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Anyone who has read some of my past comments about "open houses" will know that I am really not a big fan of doing them.
You see....in my past experiences with them I find most of the time they are a total waste of time and I think I actually sold one home from them in over 11 yrs in the business. I would rather not do them but as part of my marketing I always offer it but do not think it is where most of the exposure will come from. Open houses usually draw people who have no idea how much the property is or what the configuration of the home is until the walk in the door. That is a totally different subject. But when you have listings to sell sometimes you need to change up and use anything to your advantage to find a buyer.
My dilemma is as follows...I have this listing Moderator cut: advertising and it is a very nice home and I have spent lots of time marketing it but I would like to try to run an open house there but my problem is that in this particular community the city has rules about posting signs and they do not allow Realtor signs in front of the house. The association does not allow them and even if I were to put some signs out on the main road outside the community...code enforcement will remove them and sometimes even fine you. After all that I not only lose the sign..I lose the money I spent on the sign as well and the homeowner is not happy. This very common in other cities that I work in as well. The city of Weston only allows signs on main streets on Sundays only. If code enforcement see's them at any other time they will remove them and fine the company or agent. Unless the rules have changed then we will continue to have more obstacles on our way.
Regardless of what my philosophies are about running them.. I still wonder why cities and communities such as this would want to impede on the possible sale of someones property. I know...some communities think they are an eyesore but what is the sense in using it as part of our marketing of properties especially in todays market when we need to use possible means to expose the sellers property. Like I said before...I am more than willing to do them but is it worth my time and the homeowners time if we can't get any cooperation?
I would love to hear other opinions on this.
Last edited by Trainwreck20; 08-09-2007 at 02:24 PM..
I've been a broker for 25 years and I still pull up agent signs left in our neighborhood by unattentive agents. They want the listings, they want the money, they just don't want the responsibility of keeping their signs picked up after caravans and open houses with wilted balloons hanging from them.
Have you checked with the municipality - we have the "no signs" rule in my area also. However, Open House signs can be placed on the day of the open house for a few hours. For Sale signs can only be placed on the owner's property. In communities where "for sale signs" can not be placed in front of the property, we have window signs which are place in the home owners front window.
We have the same thing where we are...no open house or directional signs allowed. So...what we do is place an ad with the address and directions. We also send out post cards, post it on the internet with the same information.
My husband and I have been going to open houses and we check the newspaper to find out where they are. I would think an ad in a popular newspaper + as suggested above some balloons in the front of the house would suffice.
We had this problem so I parked a car with a sign on it at the subdivision entrance and one by my house. It did tick off the developer who had new houses for sale but the HOA can't control what is on a car that is legally parked.
JIMJ, I did the same thing for an open house.
We ended up forming a committee with our board and went to the council to amend the ordinance on signs. There is some case law on free speech that may apply in your situation. You need to also get residents involved and show then how this will help them when they go to sell. Does your community ban election signs? If so those laws are being overturned left and right in Ohio.
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