The Property Unleashed Podcast

Building Profitable Relationships with Estate Agents for Property Deals

• Mark Fitzgerald • Episode 332

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Mark Fitzgerald shares expert strategies for sourcing property deals through estate agents by building relationships and communicating effectively. He explains how to overcome common obstacles when working with agents while maintaining strong professional connections.

• Understanding that agents speak a different language than property investors
• Explaining deals in basic terms agents understand
• Ensuring agents know they will get paid and aren't being cut out
• Working with independent agents versus high street franchises
• Making realistic offers with clear justifications
• Not oversharing your investment strategy or profit mechanics
• Building rapport with consistent follow-up systems
• Positioning yourself as a serious buyer rather than competition
• Breaking the ice with specific property inquiries from their website

Check out my new community "Education to Action" at educationtoaction.com where we share property strategies and provide support from experts without costing thousands. It's a membership community where you can join and leave as you please while getting access to live workshops, Q&A sessions, and coaching.


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  • My NEW Community for property investors called Property Education To Action, This is the best place to achieve your property goals and build the life you desire. https://educationtoaction.com



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Speaker 1:

How to source property deals through estate agents. Hello and welcome to the Property Unleashed with me, your host, matt Fitzgerald. Great to have you joining me here today. So today we're going to look at how you can source great deals through estate agents. Now, I've spoken about this in the past, but I'm always honing my skills. I'm always looking to better myself as well. So when I learn new things, tactics, skills, methods that are working right here, right now, I like to share it with all of you lovely, lovely people out there, and of course that yes, that means you, that's listening to this podcast right here, right now.

Speaker 1:

Now, quickly, before we get started here, if you haven't checked out my new community, which is called Education to Action, eta, property Education to Action then please do make sure that you check it out in the links below educationtoactioncom. It's a great little community where we're sharing all of the different property training strategies for you to be able to get out there and use and see which ones you really want to become the expert in. And we have a great community of experts my power team in there to help and support you every step of the way on your property journey, and it's not going to cost you thousands of pounds either. We've kept it very, very cost effective and it is actually just a little membership that you can join and come and go as you please. But come and have a little look. It's our own community. I like to think of it as a village, because in a village we help each other out, so you have your local shops, you have your local handymen and women and things, and you all support each other and that's really what we've been doing now. It's an ever-growing community that is really helping people take the education that they get, either from being in there or they get from, or they've already got, should I say, because they've already done some training and things and putting that into action. We have live workshops, q&a sessions and coaching. Anyway, go and check it out for yourself, educationtoactioncom. Have a little look, tell me what you think as well. So let's get into today's session now, shall we?

Speaker 1:

So it's dealing with and working with estate agents, and I find that this can be very hit and miss. There is no one size fits all, which I wish there was. You can't just say specifically one thing to one agent and expect that to work with all of the different agents, because we're dealing with people and of course, people are very, very different. Now some agents will understand what you're trying to do. So if you're out there trying to get rent to rent deals, some agents might come on board with that. Some might actually be fearful of that because they're not sure what it is or maybe they've just heard bad things about it.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you're sourcing deals and you are a deal sourcer getting out there as well, you need to make sure a few fundamentals when it comes to working with estate agencies. So most of the time, no matter what strategy that you are trying to do whether you're looking at lease options, rent to rent deals you're looking at sourcing deals for investors. One fundamental thing that you have to make sure you get right is that the agent themselves understand that they are going to get paid, that they are not going to be cut out of the deal. If you're trying to get creative with your property investing and you're trying to explain how you're going to structure a deal so that it helps the vendor or helps the landlord, chances are, even if you explain it really well to the agent, they still may not put it across to the actual landlord in the right manner so that it sounds plausible, so that it sounds like a deal that they want to do.

Speaker 1:

What we have to do with agents is give them the high level overview. Make sure, a we don't share too much with them, because if we do, they can go off to the vendor or the landlord or whatever, and tell them exactly what we're thinking and make themselves look good or I've come up with an idea, or they haven't, they've just stolen ours. And. B that they're going to get paid, as I said before. So how do we do that? Well, we need to talk to them in their language.

Speaker 1:

You see, most of us, when we're starting out, we have very limited vocabulary when it comes to all of these. So if you're going, oh, I'm going to do an R2R deal or a PLO, they won't understand what all of that is. A lot of them, some of them might do, some of them are educating themselves, but most aren't. Most it's just a job to them, isn't it? So you need to make sure that you keep it in very basic terms what you're trying to explain to do and how you're trying to do it. You need to keep all conversations at their level and you need to make sure that they don't look at you as a competitor Okay, somebody that's trying to take the deals away from them, somebody that's trying to take their livelihood away from them.

Speaker 1:

So we have to keep the conversations, as I say, at their level and also look at the sort of agent that they are as well, because I find that working with independent agents is a lot better than working with the big high street franchises, because fundamentally they really don't want to work with anybody else. A lot of the time they've got a big backer behind them or they are a franchise of a bigger company. But the independent people are a lot more willing or open to have those discussions, to help and work with you, because if they lose the old client here or there, it actually could really really affect their business. So most agents it's just a job. They're not further educating themselves in what they're doing like we are. I mean, even by listening to this, you're furthering your own education and of course, what you know works out there at the moment. And of course, while we're passionate about our deals, many agents aren't passionate because it's just the day to day. So we can get all giddy and say, well, we can do this, we can do that. We can help you with this. And realistically, agents are just thinking look, I just want to get paid, I want to get this property off my books and move on to the next one.

