Open Houses: The EXACT Plan That Closed 18 Deals

Summary

Stay Paid Podcast: Open Houses—The EXACT Plan That Closed 18 Deals

Release Date: March 3, 2025

In this insightful episode of the Stay Paid Podcast, hosts Luke Acree and Joshua Stike delve deep into the effectiveness of open houses in the real estate market. Joined by Stephen Acree and Cody Smith from the Acre Brothers Realty Team—the top real estate team in Lynchburg, Virginia—they share a proven strategy that led to the closure of 18 deals through open houses in the past year. This comprehensive summary captures the essence of their discussion, providing valuable takeaways for real estate agents and entrepreneurs aiming to enhance their business strategies.

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1. Introduction to the Episode

The episode kicks off with the hosts highlighting their recent achievement: being listed as a top 10 real estate marketing company for 2025 by Close.com. Despite ranking third with a 4.3-star rating, the team expresses motivation to improve, underscoring the competitive nature of real estate marketing.

Joshua Stike [00:20]: "We have. Joining us as always, Stephen Acree and Cody Smith from the Acre Brothers Realty Team, the number one real estate team in Lynchburg, Virginia."

2. Listener Engagement and Episode Genesis

Engaging with their audience is a cornerstone of the podcast. The idea for this episode originated from a listener survey, with a question posed by Lane Blandford from Alabama:

Joshua Stike [02:22]: "This episode's idea came from a question from one of our listeners, Lane Blandford, I believe, out of Alabama. She asked, do you believe public open houses and realtor open houses are still effective?"

This prompted Stephen and Cody to share their successful open house strategies, setting the stage for a detailed exploration of effective practices.

3. The Success Story: 18 Deals from Open Houses

Stephen Acree reveals the impressive outcome of their open house efforts:

Stephen Acree [02:08]: "We did 18. And we had one agent, Tim, that did at a super high level. He had about 10 of those."

This success was not accidental but the result of a meticulously formulated Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) that was adopted team-wide.

4. Providing Valuable Resources

To empower listeners, the Acre Brothers Realty Team offers two essential resources:

1. Open House Kit: Available for download at remindermedia.com/openhouse, this kit includes customizable Canva templates for signage, sign-in sheets, and other collateral needed for a successful open house.

2. Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) PDF: A detailed guide on how the Acre Brothers run their open houses, ensuring consistency and effectiveness across the team.

Luke Acree [02:31]: "If you go to remindermedia.com/openhouse, there's actually a kit there that you can download and I think it has a Canva template that you can actually use to customize."

5. Marketing Strategies for Effective Open Houses

The team emphasizes the importance of strategic planning in hosting open houses. Key strategies include:

• Frequency: Each agent typically conducts two open houses per week. This consistent presence ensures a steady flow of potential leads.

  Cody Smith [04:34]: "I'd say on average we're doing about two a week per agent."

• Signage Placement: Utilizing high-traffic areas to place multiple open house signs, directing potential buyers effectively to the property.

  Cody Smith [08:05]: "We set signs on every single corner... intersection, and lead them back to the property."

• Online Presence: Listing open houses on MLS, Zillow, and leveraging social media to maximize visibility.

  Stephen Acree [08:49]: "We have our segmented groups in our CRM that will also send out open house listings to."

• Door Knocking: Engaging with neighbors to inform them about the open house, gather feedback, and build relationships with other realtors.

  Stephen Acree [09:38]: "Creating those relationships and... being the only one that's ever followed up in a heavy, heavy way."

6. Door Knocking: Best Practices and Scripting

Door knocking serves as a pivotal part of their strategy. The team shares effective scripts and approaches to ensure meaningful interactions:

• Approach: Initiate conversations by mentioning the open house and asking neighbors about their favorite features of the neighborhood.

  Stephen Acree [09:51]: "I want you to know I'm holding an open house right down the street... What is one feature about the neighborhood that you love?"

• Building Rapport: Asking for value by seeking opinions fosters trust and opens avenues for future collaboration.

  Cody Smith [10:34]: "It's so much more relational to me. I'm like, so much more transactional when I approach it."

• Providing Value: Offering free resources, such as a bimonthly magazine with tips and recipes, reinforces their commitment to the community.

  Stephen Acree [11:32]: "I actually do a free magazine. I send it bimonthly... it's really cool. I would love to send you that completely free."

7. Conducting the Open House: On-the-Day Strategies

A successful open house hinges on preparation and intentional engagement:

• Preparation: Conduct a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) to be well-versed with the property details, even if it's not their listing.

  Stephen Acree [14:48]: "Being prepared... running a CMA, getting the house numbers."

• Data Collection: Ensuring every visitor signs in with their contact information to facilitate follow-up.

  Stephen Acree [21:48]: "One of the main reasons we do this is... the seller wants to know everyone that's walked through."

• Engagement: Asking insightful questions about the visitors' home-buying journey to gauge their position in the sales funnel.

  Cody Smith [17:09]: "All of our questions are related to capturing data. So we know how to follow up afterwards."

8. Lead Follow-Up: Building Relationships and Closing Deals

Timely and personalized follow-up is crucial for converting leads into clients:

• Speed to Lead: Reaching out immediately after the open house ensures the memory of the interaction is fresh.

  Cody Smith [29:56]: "Speed to lead still is the same here. Reach out right after the open house because that's when they're going to remember you."

• Personalization: Sending off-market properties based on the leads' specific preferences demonstrates attentiveness and expertise.

