[...] born out of necessity. Steve shared his disdain for the archaic ritual this morning at our home blog, and being in the same philosophical camp, I felt compelled to add my [...]

I catch grief as well because I don’t make the sales meetings. Sorry, I’m working.

I do go on the tours at least twice a month because

1. I enjoy it and it keeps me in touch with the regular housing market.

2. I enjoy driving the newer agents around and answering their questions.

I commented on Kris’ post on this over at Bloodhound.
Tours are a throwback to old days when there was a Century 21 office next to a grocery store in every shopping center.
Tours are right in there with print ads and open houses when it comes to effective real estate marketing.

>“Didn’t see you at the pitch session this morning. I guess you’re really not interested in selling this home.”

The pitch session is another example of what agents do to appear as if they’re working. It’s the same reason they hold open houses for others’ listings, and hope for ad calls that lead to easy sales — they are deathly afraid of the real work that produces results for them and their clients. Meanwhile, you and Kris are doing more business by Valentine’s then they’ll do all year.

>Agents had no way of knowing about new listings each week until the next monthly MLS book came out, that is, until the weekly Pitch Session was born.

I’m outing myself as the dinasaur I am, but we DID know about new listings before the next book came out. The board delivered several pages of stapled sheets of paper showing the new listings, pendings, solds, etc. 2-3 times weekly.

Geez, I feel like Grandpa telling me how he rode his horse to the little red schoolhouse.

Jeff ~
You ARE a dinosaur, man!
Sorry I must make this so short, but I have a busy day today ~ floor time @ noon, then deliver personalized scratch pads, then have to send out my ghost-written newsletters with recipes
Almost forgot that I need to order more refrigerator magnets too!

I am going to hedge on this one – I agree and disagree. While I agree that the idea of sales meetings and tours can often become misguided by vendor sessions not focused on how the particular business can help the agents but instead help the vendor, I have found the idea of sales meetings and tours to be a good one. Here’s why …

I’ve sold several houses that I saw on tour, either because I saw them before they went on the market and knew I had a buyer for them, or because I had seen them on tour and could provide an accurate description of the home. The buyer was well-informed before seeing it and was able to make a strong decision. This would not have happened if I had not previewed it first. As agents, we can’t preview every house as it hits the market, no matter how small your market is. Tours are still a good way to see four, five, even ten houses in a morning (if they’re well-planned out) and that goes a long way to establishing yourself as an expert. Sure, there are plenty of times when I see properties I know it’s unlikely I’ll find a buyer for, but when that opportunity arises I DO want to make sure I’m ready.

You learn best by being being there, so get on-site and prepare. But good food for thought!

Thanks for all of the comments. Point of clarification, though. I’m not referring to in-house sales meetings, which may actually be valuable assuming a good sales manager. And I strongly agree with the value of the caravan to actually visit new homes on the market. This is extremely valuable, since pictures tend to show only the best features (i.e., not showing the adjacent 200′ high transmission tower and wires). Where I take exception is the vendor sponsored pitch session inviting agents from all companies to attend, just so the listing agent may tell you pretty much what you already know or have seen in the MLS. That is just not good time management.

I take exception and offense to those agents who criticize me for not wanting to subject myself to the obviously self-serving vendor onslaught of these meetings. If I were a new agent wanting/needing to familiarize myself with these services and to network with other agents, fine. But that’s just not where I am at this point in my career. And, for the record, it has no bearing on the sale or marketability of the listed home. If I want a social event, I have many other preferred options.

Hi guys! Reporting from the field: 90 degrees and thunderstorms – Gotta love Houston!

Jeremy, We do see all of the homes on broker caravan. I think we are saying the same thing. The broker open house itself remains invaluable; the coffee and donut kick-off is antiquated. In our case, the “pitch” involves an agent standing in front of a picture (from the MLS) and the home and saying something poignant like “This house has 5 bedrooms and new paint. Please come see it”.

The punch line is that the agents who attend the pre-tour “pitch” go see all of the open homes, whether pitched or not, as do the many, many others who have forgone the pitch to (gasp) make better use of their time.

I will give you this – The one time I recently pitched a new listing prior to the Broker Open House, we did get a stronger turnout. Unfortunately, the stronger turnout consisted entirely of lenders, title reps and escrow officers stopping by to thank me for coming and telling me how they hoped they could earn my business. Somehow, I don’t think this extra “traffic” did anything to improve our seller’s chances of a sale.