A financial qualification alone does not assure you of a good client.  Just because they can afford to buy or sell a home doesn’t mean they will.

Let’s take a look at what it means to truly qualify your clients.  Top producers consistently verify qualifications to ensure that they are making the most of their time in the field.

You are an entrepreneur and you only get paid when you sell a property.  When you consider the time that you spend showing properties to people who don’t buy and marketing properties that don’t sell, then you might have wasted time that you could have used for finding and working with people who will buy and sell.

Qualification is important.  There are three simple aspects we must measure.

Financial

We all know the financial qualification; they teach us this one at real estate school.

Motivational

Most of us know the motivational qualification.  “I’d buy a house if all the stars aligned at just the right moment”, versus, “My wife and I, and our four kids, are living in my friends basement after a transfer from another city.”

The final one seems a little less known and therefore a little more dangerous for the aspiring real estate professional.

Reasonableness

Are these potential clients showing you what I call the reasonableness qualification? We’ve all heard the unreasonable ones:

“I will sell my home if I get x.”, when x is more like a telephone number than market value.

“I’ll buy that really sought after mid-block renovated gem; if it comes up and I can buy it for less than it’s worth.”

“I’d like to see 50 homes before I make a decision.”

“I need to look at homes every Sunday night at 6 pm.”

“I will list my home, but you can show it only on Mondays between 10:00-11:00 am.”

The non-verbal message: “I might buy and sell with you, but I will make your life miserable during the process.”

This is just the tip of the iceberg.  Do you have a great unreasonable client story?  Send it along – I promise to keep it anonymous.

It’s important to measure each of the qualification areas before deciding if you will accept a client.  To measure this we need to get excellent at asking the right questions, truly hearing the answers, trusting our intuition and having the courage to say no and walk away from a potential commission.

I’ve watched hundreds of agents chase after unqualified leads in lieu of building their business.

The outcome is never pretty.