ago, we let them know when their client has reached a certain level of equity in their home and prompt the agent to give their client a call with the good news. It’s a good excuse for them to call, catch up, deliver the great news, and see if their client is ready to sell their home and either upgrade or downsize, depending on their station in life. Statistics have shown that almost 70% of people selling their existing homes DON’T call the real estate agent who originally helped them purchase it. If the agent can get out in front of this and be the one bringing this type of news to their clients, that number is going to swing in the other direction, right? And with one call, you’ve picked up a new listing AND the chance to help them purchase another house. You’re welcome!

For home buyers, could help you get a jump on the huge number of buyers vying for just a small number of homes in a certain price range. Before doing anything else, come in and get qualified for a mortgage. Once we know what you’re qualified to purchase, the moment a home comes up on our equity watch that fits your parameters, you can be notified immediately. That sure beats getting three years of spam emails because you entered your contact information on a particular website that shall remain nameless but possibly rhymes with Killow.

If the benefits to real estate agents and home buyers aren’t enough to convince you of the awesomeness of this service we offer, let me give you an example of what this can do for a home SELLER. Recently, we reached out to an agent who sold a home to her client about seven years ago and let her know that her client now how a decent amount of equity in his home. With a bit of prompting (none of us is perfect), she remembered the gentleman and gave him a call to let him know. While the agent was able to pick up an instant listing AND a subsequent purchase for her client (absolutely NOTHING wrong with that!), the client himself did EXTREMELY well: with the money he made off the sale of his home, he was able to use a portion for the down payment on his new (BIGGER) house and use the rest to pay off some debts. Upshot: not only was he able to upgrade to a bigger house, the elimination of debt increased his monthly cash flow by $1700. I’m fairly sure we made it onto his Christmas card list for the next ten years.

In conclusion, let me assure you that there’s nothing creepy or voyeuristic about our equity watch –no matter how nicely you ask.