First, show them how the law of supply and demand dictates that rents will continue to rise. In some communities it is already cheaper to pay a mortgage payment than a rent payment. If foreclosures continue, so this trend should also continue.

Get the numbers for your own community and show them the comparisons.
Then talk about the fact that mortgage payments build equity for you while rent payments build equity for the landlord.

But here’s what’s really important:

As long as you don’t plan to move, it doesn’t matter if your home increases or decreases in value over the next couple of years. If you want pride of ownership, love the home, and can comfortably afford the payment, that’s what matters.

Next, when you own your home you don’t have to answer to a landlord. You can paint the walls, change the light fixtures, and drive nails to hang pictures. You can even move a wall if you really want to.

On top of that, when you own your home and have a fixed rate mortgage you don’t have to worry about the monthly cost going up or being evicted because your landlord failed to make payments (or wants his kids to move in, or sells to someone who wants to live there themselves.)

Of course there are tax advantages. I found a website that shows how much tax you pay after deductions – and it can be eye opening.

For instance, for the year 2011, a married couple filing jointly will pay $22,372 on an after deductions income of $100,000. Pretend for a minute that they have $16,000 in deductible interest and no other itemized deductions. After eliminating the standard deduction of $11,400, they’d still have an additional $4,600 in deductions for income tax purposes. Their tax bill would drop to $16,100. That savings of $6,272 comes to $522 per month that could go toward a house payment, savings, vacations, or whatever else they liked.

And of course, if they have other itemized deductions, such as employee business expense or medical bills that would normally be swallowed into the standard deduction, their savings will be even higher. And this doesn’t consider state taxes – if you have those, they might save there as well.

Check out that website I found, and use it to show your fence sitting buyers how much they’ll save.

http://www.moneychimp.com/features/tax_brackets.htm

What if they said:
“Scientific discovery reveals the secret to hypnotizing buyers into choosing your home – and paying top dollar!”

But then… someone commented with an idea that’s part hype and part good sense.

Read the post and the comment, then tell us what YOU think.

It’s all about THEM.

Stick with the tried and true rule of using “You” at least 3 times as often as you use “I.”

Next, make your message a “gift.” Give them an uplifting poem or a beautiful photo. You could even include a fun holiday puzzle or a link to a heartwarming holiday story.

If you want your holiday message to help make your phone ring, and if you’ve purchased some kind of give-away, offer to send it when they call and request it.

I used to buy both wall calendars and pocket calendars – and folks would come to the office to get them. So – a “Stop by for Christmas cookies and your 2012 calendar” would be good if you have a bricks and mortar office.

You could even thank your past clients for their business and tell them that because of their support, you’ve just made a donation to a worthy cause.

Just remember to make the message your own. Nobody is much interested in receiving a card that says “Happy Holidays” and comes with a pre-printed signature.

Who buys a house in December? A buyer who needs to find a new home.

And that’s good news for those agents who choose to keep working in the month when many other real estate agents will be goofing off because “There’s nothing going on.”

It isn’t the greatest news for the buyers, unless you want to say that having fewer homes to view makes it easier to choose one.

It’s GREAT news for sellers for the same reason. They have far less competition, and the buyers who come through are serious – they’re not just wasting everyone’s time because they have nothing better to do on a Sunday afternoon.

Before you decide that it’s OK to goof off this month, think about that.

And then, think about the fact that if you do take time off now, you’ll be virtually starting over in January – with no pending sales.

So, take time to do some Christmas and/or Hanukkah things, but don’t completely ignore your real estate business in December.

Here’s some help…

To help you convince those skeptical sellers, get a set of my Holiday Listing Letters… You’ll find them at Copy by Marte.

It might be filled with all kinds of useful advice and tools for your visitors. And you might think that’s enough to make them love you and use your services. But it’s not.

They may feel gratitude for the information and tools you offer, but that won’t make them choose your services.

For that you need 2 more things:

• Reasons why you are going to serve their needs better than anyone else.
• A call to action. Yes, you need to say “Call me.”

This will be the subject of my real estate ezine this week. If you’d like to be sure to get a copy, come over to www.copybymarte.com and request your free first time buyer letter. Then you’ll be on the list to receive the ezine.

They found some big differences between agents who earned $100,000 or more per year and those who earn $35,000 or less.

One of those differences is contact management. Rich agents stay in touch with past, present, and future clients.

Another difference is in what they spend on technology and marketing / prospecting. On average, rich agents spend more in a month than poor agents spend in a year.

Rich agents also hire help. They get someone else to take care of social marketing and other activities that don’t involve being face-to-face with clients.

And… they blog. In fact, the most successful agents blog on more than one platform. Why? For the contacts of course, and for the added content on their websites, but also for the search engine optimization gained from all those links back to their websites.

Want to read the full report? You’ll find it on Active Rain.

And it isn’t easy.

You can spend thousands of dollars on the wrong thing and get no results at all – which is pretty scary, especially in the current economy.

But here’s the good news: You don’t have to spend thousands of dollars to get results.

In fact, some of the most effective things you can do are free – or nearly free.

And that’s why I created my new website: PromoteMyRealestateCareer.com.

You’ll find it filled with marketing ideas that are effective – but won’t break the bank. You’ll also find free letters and free tools you can use.

So come on over and get acquainted. And if you have suggestions for more additions to that site, leave your comments right here.

The first step is to pass the “glance test” and to create a friendly feeling in the minds of your readers.

First pay attention to the “from” line: Make it clear that the message is from you. Use your name and/or your agency name, not just some address at gmail or yahoo.