  Cody Smith [26:03]: "We send them off-market properties... based on what they're interested in."

• Consistent Follow-Up: Maintaining contact through a CRM system ensures no lead falls through the cracks, fostering long-term relationships.

  Cody Smith [30:00]: "You have some sort of program, some sort of CRM for your follow-up so that you can remember these people and keep following up."

9. Mindset and Preparation for Open Houses

Success in open houses is as much about mindset as it is about strategy:

• Intentionality: Approaching each open house with a clear purpose and determination to engage meaningfully with visitors.

  Stephen Acree [35:24]: "You have to be extremely intentional... If you are just going to check off a box, you'll never win."

• Overcoming Reluctance: Preparing mentally to handle the challenges of door knocking and engaging with strangers ensures resilience and effectiveness.

  Cody Smith [36:10]: "It does, it does, it's... getting in the right mindset... I'm just driving."

10. Key Takeaways and Conclusions

The Acre Brothers Realty Team's success with open houses is a testament to their disciplined approach and strategic execution. Key takeaways include:

• Consistency: Regularly hosting open houses establishes a strong market presence.
• Relationship Building: Engaging with both potential buyers and fellow realtors fosters a robust network.
• Data-Driven Follow-Up: Utilizing collected data to personalize follow-up efforts increases conversion rates.
• Mindset Matters: Approaching open houses with the right mindset is crucial for sustained success.

Luke Acree [35:07]: "That's really good. I think that is such a good master class in holding an open house."

Listeners are encouraged to implement these strategies by downloading the provided resources and adopting the Acre Brothers' proven methods to elevate their real estate businesses.

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Resources Mentioned:

• Open House Kit: remindermedia.com/openhouse
• Podcast Show Notes: staypaidpodcast.com

Connect with the Stay Paid Podcast:

• Email: [e-mail]
• Social Media: Follow Stay Paid Podcast on your favorite platforms.

Support the Show:

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a five-star review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and share it with fellow real estate professionals seeking growth and success.

Transcript

[Luke Acrey]

Welcome to the Stay Paid podcast, where we help agents and entrepreneurs master the latest business trends to unlock growth and create a life of freedom. Brought to you by Reminder Media.

[Joshua Stike]

Welcome to Stay Paid, where marketing meets motivation. My name is Joshua Stike.

[Luke Acrey]

We're testing out that new tag 9 tagline. My name is Luke Acrey.

[Joshua Stike]

I'm gonna keep using it.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah.

[Joshua Stike]

We have. Joining us as always, Stephen Acree and Cody Smith from the Acre Brothers realty team, the number one real estate team in Lynchburg, Virginia. And we're. We're the number one marketing podcast in King of Prussia.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah. Hey, hey, listen. We were. We were listed as a top real estate marketing company for 2025 by the close dot com.

[Joshua Stike]

Yeah, go check that. Exciting.

[Luke Acrey]

That came out a couple days ago.

[Cody Smith]

No, a week ago or something like that.

[Joshua Stike]

Yeah, like middle. Middle of January.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah. But they scored constant contact higher than us. We were like number three on the list.

[Joshua Stike]

Three kind of pissed me off.

[Luke Acrey]

The clothes. If you're listening to this, I love you guys, but you pissed me off by that. You motivated my prey drive. They gave them like a 4.4 star and ours like a 4.3.

[Joshua Stike]

We were 4.3. Yeah.

[Stephen Acree]

There's only three spots. You guys got third.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Hey, there was more than three spots, ladies and gentlemen. I mean, not a ton more.

[Cody Smith]

Maybe.

[Joshua Stike]

What top two spots we got?

[Luke Acrey]

Honorable it was a top 10.

[Joshua Stike]

It was a top 10 list of marketing companies.

[Luke Acrey]

Top 10. Yeah. And we were number three on the list. So there you go.

[Stephen Acree]

That's it.

[Joshua Stike]

We're very appreciative of it. Speaking of being appreciative, we sent out a podcast survey over the last kind of month or so. We had like a thousand people respond to this survey. And one of the things that we wanted to do more on the podcast is just get more interaction from the listeners and talk about topics that you want us to talk about. So this actually came from a question. This. This episode's idea came from a question from one of our listeners, Lane Blandford, I believe, out of Alabama. She asked, do you believe public open houses and realtor open houses are still effective? So it kind of sparked this idea of Stephen and Cody, what you guys have done from your real estate team, open houses last year, and so kind of kick it off with that.

[Luke Acrey]

How many deals did you guys close last year from open houses?

[Cody Smith]

You know the exact number?

[Stephen Acree]

Yep. So we did 18. And we had one agent, Tim, that did at a super high level. He had about 10 of those. 18.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah.

[Stephen Acree]

So we formulated a full, like, Standing operating procedure on how he does it, how we do it, and then have the whole team doing it now.

[Luke Acrey]

And we're gonna make that. We're gonna give two downloads for you guys listening to this. For the this podcast, we have an open house kit.

[Joshua Stike]

Yes. If you go to remindermedia.com open house, there's actually a kit there that you can download and I think it has a canva template that you can actually use to customize.

[Luke Acrey]

It gives you like signage for your open house, sign in sheets, a bunch of collateral that you need for your open house. But than that, I want to take you guys as sop. So your standard operating procedure that Acre Brothers does. And I want to put that into a PDF and so you guys can download. Like, how does Akrey Brothers run an open house? That's what we're going to talk about on this podcast. But I think that'd be super valuable. Say that you are elegant one more time.

