Expired listings can be a profitable real estate niche to target. If you search your local MLS database, often you’ll find that 30-50% of homes expire and many of these sellers are anxious to re-list their homes with new agents.

Selling a home can be an emotionally draining experience for sellers. They often need to get a certain price to pay off their mortgage, put a down payment on a new home, and pay off any improvements they’ve done to the home. Because of this huge financial burden, sellers are often reluctant to reduce their price, though that is often the reason why their home didn’t sell in the first place – especially in a down economy.

Unfortunately, it is often the real estate agent who is blamed when the home doesn’t sell, so depending on the seller’s financial situation, he may choose to immediately re-list the home with a new agent. If you can adequately address his current concerns and frustrations through your marketing materials, while providing sound advice for making his home more sellable, you can tap into this profitable real estate niche.

One of the best ways to reach expired listings is to put together an expired listing guide that explains common mistakes and pitfalls sellers make when trying to sell their home and offers tips for promoting their home more effectively if they do decide to re-list. Here is a sample outline of what your guide might include:

• Common problems that led to the home not selling – If you’ve talked with a number of sellers, you’ve probably heard a few of them vent about why their home didn’t sell. Your guide should address these from the seller’s perspective, paraphrasing their words. The better you can get inside the minds of your prospects and look at the problem from their point of view, the easier it is to connect with them and build rapport. They want to work with someone who understands their frustrations.
• Reasons why they should re-list their home – Be understanding of the fact that if a home didn’t sell the first time, sellers will be skeptical that another agent can offer a better solution. Your guide should address reasons why if they re-list with you, they will get different results.
• A questionnaire or checklist – Put together a questionnaire or checklist that analyzes each aspect of the home selling process so the seller can analyze why their home didn’t sell. Your questionnaire should include questions on how the home was prepared, priced and marketed, as well as specific tasks the agent should have done during the process (like how often they kept in touch, what the commission arrangement was, the number of showings, etc).
• Tips for how to stage their home if they re-list – Include tips and advice for how to make each room more presentable, what to look for during the inspection, how to emphasize the home’s best attributes, and how to stage the outside of the home. You can also include a list of local contractors you recommend for minor home repairs.
• Tips for pricing the home if they re-list – Explain the criteria for getting top dollar for their home vs making a fast sale. Offer a list of local appraisers and give tips for getting an official appraisal.
• Tips for promoting the home if they re-list – Include your detailed step-by-step marketing plan for how you’d market the home, including listing in the MLS, on national real estate websites, as a single property home website, open houses and showings, any marketing materials such as brochures and flyers you create, if you hire a real estate photographer, publications where you will place ads, and so forth. Make sure to include samples of the ads and marketing materials you use, so sellers can compare how you would sell their home to what their previous agent did.
• Case studies and testimonials – Frustrated sellers will want proof that you can sell their home if they re-list with you, so include a few testimonials or case studies of expired listing clients for whom you successfully sold their home. Explain their reasons for why the home didn’t sell the first time (preferably in their words), what you did differently to sell their home, and the results.

A good expired listings kit should get sellers thinking about why their home didn’t sell in the first place (which is the purpose of the questionnaire), ways they can get their home in top shape if they do decide to re-list, how you would market their home differently so that it will sell if they list with you, and proof that you’ve gotten results for happy clients.

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