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Westchester Spotlight

Debra Priestly Exhibit: Gallery I

The Hidden Gem Of The Real Estate Market ? Military Families

As a business professional, you realize the importance of thinking beyond the traditional and finding target markets that will enable you to enhance your business. As a real estate agent, you realize the importance of serving the community while enhancing your advertising in ways that attract the specific niche market within your local area. Finding the perfect balance between these two goals often seems like a daunting process. We can help you ensure that you are meeting the needs of home seekers while enhancing your own business practices and advertising in a very successful manner.



Next, we move onto targeting a specific demographic. Many agents will form relationships with large employers in their area who are frequently relocating employees. Forming a successful relationship with a hospital, large corporation or even a university can prove an effective means of gaining successful leads. However, if you work in an area where military personnel purchase homes you are fortunate to have access to one of the largest and often most under-addressed demographic in the real estate business!



Earnings & Housing Budgets



Military families earn approximately 18% higher than the average American family! With an average income of around $80,000 per year, this demographic group consisting of around 1.4 million people in the United States provides an opportunity to increase your customer base while increasing your sales volume.



Familiarize yourself also with lending programs that specifically target military personnel. Often, there are housing assistance programs (other than VA) offered by lenders that allow lower up-front costs and fees for these families due to a continual lending relationship. Because of their BAH (basic allowance for housing) many can afford home ownership, but can?t necessarily afford all the closing costs.



Frequent Relocations ? Continuous Opportunities!



Military personnel generally move between locations every three years, and many of these personnel come with families who purchase a home at each new installation. Also, with nearly one-third of the entire military relocating each year the market for new home sales constantly replenishes.



Because of the close relationship among military families, forming a good relationship with a few families in their home buying process could offer you countless good referrals to other relocating families. They have no choice; they need to find housing options on a regular basis. Thus, you can see how the opportunity to develop and constantly expand a large renewable customer base is right at your fingertips!



Advertising



Let?s focus for a moment on advertising opportunities. Advertising can be an expensive luxury that new agents specifically cannot afford to take lightly. However, the successful agent will look for opportunities to advertise services (and his or her name!) for FREE! Yes, FREE! Often there are neighborhood newsletters, websites or even bulletin boards where service providers within the community can advertise at no cost. Also, a good way to get your name out into the community as a reputable agent is to offer free seminars on home buying, mortgage options, etc. as mentioned above.



There are several opportunities for serving the military community while generating advertising. One way in which to generate advertising within the military community is to offer free seminars about the option to sell a home ?For Sale by Owner.? Because the homeowners are frequently moving, they would often prefer to save the agent commissions and to broker their sales alone. This may not seem like a profitable situation, however providing assistance in FSBO sales could net you 1-2% of the sale for simply providing advice and guidance on the process.



A second and often overlooked method of FREE advertising is to contact the on-base housing office in your area in order to provide then with your contact information. Many times, the office publishes a packet of housing information for those relocating to the installation in which they might include your information as a source for locating off-base housing.



A third option is to provide a discount to military families who are relocating to your area, in the form of an appreciation program. There are restrictions on the amount of a discount on agent?s fees in some areas. It is important to investigate this prior to committing to such a program. These discounts might include, in addition to agent fee reductions, home inspection discounts, coordination with utility companies, etc. in order to ease the transition for the new family.



It is especially important to realize the process that a military family will engage in prior to their relocation. Because there is often a limited timeframe for the relocation, they will generally begin searching in advance for homes near their new installation. With almost all military families having access to the internet, (92.8% according to Department of Defense statistics ? 2003) it is crucial to have a great online presence!



We recommend that your form relationships with local businesses in order to establish as many reciprocal links from area businesses as possible. This allows you to have more links to your site, as well as to show your connection with and knowledge about the military community. On your website, it is helpful to provide information about the area schools as well as transportation and entertainment venues.



There are other possible advertising opportunities not mentioned here. Just take some time to look around your community and find out what other business owners are doing that is working for them. Some carefully spent time and consideration will afford you the ability to extend your advertising at a lower cost.



Because the military housing market is a constantly renewable resource for real estate agents fortunate to be working in a community with installations nearby, and because this demographic is often overlooked by most in the real estate profession, it truly is the hidden gem of real estate. By simply taking some time to familiarize yourself with the needs and resources of the typical military family, you could expand your customer base and income potential exponentially. It is important, if you decide to target this demographic group, to form excellent relationships with your clients because you never know when they will be coming back to your area! Take advantage of the free and low cost advertising methods listed above in order to reach these families, and enjoy the camaraderie that evolves from becoming a part of the military community.

About the Author: Michelle McClory is a contributing writer for http://off-basehousing.com, a site owned and operated by a military family with 16 years of active duty service 8 assignments who knows the frustration of moving across the country. Read more articles of interest at: http://www.Off-basehousing.com.

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