[Joshua Stike]

Reminder media.com open house.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, so we'll add those two downloads for you guys there. So you guys did 18 open or 18 deals from open houses out of what, 269 or 270 transactions? Okay, so that's fantastic. So that's a great lead source for you guys. I see open houses as stellar if you can do them, because it's really, you know, an unpaid, I would say inbound lead and unpaid. Like you're not really having to pay Facebook or pay Zillow to get this lead. You are spending your time. But you know, that's sweat equity. So it's a, it's a great way, especially for agents that don't have a consistent lead flow, to get lead flow. And I was listening to an interview, I forget if it was Brandon Mulren who puts out great content where he had interviewed somebody who they were doing five to seven open houses a week. 75% of their 125 deals that year came from open houses. So that. That was their strategy. Now, not every market is as good for open houses. I understand that, but can you guys talk about how many you do per month? Kind of. What's your strategy there? Do you do them for every listing you have? What's the strategy?

[Cody Smith]

Yeah, I mean, each agent has different goals when it comes to open houses. I'd say on average we're doing about two a week per agent. But some of the agents are holding them Saturdays and Sundays and trying to rock it. It depends on their goals, you know. So Some will have 12 transactions that are going to come from open houses. This year and they should be holding one every single week. Yeah.

[Stephen Acree]

So when we're goal setting part of the year, it's. The goal is how many transactions you want to get and then we break down, especially if you've been in the business, how you got them previously and what actions do we need to take to gain those? So if you want to gain open houses more than, you know, make a strategy of how many open houses you need in order to get the lead.

[Cody Smith]

Yeah, historically the open houses. Because, you know, when I jumped in the business, it was a really great market. I jumped into 2016 and just obviously went up from there across the board. Right now we're seeing a longer time frame for close, so just everyone has to know it's in the follow up. Like whatever lead source you have, it's going to be in the follow up. Usually they've been, you know, pretty instantaneous. Instantaneous leads, bottom of the funnel leads. But now you're pushing like the six month, you know, that's what you guys.

[Luke Acrey]

Are seeing in the Lynchburg market.

[Cody Smith]

That's what we're seeing. But you'll see something like, Adam just implemented this strategy and just got someone under contract within two weeks from an open house and he's got another one he thinks will be a little bit sooner as well. So obviously they can be bottom of the funnel. That's why I like them. They're a little bit further down the road if they're going out and seeing houses. Yep. But everyone needs to know, like across the board, everyone's saying, you know, they're pushing off, pushing down the road, you know, towards the middle of the funnel.

[Luke Acrey]

You guys have your own listings, right, that you're doing these open houses for? What if the agent doesn't have listings? Can you walk through how you guys have gotten doing open houses for other agents? Like, how does that process work? How would you recommend that?

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, yeah. Versus your own listing, the team's listings, and then it's building relationships with other realtors, even outside of our brokerage. So we'll go to dinner, drinks, whatever with other realtors in town and just talk about business, how we can help each other. And it's creating those. And I've gotten great feedback because of my follow up to the agent. So when we hold an open house, I'm texting, hey, what can we do for you? Do we need to bring signs? You have your own signs. You know, what kind of marketing is it okay if I post a social media post, I'll include you as a Listing agent. And then an hour after the open house, I'm texting that agent, hey, we had four people through. This is the feedback we had. Thank you so much for letting us hold it. And then so that's a huge piece that I've had a lot of feedback on, is like, you're the only one that's ever followed up at a heavy, heavy way of how it went.

[Cody Smith]

And if you don't do that, you will get the shitty listings. Every agent, you know that doesn't hold open house wants you to hold an open house for their crappy listings. And so if you're not providing value to that agent, they're never going to send the good ones. And that actually might be the most important thing, is you have to pick a listing or you should pick a listing that's in the price range you want to be in, and that's going to be competitive on price because that's going to draw way more traffic, you.

[Stephen Acree]

Know, and then from that. So the number one agent, solo agent here in Lynchburg, she has now referred me to three or four other top agents to do their open houses that say, hey, your brothers does at a high level. They communicate really well. So I'll have people. People reach out to me to hold their open houses. Now.

[Luke Acrey]

Dang, get out of here. That's crazy. Who is that agent?

[Stephen Acree]

Jill Rufus.

[Luke Acrey]

Jill Rufus.

[Joshua Stike]

Yeah.

[Luke Acrey]

We got to get Jill on the show. We've talked about Jill and Jimmy before. We've got to get them on the show.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, they're phenomenal. Great relationship builders, man. They are great relationship builders.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah. Shout out to Jill for that. So, okay, so that's how to get the open house you're running. You guys are running like two, one to two a week per agent on the team. So then walk us through the. How do you market it? And then we'll get into. How do you run it?

