The method
How I sell a home: the right buyers, then more of them
Targeted brokerage ads to the right buyers, my own Google, Facebook and Instagram ads on top, and you hear from me constantly. Here is how I sell a home.
The short version
Most agents put a house in the MLS, hold an open house, and wait to see who shows up.
I don't wait. I'm Principal Broker of Beach-Homes Realty and Lake Homes Realty, and your home is marketed under the one that fits it. A coastal home goes out through Beach-Homes Realty. A lake home goes out through Lake Homes Realty. Either way, it goes to that brokerage's targeted buyer lists and its Google Ads.
Then I add my own ads on Google, Facebook and Instagram, in addition to my social media posts, on top of what the brokerage does.
It has four parts, and the rest of this page walks through each one: Equity, Presentation, Impact and Campaign.
And you never have to wonder what's happening. When there's activity on your home, you hear from me almost every day. When it's quiet, you still hear from me at least once a week.
Maybe you're not ready to sell. Plenty of the people I work with start with one sentence: "I've wondered what my home is valued at these days." That's a fine place to start. Nobody gets pushed. You get the facts, and you decide.
I've been doing this since 2013, and I've sold 200+ homes across New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts. Trust the process. I've done this enough times to know it works.
Find out what my home is worth
Equity: price it where buyers compete for it
Every listing starts with a walkthrough. I spend three hours or more in your home. I go room by room, pull the permits and documents, and build a features sheet that lists everything a buyer will ask about.
Three hours sounds like a lot. It's the difference between knowing your house and guessing about it. A Zestimate never walked through your kitchen. It can't tell a 2019 roof from a 1998 one, and buyers can.
Then we set the price. This is the part most sellers dread, and for good reason. Overpricing is the costliest mistake in real estate. It doesn't only cost you money. It costs you the move. A home priced too high sits, buyers start asking what's wrong with it, and the eventual offer lands lower than the right price would have brought in week one.
So I don't hand you the highest number I can say to win the listing. I show you where your home actually stands against what's selling, what's sitting, and what buyers in your price range are really paying. You'll see the same data I see.
Pricing right doesn't mean pricing low, either. Most of the time it means spending a little, in the right places, before your home goes public.
During the walkthrough I make you a short list of recommendations. These are small, targeted investments: paint where a buyer will notice it, repairs an inspector would flag anyway, cleaning, landscaping, the few things that change how your home feels in the first thirty seconds. I'll tell you which ones are worth the money and which ones aren't. Most sellers are surprised how short the list is.
The reason is simple. Buyers pay for what they see. A home that looks cared for draws more showings and stronger offers than the same home listed as-is, and it gives a buyer fewer reasons to come back after the inspection asking for money off.
So you're never guessing. You get the recommendation, the reason for it, and my read on what it's likely to do for your price. Then you decide.
That's what equity means here. Your home's value is only worth something if a buyer pays it. My job is to put it where buyers compete for it.
How I sell a home: the right buyers, then more of them
Presentation: buyers decide online before they ever call
Buyers make up their minds on a phone screen, usually late at night, long before they book a showing. If the photos don't stop them, nothing else gets a chance.
So every listing I take gets the full treatment, at every price point:
- Professional photography
- Video
- Drone footage
- A 3D tour
- A floor plan
- A printed features sheet for every showing
- A yard sign, plus directional signs from the main road
Before any of that happens, the house gets ready. Staging isn't an upsell with me. It's standard on every listing. I own a lot of coastal furniture and decor, and I use it. I'll tell you plainly I'm not a professional stager. But on a coastal home, having the right pieces on hand beats a generic kit every time.
You might be thinking, "I'm not doing a bunch of renovations right before we sell." Good. Neither am I. I'm talking about the short list from your walkthrough: small investments in the few things a buyer's eye catches first, chosen because they pay you back.
For homes above $1,000,000, there's more. My Luxury Marketing Package gives your home its own property website, a Google Earth aerial flyover and a YouTube video tour. Then it goes where high-end buyers already look. Your home is featured in The Wall Street Journal, Robb Report, Unique Homes, Mansion Global, MarketWatch and Barron's.
It also goes international. The package places your home on 90+ real estate search sites around the world, including JamesEdition, LuxuryEstate, the International MLS and Juwai, China's largest overseas property site. Listings get translated for buyers in Europe, Asia, Australia, the Middle East and South America.
