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Why Would a Seller Choose Not To Go on MLS?

Posted in: Real Estate Insights|By: David Faudman|

road with arrowThese days, your savvy sellers will expect you to do something special beyond just going on the MLS. Often they are are simply not prepared to go on the MLS right now. In some cases, they prefer to skip the MLS altogether.

Reasons a seller prefers to market his home off MLS

  • Avoid unnecessary showings. It’s a hassle for them every time their house is shown. Sellers would rather show their home to 10 realistic, motivated and qualified buyers than to 100 looky-loos.
  • Keep the process professional. Most sellers prefer a discreet transaction conducted among true pros instead of a public free-for-all.
  • Market a house that does not show well. Often the seller is not prepared to prep their home to show as well as they should. In this case, the home should only be shown to motivated and well-represented buyers with vision.
  • Test a price. Pricing is as much an art as a science. Sometimes it makes sense to try out a price without damaging the property’s future marketability.
  • Adapt to special circumstances. If your sellers have special privacy, health or closing needs, they need very controlled exposure to a highly targeted market.

Homes sell best when you zero-in on truly motivated and qualified buyers. Doing so quickly and efficiently brings your seller the highest price with the greatest ease.

Does a home for sale really need to be exposed to everybody?

  • Mass marketing works well for standardized products. But most homes are one-of-a-kind, luxury items, not commodities. If mass marketing luxury items was most effective for sellers, Christie’s would put high-end art on eBay.

10% of agents do 75-90% of sales

  • 10% of the real estate agents sell 90% of the properties. By reaching these top 10% agents, you’ll reach the most qualified, realistic and motivated buyers in the area.

Reaching the most professional agents with the most motivated, realistic and qualified buyers often results in a higher price and smoother sale for the seller.

  • This is great. Can you make it as a page we can download and print in color to add to our listing appointments?

    Thank you,

    Andrea

    • Andrea, Thank you. We will be improving many features of TAN including the marketing materials. For now, the easiest thing for you to do is either save or print the blog piece to PDF. Then you can easily share with clients.

  • Hi David, You do present some good reasons for not putting a property in MLS and exposing it widely, but it seems to me that the principal and most important task of any listing agent is to expose the property to the widest possible spectrum of buyers. Limited exposure, whether as a pocket listing or in TAN, means that there will be potential buyers who will never know, much less see the property. Isn’t this like holding an auction but only telling a few people? You use Christie’s as an example, saying that they wouldn’t put high end art on e-Bay. True, but Christie’s (and Sotheby’s & Bonhams & Skinners) make their money and reputation by holding public auctions of very high end art. True that they sometimes broker private dealers, but most knowledgeable sellers of expensive art insist on highly publicized and advertised auctions. For a good reason: higher prices. Particularly true in a real estate market like now, where we often don’t know what the selling price will be. Why miss a chance to more widely expose a property in a hot market? Inconvenience to the sellers? Sometimes, but convenience often comes at a big cost to the sellers. If you had a nice house, would you want your agent to only expose it to a few potential buyers? I think not. That said, I love TAN. Ciao, Ian

    • Ian, Thank you for the thoughtful comments and kind words. In any given TAN chapter, members typically sell 75% to 90% of the homes in the area. And these agents represent some of the most motivated and qualified buyers. So, by posting a pre-MLS or non-MLS listing on TAN, the property is effectively exposed to 75% to 90% of the real buyers. That said, as the blog points out, while posting a listing off-MLS is right for many sellers, it is not the best way for every seller.

  • This would be a great piece to add to a listing presentation…

    • Mary, Thank you. The easiest thing for you to do is either save or print the blog piece to PDF. Then you can easily share with clients.

  • Joe

    Hi David I’m a seller bit confused. So can I use these agents for selling my house without listing on MLS? I called few of them they had never done any Pocket listing.

  • Joe

    Also why can’t I send a message directly to these so called verified Realtors directly from your site? Why do have to google them one by one and then contact them? Such a waste of time.

  • Joe, Thank you for the questions. Top Agent Network is a private, members-only network for verified top 10% producing real estate agents. As a seller, you need to be represented by a member in order to have your property marketed off-MLS to other member agents in the network.

    Recently we had problems with people spamming members using the “contact agent” links. Hence, we temporarily removed those links until we fix the issue.

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