[Cody Smith]

Yeah, I mean, we have. So we have runners for the top agents on our team that set up signs. So we'll set signs on every single corner. You just want to make sure, like, with signage that you get out to one highly trafficked area. Right. It's like if you're still in the community where no one's going to see the signs, obviously it's not going to be as beneficial. So we just make sure we get out to a highly trafficked area, some sort of intersection, and lead them back to the property. And then we'll set multiple open house signs at the property, and then we make sure we have the time on there as well, because a lot of people will show up, you know, if you just have open house show up on the wrong day, wrong time. And then we do social media at a pretty high level. So we post that and we've got our, you know, segmented groups in our CRM that will also send out open house listings to.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, so like a time sequence for you, it would be like Wednesday. One thing you want to make sure you do is you're putting it in your mls so it shows up online. So when you go to Zillow, it says open house, so people can see that online. So do that earlier in the week. And then Wednesdays we actually do a quick meeting to go over, hey, who needs open house? What open houses do we have? And then from there, they're going to do a social media video real quick, a little walkthrough or a presentation of, hey, I'm holding an open house for Sunday. And then Friday we'll do door knocking in that area of the open house, inviting the neighbors and also seeing about what they're with their house. It kind of works into the conversation. And then you hold it. That's awesome.

[Cody Smith]

Yep. And we've got multiple listings as well from door knocking. That would be for. From the open houses, but it's not actually from, you know, holding the open house. It's the door knocking side of things. So it's more.

[Luke Acrey]

How does that go? Like the door knocking, it, like, how are you approaching the door? In the scripting that you're using, do you find that most people are home, not home? Is it awkward?

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, I mean, it's a mix. I mean, you're gonna have people there, people not there. So that's. That's any time. But as far as the conversation goes, it's not awkward because I'm just telling them, hey, I just want you to know, I'm sure you've seen some signs, but we're going to be holding an open house right down the street on Sunday to the four. So if you see a lot of extra cars, that's probably the reason why. And I would love to ask you a question that I wouldn't know because I don't live in the house, but what is, like, one feature about the neighborhood that you love? Oh, that's asking for value, Right? Awesome. I love that there's bus stops or. Yeah, I love that we have this, like, little community playground. That's awesome. Oh, my gosh. That is great information. Thank you so much. Well, yeah, I would love. If you want to come by and see it. Yeah, it's always cool to see what other houses look like, you know, compared.

[Cody Smith]

To Cody's so much more relational to me. I'm like, so much more transactional when I approach it. Like, I go from, dude, you wouldn't believe what this listing, you know, is going up. I think we're all. All the way at 3:50. It's crazy, you know, like, by the way, do you, you know, want numbers on your house? Yes.

[Stephen Acree]

This. But for me with the open house one. So I wouldn't do this script if I was just door knocking.

[Cody Smith]

Yeah, yeah, that's the script.

[Stephen Acree]

I would use that I've got listings from. By using that exact.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Gotcha.

[Stephen Acree]

Even it works this for the open house. That's how you kind of. Because you're bringing in the open house of the reason why I'm here. So it's a less pressure situation.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, it's a great intro.

[Stephen Acree]

Asking for value, doing that and be awesome. Also, how I even, you know, were able to help these people out is by giving them numbers on how much their home was worth. And they were shocked on how much the house is worth. So I would love to do that for you as well. Do you know how much your home's worth? And then that goes the selling part.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah.

[Stephen Acree]

And then it's just value from there. I. If they say no. Awesome. Well, I've got a list of contractors. You have any updates or anything you want to do the house that I could just add value with and give you their information or connect you. And then lastly, I bring up the magazine. Actually, I go, awesome. The last thing that I do is I actually do a free magazine. I send it bimonthly. Has a bunch of tips in there, and one of my favorite parts is the recipes in it. And it's really cool. I would love to send you that completely free. Will that be okay with you?

[Joshua Stike]

Who produces that magazine? That sounds cool. That sounds neat. Yeah.

[Stephen Acree]

A company called Reminded me.

[Joshua Stike]

I love the.

[Luke Acrey]

Oh, dang. I heard they're like a top for 2020.

[Stephen Acree]

And trust me, there's more than three.

[Joshua Stike]

I love the question, though, about the. We had. I think Alan's interview will come out.

[Luke Acrey]

Alan Dalton.

[Joshua Stike]

Yeah. But he talked about. And his agent actually promotes and does a booklet.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, she's a client of ours, Julie Vanderblue. We're gonna help her on the show.

[Joshua Stike]

And she'll interview the neighbor. Has a whole section of what the neighbors say. It's a great way to promote.

[Luke Acrey]

She does that in. And this is something I was thinking about for you guys, which is interesting. She takes the listing. Now she's dealing with higher in homes. I think she did like 120 million last year herself. Her production. Wow. Herself. Let alone her team. She has done, you know, a team, but she does a book per listing. Like, you know, like some people do a flyer and it's, you know, pictures of the house. But then there's a whole section that was asked the neighbors. And she basically puts in there what the neighbors say the best thing is about living in this neighborhood. And I'm thinking you maybe don't have to do a book on that, but you could do that. What you're saying, Cody, you could take that and put it in the listing. Put it in the, you know, on the MLS or whatever to show on Zillow and stuff like that. Because nobody else is doing that. And that is you.

[Joshua Stike]

One pager at the open house.

[Luke Acrey]

And it also might be the same.

[Cody Smith]

Thing for when we hold the open house, when people come through and we have another listing. Like for right now, we have one in Cornerstone we're working on. And we took the feedback from everybody at the open house and brought that to their property. Like, everyone's looking for a main level primary bedroom. They're looking for a garage in this neighborhood. They're looking for a yard. And yours has that. And it does work out really well if you have that data.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah. Because I also think if you could somehow. And maybe chat GPT could help with this or some AI. If you could take what they say about the house and then turn that into text, that would be SEO, because then you are putting on each of your listings on your webpage what the neighbor says about that neighborhood. And I just feel like, oh, that would be quality content. But how could you do that? Maybe you wear a mic and you record all your combos that day and then upload the audio to like chat GPT and just have it transcribe it or something like that. Like, that might be an easier way to do it to remember.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah.

