Want to know a powerful device to sell your home? The right word.
Too often, sellers and their agents use lackluster language in their ads, real estate experts say.
”If people think an ad is clever and catchy, they`ll read it and call on the home. They get tired of reading the same old ads,” stresses Elaine Northrup, who sells real estate for Coldwell Banker.
Create a visual image of your property-even if that means taking poetic license, advises Richard Merrill, a senior executive with the Prudential realty chain. Why advertise that you have a ”wooded lot” when you could say you have ”star-reaching pines”? he asks.
”Use words that are not redundant or hackneyed,” says Karl Breckenridge, author of the book ”Staying on Top in Real Estate,” published by Dearborn Financial Press.
You`ll get a lot more attention by titling your house ad ”The Lady in Red” than by calling it a ”Lovely Red Brick Ranch,” for instance, says Northrup, a former English teacher. Use the titles and words from songs, books, films, fairy tales or other cultural staples to write an imaginative ad, she recommends.
Turn a typical colonial home located near water into ”the swan on the lake” and you`ll generate more interest than if you call it ”a beautiful lakeside home,” Northrup says. This is especially true if you carry the swan metaphors through the ad, she says.
”I find that the more I exaggerate and the further out I go, the more comments I get on my ads and the more people like and remember them,”
Northrup says. By drawing a picture and using hyperbole, you create an element of humor that generates interest, she believes.
Having an appealing ad is more important than ever, given the glut of properties for sale in many neighborhoods. It`s a different world than that of the 1980s, when houses were in such demand that several buyers might bid simultaneously and a contract might be written urgently on the hood of a car. ”In a marketplace where there are 10 houses for every buyer, advertising is particularly important,” Northrup says.
Real estate specialists offer these pointers on wording for house ads:
– Tell little rather than a lot in your ad.
A good ad uses economy of language to tempt a buyer to learn more, says Merrill, the Prudential executive.
”The purpose of an ad is to generate a call. You have to give enough information to stimulate the call, but not so much that the buyer will eliminate the house and not call on it,” he says.
One big waste of words is to offer specifics on a home`s location.
”There`s hardly a place in the United States you can`t identify geographically in a couple of words,” says Breckenridge, the author.
Anyway, if you give the prospect specific directions to your home, you`re tempting him to drive by without making an appointment. All too often, a home is dismissed by a prospect before he sees the interior, Breckenridge says.
– Key on special features, buyer motivation or location when marketing a ho-hum house.
Is your home that forgettable tan, aluminum-sided townhouse with an ordinary three bedrooms? Then it`s especially important your ad be carefully written.
You could emphasize special features, such as an open foyer, skylights or cathedral ceiling. You could emphasize the setting by saying the home is a five-minute drive from downtown.
– Steer clear of words that imply seller distress.
Losing your job, your wife or your health may be forcing you to sell at a cut-rate price. But phrases such as ”desperate seller” or ”foreclosure pending” have been so overused in advertising as to have virtually lost their meaning.