Speaker 1:

So you need to make sure that when you're working with agents or you're looking to work with agents, that you communicate with them regularly and you get to know them. As we always say here, you're building up the know, like and trust. You try and deal with the same one, the same person in that agency as much as you possibly can. So if you're speaking to somebody, do try and get their name. If you can get their name, then you can ask for them specifically next time you're calling them. You've got to build up that rapport. You've got to get to know and like them and, of course, keep things realistic.

Speaker 1:

Even if we want to do 10 property deals in the next six months, just talk about one deal at a time, because that's more plausible. People are in there to buy properties. They're not in there to buy hundreds of properties. We need to also make sure that the agents know that we're serious. We're serious about doing deals. We can act and we can act quickly, and that's what we're all about. We're not a competitor. We're actually in the area now looking to work with the best agents in the area we're speaking to. I like to say this we're speaking to you first because we see that you are one of the best, if not the best, agents in the area. So we wanted to start here, have a word with you, because we see that you've got some great deals there.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you get through that sort of process and you're looking then at doing deals and things, you need to make sure that when you're making offers through the agents, that you can talk them through the deal. So, if you're looking at doing below market value deals, then you need to be able to explain why you're offering below market value, not just because I'm going to offer 25% below market value just to see what happens If you can actually follow it up with. My offer is this, which you can see, is 25, 30% below market value, but it's because of this, this, this, this and this we need to do this. We need to do that. Then it's great.

Speaker 1:

If you're looking at doing rent to rent deals and things, I would always say look at what you can afford to pay in guaranteed rent. Then take maybe 100, 200 pounds off of that. That should be your first offer, okay, and see how things go, because it's always better to be able to move up. Once you've obviously made the offer, you can't really ever move back down unless you find something that is of a major problem. Keep a lot of what you're going to do with the properties or how you're going to actually make your money through the properties to yourself. Make sure it's all high level because, as I say, you can actually and I've seen this before People tell a landlord, or they tell an agent, exactly what they're going to do with the property. In the next breath, the price has gone up even higher because they've just realised the value of the property. And, of course, just talk through your offers and how you are going to oversee these deals as well. Give people that peace of mind that you are on hand and that you are there to help and support them.

Speaker 1:

Okay, the other thing I would say as well is don't rely on agents to follow up with you. You'll have heard me say it and I'll say it again you need to be the person that follows up with all of them and, of course, you need to make sure that you're consistent in that the money's in the follow-up is what I always like to tell myself. So make sure that you have a good system in place to remind you, set reminders on your phone, set calendar reminders all sorts of different things. I use Trello for a lot of my flow and for a lot of my leads and things, so I would make sure that and on that you can set some alarms as well, which is very, very nice but make sure that you're always following up, because, of course, whether it's an agent, whether it's a seller, whether it's a vendor, if you're in the buying process and you're a deal sourcer and you're selling deals, it needs to be you that's checking in with, potentially, the solicitors or the agents, making sure everything's on track. Don't just rely for other people to do this for you, or you will find that you lose more deals than you're actually making, because it can be very, very difficult to keep track of all of these things. So have a spreadsheet, have a sort of a planner out there. Who have you spoken to recently? And make sure that you plan to check in with people regularly.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you are just looking for deals as well, make sure that you ring these companies up on a regular basis or go in and see them, which can be even better. And you know a lot of the times if you've spoken to somebody and then two weeks later you ring them again, they might not always remember you, unless you're quite a rememberable person. I struggle with that because I have a bit of a funny accent which you probably all can hear now. So where I live, nobody sounds like me. So when I ring somebody up they're like oh, I remember you. You're the guy who sounds like a farmer. You know you've got that Somerset accent or it may liver it, and yes, I have got a bit of twang to it. So it's easy for me A to be noticed and recognised. But also, if I'm trying to ring somebody up again because my call didn't go too well, then normally they do remember me. But you might not have that problem. So make sure that you're following up regularly.

Speaker 1:

I always like to go on people's websites and have a little look at the properties that are there and use some of the property ideas there, whether or not they'll be 100% suitable or whether or not we know that they are on the market or gone. It's sometimes good to ask about those, because it's an icebreaker. So by just ringing people up, you're breaking the ice with them and, of course, then you can start to build up your rapport with those agents. So working with agents is so, so powerful. It's something that I think any successful property investor needs to make sure that they're doing, and there's some of my top tips there to just help you.

Speaker 1:

Working with investors whether you're deal sourcing, whether you're rent to renting or you're just going to go out there and buy properties and things as well it is a people's game. It is a people's business. So we need to get out there and we need to communicate with everybody. And, of course, the sooner you can do that, the sooner you'll realize that they're just people. They're just like us. They get up, they might like their job. They might not like their job, but don't overthink these things.

Speaker 1:

Just start picking up the phone, start having some conversations, expect to be turned down, expect to get no's, but you will get some yeses. You will get some that people want to work with you. And if an agent says I'll take your details and I'll call you back, don't just sit around waiting for that phone to ring. Make sure you are actively calling them back with your follow-up. So I hope this session has helped you today. If it has, then please feel free to leave us a review wherever you're listening to it, leave us any comments and, of course, reach out to me on social media if you need any help or you just want to connect. I'm always looking to connect with like-minded people. Drop us a DM, tell us that you listened to the podcast and now I'm looking to connect with you, mark, and I will gladly follow you back or connect with you. Do take care, and I'll see you in the next episode very soon. Bye for now.