[Luke Acrey]

You know what they say? Because it'd be sometimes kind of hard and it'd be good to have it in their. In their words. But anyways, super interesting. So you're door knocking. You're inviting people to the open house wearing a wire. Yeah. You're wearing a wire now.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah. Video cam. You have the glasses on the video.

[Luke Acrey]

Exactly how. Let's talk about the day of the open house. What happens?

[Cody Smith]

Yeah. So you take this away and then I'll take up the follow up.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah. 100. So the first thing, anytime you do an open house is being prepared. So that's already running a cma. Even if it's not your listing, you're running as if it were, you had a buyer already presenting those numbers. So running a cma, getting the house numbers, you should be the expert of this house, even if it's not your listing. That way you have the knowledge, the respect immediately for any questions that would come up. So being prepared, but not only prepare in that way as far as knowledge, but also your motivation. Why are we here at the open house? It is to be engaging so as to be a very approachable and approaching people. It's collecting the right data, asking the right questions and ultimately the goal of number one, getting them signed in. You have to get them signed in, but also your goal is to get them signed in a in an exclusive rights to represent them. So just going in because a lot of if you don't have the right motivation in it, you're just showing up, you know, just doing this, you're not going to win anything. You're just wasting two hours.

[Cody Smith]

You'd be surprised how many agents don't do just that. That part just the mindset shift of we have to capture information, we have to capture data because like we'll get, we'll get back from the open houses before we put together this, you know, program for it. And you'd have two people sign in out of seven people showing up or two people sign in, seven people give their email address. It's like, dude, you're never going to win this. You're never going to put in the time to win them over email. And like that's, it's just the most important part. You've got to follow up with these people. You need some, some way to follow up. So being extremely intentional.

[Stephen Acree]

Yep. So with that I'm setting up right in the front door. So front door I've got my laptop set up for check in. And being the first one to say hey, I usually go. I actually started like man, so nice day outside of Sea houses. Right. Like a joke that they like knew that was kind of coming. And it's like a little bit later just to kind of how's the weather?

[Luke Acrey]

Right.

[Stephen Acree]

And it kind of like just breaks it a little bit because I'm not asking immediately about houses. I make like a small or something debris friendly. And I think actually that's a huge part because you got creating like an Environment that's a little bit welcoming.

[Luke Acrey]

That makes so much sense.

[Stephen Acree]

Additional questions like how long have you been looking for a house? You know, what drew you to this house Asking? Those are all intentional questions to figure out, all right, where do I need to go?

[Cody Smith]

It's where they're at in the funnel. So like all of our questions are related to capturing data. So we know how to follow up afterwards. So we know how to set up expectations at the open house. So how long have you been looking for a house? What does that tell you? Like I know if they're brand new one they're going to be later on the funnel. Right. But I also know they're probably not signed with an agent right now and so that's super helpful. I know I'm going to, I'm going to push for this lead because they're new. If they've been looking for a house for a long time, they might be looky lose. Right. But they also might be signed with an agent and that's helpful to know. So you need to ask and you know, pro. More, more questions from there to get that data. It just tells you how to follow up with the person from one question.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah.

[Luke Acrey]

Okay.

[Stephen Acree]

And the biggest, the biggest answer or information that you can get is the timeline because the timeline will tell you a lot of the motivation where they're at in that funnel.

[Luke Acrey]

So if I said I'm looking and I'm hoping to find something in the next six to 12 months where what do you guys know about me?

[Cody Smith]

I'm done.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, six to 12 months, that I mean. So you're probably lying. It could be sooner. So I need to find out way more information than just that. So that actually doesn't help me out a ton, but. 6 to 12 months, awesome. Are you guys currently renting or you know, you're just not in a rush?

[Cody Smith]

When's their lease up?

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, so they're running. We're renting. Oh, okay. So is your lease up in June?

[Cody Smith]

No, labeling it incorrectly.

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, I'm just finding information out. Gotcha once now if you say yeah, we're actually, this is our fourth house, you know, we're kind of in a rush. Okay, why are you guys in a rush for? You know, it's just you're ask. Ask you another follow up question from that. But that question starts the, the timeline and figuring out the information.

[Luke Acrey]

I've heard many agents say that I have talked to over the years that whatever timeline they give you cut it in half conservatively, if not more. For sure. That they actually, if they said six months, they really mean three and maybe less. Meaning, like, only thing that's. Sorry, Stephen. The only thing that's stopping them is they haven't found the right house. But if they found it, they would buy it today.

[Cody Smith]

One way to know a timeline. That's just a helpful hint. If someone comes in and just speaks so great about the property. I love this. I love this. And there's zero negatives on the property. You know, they're going to be a longer term lead because anybody that's actually interested, that's ready to make an offer on a property is going to tear it apart. You know, if, you know, they come in and they're just like, I love this. This is amazing. All this good stuff. I'm like, they ain't buying this home. You know, they're not buying. I don't try to sell on the home at that point.

[Luke Acrey]

That does make a lot of sense. Because when you are. When you have to buy something or make a decision, you are a lot more cautious. Yep.

