What is the value of running an open house?  Depending on who you speak to, you’ll hear everything from totally useless to absolutely necessary.  The truth may lie somewhere in between.  There was a time in our industry when open houses were an absolute “must do”.  We held them week after week, month after month in an attempt to generate traffic and find a buyer.  They took a lot of time and it was a big inconvenience to homeowners.  But that was before the age of the internet, color pictures, floor plans and virtual tours.  Now, buyers can virtually walk through hundreds of homes in a matter of hours while sitting in front of their computers.  The process of eliminating homes from consideration is much more easily done from the comfort of your home or office.  Also, Buyer agency was not prevalent in the 1980’s in our market so attending open houses was a way for buyers to find a broker to work with.  Today, buyers are hiring a buyer’s broker to represent them earlier in the process and their agent will be taking qualified buyers to the home whether there is an open house or not.

 

Are open houses necessary?  No, but they are convenient for buyers who are new to the market and want to see as many homes as possible in a very short period of time.  But is that good for the seller?  Well, in some ways, yes.  You can have a week’s worth of showings in an hour or two.  But what are the qualifications of those visitors to an open house?  Are they running into and out of the home without really appreciating what it has to offer?  How qualified are they to purchase a home?  Did they just see the open house sign while they were driving by and decided they had nothing to do so they might as well stop in?  And how do you help a qualified buyer during an open house if you are engaged in a conversation with another visitor?  Do you have an opportunity to properly serve a visitor and spend the time they need to get all their questions answered?

 

So, when and how often, should a home be held open?  Although there is no hard and fast rule, here is what I recommend to the sellers I represent.  When a home first comes on the market, there is a lot of activity and buzz surrounding it.  It’s new to the market and the buyers who are actively looking for a home in this price range will want to see it.  For convenience alone it would be a good idea to have an open house within the first 2 weekends of it first coming on the market.  These are also the best buyers for a home.  They are actively on the market searching for a home and they are up to date on value.  If it is priced correctly, it may sell quickly.  But make no mistake here.  If there was no open house, the qualified buyers will still make arrangements see the home with the assistance of their broker.

 

So in the end, running an open house is a matter of preference and convenience for the owner, not a necessity in selling the home.