The Letter That Sold a Miami Beach Condo

by Lois K. Geller // Illustration by Lance Jackson

Two years ago, I began trying to sell my parents' Miami Beach, Fla. condo. The property truly was on the beach – down the elevator, around the pool, and ta da, you're standing in sand. The real estate market was already soft and getting softer. The apartment, a large one bedroom overlooking the ocean, would have sold in a heartbeat a year earlier. At that time, I had difficulty even finding a broker.

There were hundreds of units on the market – there still are, for that matter – but I finally found a broker who told me she might sell it in a few months. We staged the place, painted and cleaned until it glowed and ... nothing. We lowered the price (several times) and still ... nothing. I asked my broker if we could try a direct mail program; she said she'd do a postcard. I wanted to tell her to save her money. She mailed it and ... nothing. After our agreement expired, we parted ways and I found a new broker. She tried another postcard mailing, again results-free, and I suggested she call neighbors in the building to see if we could drum up some leads. She told me, firmly, that it would be a waste of time.

A year and a half dragged by with nary an offer, even though I'd dropped my asking price to half of what the apartment was worth. By then my book, Sold!: Direct Marketing for the Real Estate Pro, had come out and was selling nicely. Broker number two said I needed another price cut. †I thought I needed to say goodbye and practice what I preach. I launched a non-postcard, direct mail campaign targeted to the people who already lived in the building. Why not? I've used direct mail to sell cars, vacations, insurance, credit cards, association memberships, books, Olympic coins, and stamps from the Isle of Guernsey. I started by getting the names and apartment numbers of owners in the building. I had the list, one of the two crucial elements in direct mail success. Now I needed the second element, an offer.

In the realm of real estate, the offer comes from buyers, and it is generally what they are willing to pay for a particular property. In the direct marketing world, the offer is something in addition to the basic proposition – what Louisianans call a lagniappe. It's really a kind of double tipping point: the compelling what's-in-it-for-me reason that will make someone pay attention to your mailing, and the little push that gets them to respond immediately, not some time down the road.

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