[Stephen Acree]

Right. Cautious, nervous. They're not going to be your happy. Go lucky, super interactive.

[Cody Smith]

And don't talk to the people that want to talk to you. Anybody that feels comfortable talking to you. Those are not the ones that are going to be the good buyers. How weird is that? Anybody that's extremely engaging and feels no pressure with you means they're not going to buy because they're not going to be sold. They're not going to be sold. Anybody that feels pressure on being sold is the one that's going to buy. And so you actually have to. I tell my agents this. When you're sitting there at the table and someone's trying to talk to you and someone's walking around, dude, you just got to be the rude person. Like, you're not going to be rude, obviously, but you're like, hey, give me one second, let me. I got to go talk to them real quick. Like, I cut my conversation in my last open house off to go talk to someone else. Because I knew they were the buyers and this person talked to him. He's not the buyer. Y. But you have.

[Luke Acrey]

That makes sense. That translates. That's got to be a sales principle because that translates to so often what we see at conferences or on the phone. It's like when the person actually is interested, they're guarded because they know if I show I'm interested, oh, I might get sold. Where the person is not interested, they're not guarded at all because they never planned to buy so that, that's really, really powerful. So how do you get them to sign in? Yeah, right, because some people don't want to give their info.

[Stephen Acree]

Right. So timeline. We asked that. Okay, perfect. Well, obviously go through the house, see what you think. I'd love to hear your feedback or any questions that you have. But before you do, I just need you to sign in real quick. Just your name, your number, email. One of the main reasons we do this is actually because seller wants to know everyone that's walked through. Right. Just like if you own this house, you would want to know who came through. So I want to make sure all this is there. They have that and we can go from there because then no one can say no because everyone's like, oh, yes. And that is true. Like it's not a false statement. I will let the seller know how many people we had come through, who all came through.

[Luke Acrey]

And they do want to know. Yeah, right.

[Cody Smith]

And I, I don't even explain. I just tell them to sign in here and then you guys can open up doors, drawers, whatever you guys want to see. Right. So I just tell them because I want it to be a little bit awkward for them.

[Luke Acrey]

You're kind of like, hey, sign in here and you stare in there.

[Cody Smith]

Are you going to get away from me? You know, it's like kind of the vibe. It's like you guys can, you know, go open up doors, drawers, whatever you guys want to see. Because there's a lot of pressure there.

[Joshua Stike]

Oh no, I was just going to ask, you mentioned laptop. Are you having them do it digitally or is it paper?

[Stephen Acree]

Yeah, and we actually created. You can do like a Google form where like you just, you answer the questions, you hit submit and then I'll go into Excel Doc. And then we have it linked to our CRM as well. So then it automatically links the follow up.

[Luke Acrey]

Boss. Yeah, that's sick. Okay, so let's. Yeah, let's move now to. Okay, you got them, you got the open house going. People are coming in. You're getting them to sign in. Do you follow them around the open house or.

[Cody Smith]

No, Absolutely not. No. Okay, so I, I do. It's at the open houses. It's so creepy sometimes because. So I'm not following them around, but I intentional to exactly where they're at in the house. So the other day, the front door is right where the staircase is and the kitchen is where I'm having them sign in. So I walk them to the kitchen. When they come in, then they sign in, then they go throughout the house. I'm not following them. When they come down the stairs, I know I have to meet them before they just run out the front door. And so I'm just very intentional about listening to where they're at because I'm going to meet them at the door to get feedback for the sellers. And obviously I'm just getting feedback for myself what they thought. If they start picking apart the house, great, you know, that's more data for me. And then I go from there. But we don't follow them around the house. If you do, that's, you know, it's gonna feel awkward. And rapport building is extremely important in this process. So after I get assigned in, I'm like, it's all rapport building and collecting data from there because I'm going to be setting up expectations for when I'm going to follow up and provide the value that I'm talking about at that point.

[Luke Acrey]

Okay, so then last question would be on kind of when they're in the house. And then we'll move to how you set up the follow up. Like, do you. How do you pick what data you share to make you look like the expert? Do you ever do any special things like there's a park down the road or there's a this, that and the other that makes you elevated or makes the house more valuable?

[Cody Smith]

I share. He does.

[Luke Acrey]

Cody's rolling his eyes. Steven's like, no, Cody's like, rolling. It's like, yeah, I do.

[Cody Smith]

Well, it's all about value add. Right. So I share information that they wouldn't know otherwise. So yeah, if there's a park down the road that I found some sort of motivation that they'd be interested in, I'll share that, you know, but I'll share things about the house like, you know, roof's, you know, been updated, H vac's been updated, that kind of thing.

[Luke Acrey]

To say, hey, so you go more, which makes sense, you go more like deep. I call them infrastructure. Things like roof foundation, H vac, like something about the house that people would be nervous of. Yeah.

[Cody Smith]

But just remember, no one really cares. The only reason I'm doing that is to show that I'm the professional and build some sort of trust. I'm really not interested in those things. I'm not interested in the park down the road because most of the time they've shared that they don't care. You know what I mean? I'm. I want to know what you care about so that I can solve the motivation.

[Luke Acrey]

Okay, gotcha.