Then consider the subject line: Make it interesting, but true, and make it relevant to your message.

Consider your own reactions. When the subject line is clearly an attention getter to make you look at the message…and has nothing to do with the message… doesn’t it make you cranky? It does me!

Take a little information out of your message and turn it into a hook to draw your reader in. If you’re telling about a new listing, say so. The people who are looking for a home will read it, but the ones who are hoping for an offer on their short sale probably won’t. That’s OK, because they’re not your target audience.

If you have interesting news about a political or social development, don’t say “news.” Say something specific like “HR 345 passed! Here’s how it affects you.” You have about 40 spaces, so use them!

Every day my mail… and probably yours… is filled with e-mail from people who are trying to trick us into reading their messages. I get mad. That means that even if I wanted what they offered I’d ignore them.

Now pass the second “glance test.”

What about the look of the copy? How many times have you started to read an e-mail message and stopped because it was too much work?

A long block of copy might work in a book or a magazine article, but on the screen it’s difficult to keep your eyes on the right line when there are too many lines.

Copywriters call it a “gray wall” and it is a wall. It’s a wall between you and your intended readers, because many people simply won’t bother to try.

The answer is to use short paragraphs with blank lines between them. Break it up, make it easy to scan, and use bullets and sub-heads to draw your readers to the most important points. If you want your message read and understood, present it in bite size pieces.

The bottom line is that you need to do everything possible to create trust in your reader, and to make it easy for him or her to read and comprehend your message.

One of the easiest ways to accomplish that is to put yourself in the reader’s place… If you got that e-mail would you read it or delete it? If you’re not sure, ask a friend to read it before you send it.

They’ll probably remember to hand out a business card when they meet someone new, but getting a marketing piece written and sent to their sphere of influence or their client leads gets put off from day to day. Pretty soon they realize that it’s been months since they’ve gotten in touch with those important people.

One reason for that is that most real estate agents tend to start all over from scratch with each prospecting effort.

And, when you’re tired from a long day of dealing with a variety of people and situations, sitting down to write a letter can be just “too much.”

But you don’t need to fall into that trap, because there’s a simple cure.

Use the non-busy time to set up autoresponders and pre-load those autoresponders with messages. Then set those messages to go out at the intervals or on the dates you choose.

Your prospecting will then be happening even when you’re too busy to think about it.

You can create one autoresponder list to mail to your past clients and sphere of influence – so that you’ll maintain top of mind awareness with them and they’ll remember to send you referrals. This list should hear from you at regular intervals – the same day each month or the same week each quarter.

Then place “capture forms” on your website – one for buyers and one for sellers. If you’re ambitious, you can even create different forms and thus different lists for different kinds of buyers and sellers.

You may already have something set up to let buyers tell you what they’re looking for in a house. If so, you can simply begin drip marketing to those buyers. But remember that not all buyers will fill out your search forms.

So offer them a special report, then follow that up with other useful information every few days.

What kind of report? That depends upon who you are targeting on your web pages. If you want first time buyers, send them a report that helps them decide if now is the time for them to buy. Follow that up with a checklist and other information that’s useful in helping them decide what they really want and need in that first home.

Save more time buy choosing one or both of my sets for buyers who visit your web page.

If you’re targeting relocating buyers, send them some good information about the community. Then follow up with letters that outline the superior service they’ll get with you as their buyer’s agent.

For sellers:

Your website might also offer sellers an on-line market analysis. Why not follow that up with an offer to do a no-obligation analysis based on seeing the home? Then follow that up with promotional letters outlining the steps sellers need to take before listing a home, an overview of the current market, and promotion about how you market your listings.

As long as you keep sending useful information, those buyers and sellers will welcome your emails. And – the useful information will position you in their minds as an agent who “knows your stuff.”

I find that embarrassment strange.

Some of those same agents have no trouble hiring a professional photographer to help them show their listings in the best light. They have no problem with hiring a stager, either. But when it comes to writing, they think they SHOULD be able to do it themselves.

What agents need to remember is that unless they’ve studied the psychology of marketing, doing it themselves might not be such a good idea.

And unless they have plenty of time to devote to writing, they probably will do a mediocre job.

The truth is, good copy takes time, study, and plenty of thought. And after that it takes proofreading. Depending upon the subject matter, one simple sales letter or postcard could hours to write.

I know – I said that once in a post and someone wrote back “Ridiculous. I’ve got a background as a journalist and I can whip out a good article in a half hour.” Well… maybe that’s why we readers have to keep going back over so many newspaper articles to figure out what they’re talking about.

But the second part of that equation is that news articles aren’t written to persuade. (Well, they’re not supposed to be written to persuade.) They’re supposed to be reporting the facts.

Marketing copy is a completely different animal.

So if you don’t want to write your marketing copy, don’t be embarrassed. If you know you need a writer but somehow think you shouldn’t, re-think that.

Find a writer whose work you like, and delegate that marketing copy, because writing probably isn’t the highest and best use of your time.

Then let your writer work while you do the jobs you do best – such as listing and selling homes, staying in touch with people, negotiating contract details, solving those goofy problems that crop up, and tending to all the details involved in a closing. And blogging, of course. That’s the writing you “should” be doing!

The same applies if you’re a stager, mortgage lender, appraiser, inspector, etc.

Quit feeling guilty because you’re not a professional copywriter, web designer, auto mechanic, hairdresser, plumber, electrician, accountant, dentist, or dog obedience trainer. You can’t be everyone, so delegate those other tasks and concentrate on being the best at what you do.

And don’t limit delegation to writing. Think about all the other things you do that keep you from doing what you do best, then delegate the busy work.