Should you write a seller letter?

Often a seller will ask me, “Bill, what can I do to help sell my house?” And I respond with write your potential buyer a letter. I call this task, “write a seller letter”.  In the space below, I will cover this in more detail.

Here is one quick tip to home sellers. Write a letter about what it’s like to live in your house.  Give a potential buyer of your home a glimpse into what it was like for your to live in the home for sale.  Tell a story of how that home supported your lifestyle. How did the home support you during the holidays, or a post-high school athletic contest gathering?  Get the buyer to imagine himself, or herself, living through some of those truly fun times you had in your home.

Make the sale very emotional.

Make the sale very emotional. I had a client one time write a letter, and she wrote a really nice bit about how when the kids were little, they used to finger paint on the side porch. And it just really made the house look very tangible as a place to raise their children.   This was more than answering the question of whether or not the couch will fit in the family room. This was making an emotional attachment to a vision. And a vision any parent would love to have in their life.

Another family said, “Make sure when you look out in the backyard, you’ll see the big, tall pine tree. That was our first Christmas tree when we bought the house 20 something years ago.” At one point we once put lights on it for the holiday. But it grew too tall. This helped to get the buyer to see their family starting their own traditions in this house. It makes the home unique and rare, yet very approachable. And this will make a buyer become emotional about the home. And emotional buyers have proven to pay more.

While on the topics of emotions, do not overlook my blog post about the Five Rules For Home Buyers.  In this post, I talk a lot about what happens when you get emotional about a property. And how that can be expensive for a buyer.

Tell a story

Lots of times, people will tell a story about what it was like to push the kids in the stroller down to the village for a cup of coffee.  Or how they still do that. But now, both the parent and the child are having coffee together 20 something years later. If you can make an emotional attachment, something a buyer can associate with when they’re walking through your home then they may see themselves in that same stage. And this may create the vision to have the buyer become more interested in your house.

It’s just a simple tip. It’s not expensive. Certainly, it’s a wonderful tool. And I recommend that you take a look at it.