[Cody Smith]

I'LL share pieces that will give. Build trust with me and the consumer at that point. So for instance, the other day I'm walking through the house and I'm like. And just so you know, like, you know, most people don't understand this, you know, when they're looking, but a lot of deals get sold off the market. And you just gotta understand that because, you know, you guys probably been looking for a while, right? And they're like, yeah, we've been looking for a while. But you know, just so you know, a lot of the deals that you guys are looking for don't even hit the market. And obviously that begs the question of how do you get those deals? And then I can come in as the trusted professional and I also can set up expectations. So my last one was, hey, we've got one right around the corner that I think based on what you're telling me, you'd be really interested in. I'll send that property. Property to you guys right after you guys leave. And then I'm following up expectations.

[Luke Acrey]

Fantastic. So your hook is off market properties for. That's your hook to get the follow up setup, which is.

[Stephen Acree]

That's really good in conversation. Right. So getting the feedback on the house, what you think. Awesome. And then the pitch that Steven just said about off market deals.

[Cody Smith]

Yeah. And remember, we may not be in this market in the next five years. We might be in a different market, so you might have a different motivational piece. But right now, what did people tell you they wanted? They want their agent to find them a property. Over 50% of buyers said, I want my agent to find me a property. And so if you know that we're in that kind of market, why change it up? Right. Why not just add them to value and you've got the product. And that doesn't have to be with you. It can be with your brokerage. Like off the market deals happen all the time within brokerages. I mean, every top agent that I've talked to, that's what they're doing.

[Luke Acrey]

That's interesting. Yeah, it's a perfect hook because it's a paywall, basically. It's like it's something that you only you have access to that even Zillow can't give them or, you know, the MLS feed even in a way, can't give them. And so that's your value now is in place.

[Cody Smith]

And if they're truly looking, they're gonna want it. They're gonna want it. They can't say no to it. It's too Big of a value.

[Luke Acrey]

The hardest thing in sales is realizing buyers are liars. Because I remember like when we went looking for an open house, we were like maybe. And then it was like, I think we said, I think we were like, you know, we're thinking like 350 grand and it's like, it's like we went, I think 500 something grand for our first like, like. So we were totally, not purposefully lying, but giving a way more extended time frame, a way less budget than what we ended up doing. Because it wasn't the budget and it wasn't the timeline. It was did we find the right house for us? Like that is what drives everything. And once you understand that, it's, it's really the pain point. What's the pain point of the desire. And if I can help you achieve your desire, then people will pay.

[Cody Smith]

Then people know if you know that piece. It's funny because everyone gets nervous about the door knocking and asking people if they want numbers on their house. But you, Luke, as the consumer, you know, buyers are liars, right? But what is one piece that you would love to know the value of your house, right? What is one piece that you would want to know? When you're at the open house, the person wants to work with you. But we shy, we start to get really salesy and don't push outside of us to tell the consumer what they really should want, right? They've already told you, you already know this information. But you just gotta tell people, dude, I wanna work with you guys. I would love to work with you guys. And it feels so good from the consumer because no one has the brass to be able to say that. Cause they're just so scared and they this sales oriented over educating people. They start to go into rates, you.

[Luke Acrey]

Know, well they, they dance around. Yeah, we see this on the phones with selling real estate agents is in. Grant Cardone teaches this. You know, obviously he's a sales trainer for many years and now has other things. But he would say you must state your intention. Stop shying, right? Like you need to tell people, hey, I want you to sign up for my product. Hey, I want to work with you. Because all of a sudden all this adding value now is actually true value. But when you don't state the intention, it feels like you're trying to manipulate and sell me into buying into you. And it's like, stop trying to manipulate and sell me into buying into you. Tell me, hey, I want to work with you. And here's, you know, I want to give you this and I want to give you this. And I want to give you this because now it actually is in the right authentic context basically.

[Stephen Acree]

Right?

[Cody Smith]

Yep. Yeah. And people just over educate, stop. Like people buy off of emotions we always talk about and then they justify off of logic. And it's just like people are. It's just like you just gotta state your intentions. You just gotta do it. But.

[Luke Acrey]

Yep. All right, so I know we gotta wrap up here, but I want to hear, can you give us kind of your couple minute take on follow up? Like how do you do the follow up? How long does it take? When do you hit them? Is it right away? Kind of. How does that go?

[Cody Smith]

So simple. Speed to lead still is the same here. It's like you got to reach out right after the open house because that's when they're going to remember you and it's going to show that you really work hard for people. So speed delete is extremely important. The second thing is the piece we already mentioned, which is 50% of buyers want you to find them a property. So what are you going to be sending them? A value properties. And it's the simplest thing. So most people struggle because there's not a lot of inventory. Right. And so when the property comes in the market, it might be a week from now, which is too late to follow up with the lead. So what I do is two things. One, we come prepared to the open house, we send them off the market deals, so we already have the product that they're interested in. The second thing is I will send them products that they're not interested in as well. And I know they're not going to be interested in it. The important piece here is that you explain what you think they won't be interested in and what you remembered that they were interested in. So, hey guys, this one, I know it's a little bit smaller than what you guys were looking for, but it does have that open concept. And I really, I just saw, I want to send it to you guys. Feel free to tear it apart, you know, and tell me exactly what you don't like about the property because that will help me narrow in on exactly what you guys are looking for. So I have a piece to follow up with. I've told them I listen to you and your wants, I understand you. And so I'll follow up with that kind of information. But it really is as simple as that. The third piece that I'll mention is people are different portions in the funnel. And so if you're sending A property to someone that wants to move in a year, it's probably not the right follow up because that's not what they're interested in. The people that are six months out, you know, and lower, those are the people that you want to send properties to. Otherwise it's just relationship building at that point. So you're just calling the follow up. And remember this, people who are going to buy will not answer the phone. People who are going to buy will not answer the phone. Same with selling. We go to the appointment listing appointment the other day and you know what he says? He's like, yeah, Nathan has. He loves this guy. He loves Nathan. It's just incredible. Yeah, Nathan called me three days ago. Then he called me two days ago. Then he called me one day ago. And I told Nathan I'd follow up as soon as, you know, we were actually ready. So I followed up with him, you know, the third day and let him know we're ready. At that point, he's not going to answer the phone until he's ready. But he appreciates, he really appreciates the hustle and the follow up. And so you just got to remember that you actually, you're not hurting people by following up and them not answering. You don't want them to answer. A lot of the times. I know it sounds kind of weird, but it doesn't matter. You just have to just keep following up consistently. So you have to have some sort of program, some sort of CRM for your follow up so that you can remember these people and keep following up. I mean, he just had a lead two years ago that I hate to say didn't follow up with as as much just reach out to him over two of our other agents that have been following up with them because of his value add to the person and the rapport building.

