Open Houses

When you sell your home, during the average listing appointment, the real estate sales associate will tell you that part of the marketing plan is to do a broker open house and public open houses. From a professional's point of view, the broker open house may be the more important of the two. Broker open houses introduce your property to the real estate community...all those people who will be trying to sell your home, potentially. When you have already seen a property, it is much easier to talk about it, and to know whether or not the customer you have been working with would like it. In Hoboken, because the inventory is plentiful and the parking a nightmare, a listing agent will lure her/his colleagues to his open house with food from Margherita's or homemade cheese cake, or sushi! But that exposure is important and worthwhile. Sometimes, for condos that Realtors suspect are "typical", as in railroad style or non-descript 1980s construction, it may be hard for your listing agent to drag agents in. But overall, it is a worthwhile endeavor, especially for more unique or renovated properties.

Public open houses are, unfortunately, rarely productive. I have sold properties from an open house, but it rarely occurs. The statistic often quoted is that 98% of properties for sale do NOT sell through an open house. The initial open house makes sense to introduce the property to the public. Active buyers are watching what is coming on, as are their agents, so the first open house is the best. Sometimes, another open house, after a significant price change, also makes sense. But repeated weekly open houses, touted by some agencies as necessary and what they will "do" for you, are largely a waste of time for a single unit and may arguably make you look "desperate". In fact, many agencies do lots of public open houses primarily for agency exposure, and so that new agents can meet and potentially pick up buyers. The exception to the rule is public open houses for a developer's project of a new building or a recently renovated and condo-ed building. A building with multiple units available is another matter.