Many of 2021’s buyers started their homebuying process with an online search for homes for sale, according to a new report by the National Association of Realtors that collated data from a number of national-level NAR surveys.
Forty-three percent of buyers took that step and only 18 percent reached out to a real estate agent first, according to NAR’s 2021 Home Buyers & Sellers Generational Trends Report. The report says half of all buyers found the home they purchased on the internet, while 28 percent said their real estate agent found it and only 7 percent found it via a yard sign or an open house sign.
The report also showed having a website optimized for mobile viewing was important: 76 percent of all buyers used a mobile phone or a tablet, with 70 percent of older Millennials using the devices and half of Gen X and younger Baby Boomers using them, as well, instead of a desktop or laptop computer. When it came to website content, younger Boomers and all of those younger place the highest value on photos, while older Boomers and the Silent Generation valued detailed info about properties for sale the most. Nearly all buyers saw value in floor plans and virtual tours, though. Only 53 percent of buyers used open houses this year, with Gen X buyers and older Millennials using them the most often.
When it came to lead generation, over half – 52 percent – of Realtors said social media was their top source of quality leads, while 31 percent named customer relationship management software, 28 percent named an MLS site, 21 percent named email marketing, 21 percent named listing aggregator sites like Zillow, 19 percent named digital ad campaigns and only 16 percent named their personal blog or business website.
With all this focus on digital communication, the largest share of agents – 19 percent – said they wished their brokerage offered cybersecurity tools. For their part, 41 percent of brokers said that keeping up with technology was their firm’s biggest challenge over the next two years, while 51 percent ID’d maintaining inventory in their market, 49 percent named housing affordability and 47 percent said they were worried about competition from “nontraditional market participants.
