Asking the right questions that start with “why” can reveal your buyers’ true motivations and keep contracts from falling apart, writes broker Annette DeCicco.
Rocks, like buyers, are easy pickings. They’re everywhere. However, what’s below the surface is often questionable, something to avoid. Without a communication strategy, heavy on “why” questions, agents face a serious risk of loss: derailed contracts.
Pre-qualifying your buyer clients before you show homes and create offers can not only save major communication issues, but it can also help keep already complex transactions from falling apart. The secret is getting behind the walls that buyers sometimes put up and getting to their essential “whys” for buying.
Here are three cluster-question strategies agents can use to find the why behind buy-and-keep transactions and keep them on track, with buyers moving swiftly toward closing.
Interview and discover
Start with a pre-qualifying interview of questions that aid decision-making. The decision to buy has less to do with features and benefits — “beds and baths” — and more to do with a buyer’s deep-seated nature. This means taking the time to read the signals your buyers are sending you.
More often than not, the decision to buy is from the gut. Don’t mistake touchy-feely responses as not serious. “I’ll know it when I see it” or “I’m just not feeling it” are signs that you have tapped into a determined buyer — the kind who digs in, seldom backs out, and is driven by something deeply internal, not by a factual “wish list.”
Buyers who factually and firmly present their “whats,” yet back out of the home that checked all the boxes, didn’t buy their why. They didn’t lie. Their agents hadn’t asked, “why.”
“Why” is powerful enough to drive behavior. More potent than “what.”
Simon Sinek, in his book Start with Why, cautions against acting on “what” we think we know and how assumptions, even valid ones based on facts, can lead us astray.
Savvy agents know this to be true. Buyers will trust their gut over the facts and features on their wish list. Their gut drives behavior and closes — not cancels — deals.
The what-why combo
Let’s go over a few scenarios that illustrate why knowing the “why” and the “what” in transactions can help paint a clear picture of your clients’ needs, so you, as a professional, can best help them reach their real estate purchase goals.
Scenario 1: The win
A buyer wants to buy a home on a golf course, her “what.” Her “why” is the gut feeling a private expanse of land represents. Determining her “why” helps the agent secure the buyer’s decision and sell the house.
The decision to buy the “what,” the home on the golf course, doesn’t occur because the agent has found the desired location. It occurs when the agent taps into the buyer’s “why,” peace and tranquility.
The home’s location on the golf course is just the permission the buyer has given herself to move ahead. But what the buyer is buying is tranquility, little or nothing to do with golf.
Scenario 2: The loss
Enter a “dissatisfier” into the transaction — a nearby, heavily trafficked, noisy clubhouse on the course. Not solidifying the “why” — peace — causes the buyer to back out in Scenario 2.
The agent was close to closing a sale with a motivated buyer, but didn’t fully grasp the buyer’s “why” or perform the due diligence required to satisfy the decision to buy. The contract is doomed. Privacy and serenity, the “why,” were not met.
Agent and buyer need to open a way to articulate literal “whats” and behavioral “whys.” The what-why questions are critical. They bring clarity. They don’t assume. They survive a multistep transaction that wishlist features alone can’t maneuver.
Question clusters to find the why
Include these three clusters of what-why questions in your buyer interview — primaries, aspirationals and non-negotiables. These question clusters will help you to find buyers who stick and are actually ready to commit to the effort it takes to become homeowners in a challenging real estate market.
The primaries: What are your main motivators for buying? And why is that?
What would be your primary reason or cause for buying a home? Sometimes it’s just a feeling? Tell me more about that.
What desired features or rooms are essential for me to know about that would affect the selection process? And why is that? This will help me suggest alternatives with a similar style or function.
What’s important to you in choosing a town? Why is that? Is it a train, a school or something else? This will help me suggest if alternative areas can match up.
The aspirationals: Let’s start by tapping into your vision of a home. What makes a home, a town, a community appealing to you (or not)? Why is that?
What caused you to buy or lease your current home? A particular feature? Or was it how it made you feel? Can you tell me a little more about that?
If you could change something about where you live now, what would that be? Why?
Just for pretend, paint me a mental picture of what your home would look like.
What is your favorite time of day to be at home? Why is that? Does it evoke a feeling or a memory, a view, lighting, warmth?” Help me feel that.
How will you know if it’s the right home with the right “fit,” features aside? Describe how it will make you feel.
What’s important to you in choosing a town or a community within a city? Tell me how important it is to be part of something. And why is that? This will help me suggest if alternative areas can match up.
The non-negotiables: What do you consider the deal-breakers and must-haves? Why is that?
What would be a big concern about the rooms or features on your list that would be a definite no-go, even if the home’s exterior checked all the boxes? Why is that?
What would be a big concern about a home’s exterior or location within a town that would knock out a sale, even if the home’s interior checked all the boxes? Why is that?
In general, how important are the must-haves on your wish list? Why is that? Given that no house is 100 percent, what percentage of your wish list would have to be fulfilled for you to see it through?
Be solutions-oriented
A successful sale is solutions-oriented. Of your concerns, which fixes could make the home closer to 100 percent ideal?
Woody Allen summed it up in his film, Annie Hall. “Why” stays the course. Even against all odds.
A guy walks into a psychiatrist’s office and says, “Doc, my brother’s crazy! He thinks he’s a chicken.” The doctor says, “Why don’t you turn him in?” The guy says, “I would, but I need the eggs.”
So, “why” do people do “what” they do? “Needing the eggs” represents a sense of inner purpose and fulfillment. It’s the reason. It’s the cause. It comes straight from the gut.
Annette DeCicco is a real estate broker and director of growth and development at Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Jordan Baris Realty in Northern New Jersey.
