Listening to Sellers

Hello all, it’s been a while since I did one of these.

This last weekend I had the pleasure of attending one of MJARE’s seminars here in UT. We learned mostly about talking to sellers and how to handle conversations with them. This was my first seminar of Matt Atkinson's that I attended. I feel that it was definitely worth the price and if any of you here in Utah that may be curious about Matt’s seminars, I can attest for them being of great value and surly worth the occasional investment. To keep things organized I’m going to write the content taken from Matt’s seminar in bold and keep my thoughts in normal font.

When talking to sellers among your first goals should be to get them to…

1) Like you

2) Trust you

3) Want to listen to you

So many people make the mistake of automatically telling the other party what they have to say. That person has never met or heard of you before, what makes you think they are going to listen to what you have to say? You have to win them over. Imagine you are trying to hit on someone at the club. You wouldn’t walk up to them and start talking about how much you bench press or what you do for a living?

To get them to like us we need to….

Build rapport, let them talk, this will get them warming up to you and comfortable with you.

- Ask engaging and open ended questions. Ask questions that you know are going to have long & big answers. For example: what made you call our flyer today?

5 forbidden phrases:

1) “I don’t Know” The phrase “I don’t know” makes you look bad. It sub consciously suggests to the other person that you are the kind of person that doesn’t know, or doesn’t know anything. Why would someone trust you to buy their property if you didn’t know what you were doing?

1. • Alternatives: (these essentially say the same thing but with a positive connotation)
   
2. - “Gee that’s a good question.”
   
3. - “That’s a great question, let me find out.”
   
4. - “When do you need to know?”

2) “We can’t do that”

1. • Alternatives:
   
2. - “I wish I could, however this isn’t an option we have.”
   
3. - “That’s going to be difficult, there’s a 10% chance it’s possible”
   
4. - “Impossible, but here is what I CAN do for you.”

3) “You’ll have to…”

1. • Alternatives:
   
2. - “What we need to do is…”
   
3. - “To accomplish that we need to…”
   
4. -“The next step is…”

4) “Hang on a second”

1. • Alternatives:
2. - “Are you able to hold for a moment?”
3. - “I’d really like to speak with you, when can I call you back and give you the attention you deserve?”

5) The word “No” at the start of anything.

1. • Alternatives
2. - “I have not”
3. - “You know, that isn’t…
4. - change the negative “no” into a neutral or positive statement.

Matt talked about phrasing the answers to your questions in the questions themselves. All they have to do is say yes, in another words make it easy for them by only having to say one word…. “yes”. Consider this the opposite of the open ended questions.

“Customer service is MORE important than the actual product or service you provide.”

So many people don’t realize how important this is. Again, a major factor in someone making a decision to choose one person over the other is if they like them.

“Some of seller’s initial objections”

Knowing these beforehand will help you eliminate some potential challenges and result in you getting to right to business quicker.

See this example…. A lot of realtors will market the same NOD list that investors will, actually a fair amount more will, that’s why often times you will see the investor specifically note in their message to the NOD leads that they are NOT a realtor and are actually a BUYER.

Remember that a lot of sellers are going to be afraid of you (you are a ”Real Estate Investor” you’re out there to sham everybody so you can make the most money). This is why it is so important to get them comfortable.

* I have started implementing this myself by asking the seller at the beginning of negotiations what their end goal is. Yesterday when I had my phone appointment with a seller I said “Seller, why don’t you tell me what your initial intention was in deciding to sell this house, and what you are trying to gain from selling it. I’d like to write this down on my note pad so that I can keep it in mind throughout our conversation.”

I really liked what Matt said here:

“The sellers concerns define their main areas of interest and give you the feedback you need to structure your strategy.”

One thing I’ve learned in the past, especially when working as a subordinate; it matters absolutely 0% what is right, more efficient, what the best method is, or what saves the most time if it is not in the person that delegates responsibilities to you’s (or seller’s) vision or prospective, it is 100% wrong. They only want to see what they want to see, and hear what they want to hear. Surprisingly, very few people in this world have the ability to unconsciously think objectively. So it is safe to treat everyone like this. If you ever do meet someone like that, make an effort to be their friend. You will find that a friendship like that will prove to be invaluable and immeasurable to you. 

When isolating the concern:

- Never argue or fight. Instead, ask the right questions to help the seller provide an answer/solution to their concern.

1. - Pretend you are a lawyer by setting up the questions that’s answers are what you are wanting to hear.

- Use turn around statements and questions to help you clarify the concern.

1. - This is a great way to reinsure to the seller that you are a good listener. There’s nothing people want more than to be listened to.

One big thing I think I took home from this seminar that may have been learned indirectly from Matt:

Whenever …ever there is something standing in the way or any objections, concern, or challenges that the seller has, you can always just revert to asking them a question. Phrase whatever the challenge is in a question. Ask them how to overcome it. Their response will always tell you exactly what you need to know to overcome it.

A quick note Matt mentioned about retaining what we learn.

10% of it is retained by listening

30% of it is retained by writing it down

60% is retained by teaching it to someone else