How to write a (good) open house follow-up email

The problem: with open house follow-up emails most of them suck.

The reason? They all sound the same.

Purchasing a house is one of the biggest financial decisions anyone will make in their lifetime, and if you're a real estate professional who’s following up with someone who's about to make this decision, even the smallest detail—like a follow-up email—is crucial.

By figuring out how interested the client was in the house and how open they are to the prospect of actually buying that property, you and other real estate business employees can really make your mark with your follow-up emails (here are a few general tips) after the open house.

In this post, we'll look at:

• why you should send follow-up emails after a open house,
• three examples of follow-up emails that'll cover most post-open house scenarios, and
• how to create time-saving follow-up email templates

Let's start with the benefits of sending a follow-up after a successful open house.

Following an open house, a kickass follow-up email is the next step in showing your client that you mean business as a real estate professional, and care about them getting the perfect property.

But to nail the landing, you need to be thinking about your follow-ups and email templates even while the open house is taking place.

When you make conversation with prospects at the open house, you're really collecting information that’ll allow you to really personalize your follow-up emails, especially if you’re a real estate agent. The effort shows them how much you genuinely want them to get the keys to the house they are hunting for.

And not only in the initial follow up email either… the key is to consistently follow up with the client to show them that even if the home they viewed isn’t their dream property, you’ll work with them to find it.

Let’s go through the three types of emails you should think about sending out after your open house, and how every person that walks through the door can be suited to at least one of them.

Take special note of these prospects. These are the most important open house follow-up emails you’ll send.

They’re the ones who are not only in the market to buy, but also made it very clear they want your open house property.

Try and customize this email as much as you can, and don’t be afraid to sell yourself either. After all, these folks are looking to buy—and they need someone to help them do just that.

Here’s an example of an email you could use as an email template and send to a prospect who showed a genuine interest in your open house.

These are the type of prospects who are seriously hunting for a house—just not the property they viewed at your open house.

Don’t let this dampen your drive to close a sale though, this just means they could be open to buying another of your properties in your portfolio.

The focus of your follow-up email should then be to earn the prospect’s trust. Become the person they want to help them secure their ideal property.

Here’s an example of an email you could send to a prospect who showed a genuine interest in buying a property.

Last but not least, the open house window shopper. Every open house has them, but even though as a realtor you might think these people are just here for a wander-around with no intention to buy… you shouldn’t write these prospects off just yet.

These window shoppers could actually be people who could be looking to purchase a property in the future—or better yet, current homeowners who are looking to sell.

Both of these situations can open up opportunities for you, so treat them as any other open house prospect and send them a follow-up email that’ll keep you top of mind when they’re looking to either buy or sell.

A prospect who doesn’t seem interested in your real estate business could still be worth the effort, so here’s an example of an email you could send them to keep them interested.

Now that you have a few ideas for getting started on writing open house follow-up emails, here are a few things you must include.

Custom details—the template was only a starting point

Remember, the main aim of your follow-up email from your open house is to keep your potential client talking to you.

To do this, make sure you let them know that you remember them by customizing it as much as possible.

Anything from where you met the potential client, to what property they were viewing, or specifics like a certain aspect they mentioned they would love to have in their new property would be ideal to include here.

The assurance that you can meet their needs

Competition in the real estate industry is fierce. But you already knew that.

You need to be able to hit home to your potential prospect that not only can you meet their needs, but there's also something that sets you apart as a real estate agent—something (ideally) no one else has.

Use a paragraph to explain some past achievements, or any particular part or your salesmanship that you can hang your hat on.

Are you able to sell properties particularly fast? Do you have a knack of always being able to get more for a property than the client expects? Pick something that will set you apart and use it.

A clear call to action

In the real estate game, you are the chaser. You need to work for your potential client and make it as easy as possible for them to get on board. This means giving them an extremely clear call to action from the very first follow-up email you send after your open house.

Tell them that you’re available and can work around their schedule. That you’ll be in their neighborhood at a certain time. That you want to chat with them face to face about what they need out of the market. And that all they have to do is reply yes.

Make it simple—real estate is already stressful enough for them. Taking some of that pressure away from them will only work in your favor.

An offer for a private viewing

Notice how we’ve been pushing you to customize your emails? There’s a reason for that.

If you make your potential client feel like you don’t have 10 other clients (even though you do) and you’re only working for them (even though you aren’t), you’ll gain their trust and loyalty quicker than if they feel like just another client.

Here’s where you can really sweeten the deal by offering to take them on a private viewing of the property. This will have two advantages.

Firstly, it will make them feel like rock stars that they are getting into the property when there’s nobody else there. Secondly, they can truly visualize what it would feel like if they were living there, unlike an open house environment where there are a lot of other people in the room.

Make sure you offer to work around their schedule on this one. Being flexible will show them that you truly care about them loving the property.

If you want to really go above and beyond, you can try writing your open house follow-up email by hand and posting it by mail. Yep, using the old-fashioned pen and paper can win you more brownie points than you realize.

But, why would you do this when it’s quicker and easier to just fire out a bunch of emails?

Well, remember those potential clients who absolutely loved your open house? They’ve probably been to a few other open houses other than yours, and every single realtor will be sending out a follow-up email too.

Make yours stand out by going the extra mile and add a more personal touch.

Which one would you pay more attention to?

Now that you know how not only to prepare for your open house follow-ups, but also what emails to send, it’s important to track your leads in order to maximize your chances of turning them into buyers and sellers.

A CRM can help you keep track of all the prospects you spoke to at your open house—add notes to each person's profile to help you distinguish which category (interested in the house, interested in a house, or a window shopper) the potential client fell into.

For example, you can see this information in Copper along with all past activities you've had with a lead including meetings, conversations, and events like open houses:

To help you keep in touch with leads for open house follow-up emails, Copper also alerts you or your team to follow up with potential clients—for example, with new property listings.

Another time (and energy)-saver in Copper is that it can auto-populate information for your contacts. Meaning if you've collected email addresses at an open house and added them to Copper, it can automatically fill in other contact details for that person by searching the internet:

See how Reali, a real estate startup, uses a CRM to stay on top of its pipeline and clients:

People are receiving emails after every open house about every new listing and hot upcoming neighborhood.

It’s crucial to get customizing when it comes to sending out your follow-ups after your initial open house. You need to make yourself stand out by remembering key points of the conversations you had during the open house and using those personal facts to make an impact on your potential client.

By being able to quickly recognize if your open house attendee has just stumbled upon their perfect home and having their contact details organized in a CRM or database, you can use that information to send out killer emails that'll get your clients talking.