[Stephen Acree]

But when I first.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, that's incredible.

[Stephen Acree]

Slapped off pretty hard.

[Luke Acrey]

You make a great impression, Cody. Yes. There you go.

[Stephen Acree]

You know, I'm rememberable.

[Luke Acrey]

Yeah, dude. That is a golden nugget that I think is so powerful for business owners, agents, salespeople to understand. The people who want to buy oftentimes don't answer. They don't answer because they know they want to buy. And normally this takes place after you've already had a convo with them. So it's like, you know, you don't know leads that you haven't had combos with. You just have to call and find out and qualify. But this is after you've qualified somebody of like, okay, I've had A combo, whether at an open house, on a phone call, whatever. Oh, they're not answering, man. I could have swore they're ghosting me. I could have swore. It's like, don't stop, right? Because it's just every timing thing. There was a loan I was going to do one time. I forget if it was for our real estate business, Steve, or what it was, but I needed this. Like, I was going to do it. Every time the lady called me, I was either on the phone with somebody else or I was in the middle of something and I literally could not answer, but I was like, gosh. But I never called her back. I never called her back, but she just kept calling, kept calling, kept calling. But eventually she stopped and we ended up going with somebody else. And I thought to myself, I would have bought from her. Like, I would have bought if she would have just hit me at a time where I could have picked up the phone or I was there. But it was just a timing thing. But she stopped too soon, and she had called me, like, two or three times, and she probably thought, I guess he's ghosting me. I guess he's done. Because we had already had a great combo, and she stopped and she lost that on that loan business. It's just crazy game.

[Stephen Acree]

It's building a relationship. So even if they're not going to buy now, they will buy or sell in the future, most likely. Yeah.

[Luke Acrey]

So good.

[Cody Smith]

Love it.

[Stephen Acree]

So it's like you're building that. Go ahead, Josh.

[Joshua Stike]

Awesome. Now, just wanted to say thank you. I thought we were done. I thought it was a good time to awkwardly close this podcast.

[Luke Acrey]

And Josh is like, we got to wrap this up, man. We're at, like, 40 minutes here now.

[Stephen Acree]

Hopefully that answers the question.

[Cody Smith]

Hopefully we're not.

[Luke Acrey]

That's really good. I think that is such a good master class in holding an open house. Obviously, everything that we're talking about, we don't know if it's the perfect way to do it. If you have better ways, please comment share on YouTube. You know, let us know what works for you. But this is working for them. They closed 18 deals using this last year, which is awesome.

[Stephen Acree]

And you like Cody's way or Steven's way better.

[Cody Smith]

One last detail. We mentioned this early on, but you have to be extremely intentional, and it takes every time you're going to do your open house to get in the right mindset. If you are just going to check off a box, I promise you, you'll never win. You'll never get open house. Ladies if you go in with the mindset, all right, this is going to be, this is going to be difficult. It's going to be really difficult to approach this person every time. For me, like, I sell a lot of homes. I feel it every single time. God, this is hard. I hate, I hate having to push for this information every time. So I have to get in the right mindset. I do that like 15 minutes in the car ride, I'm just, it's just silence, you know, I'm just driving.

[Luke Acrey]

The rocky music's in your head.

[Cody Smith]

Get ready. But it, it does, it's. It may be one of the most important parts is just getting in the right mindset.

[Luke Acrey]

That's so good.

[Joshua Stike]

Awesome. Well, thank you guys and thank you all so much for listening. You can check out the show notes as well as you can get a link to that resource that we mentioned, remindermedia.com open house and then you can check out the show notes for the episode @stay paid podcast.com if you enjoyed this episode, I want to show your support. Head on over to Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Drop us a five star review along with a comment. Let us know your questions as well that you want us to answer here on the podcast and the best way to support the show or share this episode with somebody that you know. If you want to get hold of me or Luke, you can email us@podcast remindermedia.com and of course follow us on social media. We are at Stay Paid Podcast for this episode of Stay Paid. I'm Joshua Stike.

[Luke Acrey]

And I'm Luke Acre. Great episode, gentlemen. I hope people will go and try to do an open house. That's really your action item. Go to reminder media.com open house and download their SOP. It's going to walk you through exactly what we talked about here so you can go implement it at your open house. And remember, the difference between top producers and mediocre producers in every business is top producers take action. Take action on that today.