That matters on the Seacoast and the lakes. The buyer for an oceanfront home on Ocean Boulevard or a lakefront on Winnipesaukee is often not local. They shouldn't have to stumble across your home by luck.
None of this goes public until it's all ready. A listing gets one first week. It should be the best version of your home from the first minute.
Impact: a national brokerage behind your home, plus my own ads on top
This is where your home stops waiting to be found.
Start with who buys a home on the Seacoast or in the Lakes Region. Very often, it isn't someone local. It's someone looking for a second home, a place to retire or a move closer to family, and they're searching from another state, sometimes another country. A sign in the yard and a local office don't reach them.
That buyer is exactly who Beach-Homes Realty and Lake Homes Realty are built to find. Each is a national brand. A Seacoast home is marketed by Beach-Homes Realty and shows on Beach-Homes.com. A home on a lake or in the Lakes Region is marketed by Lake Homes Realty and shows on LakeHomes.com.
And the brokerage doesn't guess where those buyers are. At the main office, a live, real-time monitor shows the activity across our websites in every state we're in: when buyers are most active, and which parts of the country and the world they're searching from. So when we say buyers from somewhere else are looking at your area, we know where they're searching from and when they're online.
That's the business model. We feature our own sellers' homes to those buyers, digitally, at exactly the right times. Each brokerage runs Google Ads to its own targeted lists of people shopping for exactly that kind of home, and your home goes to the list that fits it.
Most brokerages don't run Google Ads like this. Beach-Homes Realty and Lake Homes Realty are built around it. And more serious buyers in the running means more competition for your home.
And I add more. For every listing, I run my own ads on Google, Facebook and Instagram. Those are real ads, in addition to my social media posts, and they run on top of everything the brokerage does. They reach people who weren't searching yet, the ones who'd buy your home if they knew it existed.
Real numbers from four of my listings.
- An $855,000 home in Dover: 77,245 views and 341 clicks.
- A $956,000 home in North Hampton: 40,756 views and 268 clicks.
- A $1,000,000 home in Newbury, Massachusetts: 18,766 views.
- A $1,770,000 home in Enfield: 12,618 views and 618 clicks.
Every one of those homes sold.
Print marketing sells the agent. Digital marketing sells the home. A postcard with my face on it tells your neighbors I'm busy. An ad in front of the right buyer's phone gets your house seen by someone who can buy it.
So when you interview agents, ask each one a simple question. How many people saw the last home you sold, and how do you know? I'll show you mine. Ask the last agent who sat at your kitchen table what theirs did.
Campaign: launch it, then keep you in the loop
I don't list a home and hope. I launch it, then I work it.
Launch week gets the most attention your home will ever get, so we time it. The moment your home goes live:
- The MLS sends it to Zillow, Realtor.com, Homes.com, Trulia and 50+ other real estate sites.
- The brokerage's Google Ads start, and so do my own ads on Google, Facebook and Instagram, along with posts across my social media.
- A flyer goes by email to every active agent within 50 miles, the ones who have ready buyers right now.
- An announcement goes to my database of 5,000 contacts.
- Your home gets its own property website with every photo, video and tour, and that link goes into every post and email.
A buyer who sees your home once on Facebook sees it again on Google the next day. That's on purpose.
After launch, you stay in the loop. When your home is busy with showings, I'm in touch almost every day: who came through, what they said, what happens next. When things slow down, you still hear from me at least once a week with an update and the latest feedback. You'll never have to ask, "Why haven't we heard anything in two weeks?"
If what buyers are saying tells us something needs to change, we change it, based on what buyers are actually doing, not on a hunch. I'm transparent, almost to a fault. If the news isn't good, you'll hear it from me first, with what I recommend next.
When the offers come in, negotiation is where your money is made or lost. Three of my four designations are in negotiation and seller representation: Real Estate Negotiation Expert, Certified Real Estate Negotiator and Seller Representative Specialist. I went and got trained in the two things that decide what you walk away with.
After you accept an offer, my transaction coordinator, Haley Paradis, tracks every deadline through inspection, appraisal and closing, and I stay in the deal until the keys change hands.
One more thing. Plenty of sellers tell me, "We should wait until summer. That's when things sell up here." Seacoast and lake homes sell after peak season too. Waiting for summer can cost you a year. If you want to know where your home stands right now, that's the conversation to start with.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I have to renovate before I sell?
No. I recommend a short list of small, targeted investments that buyers notice in the first thirty seconds, and nothing more. You'll know why each one is on the list and what it's likely to do for your price, and you decide what gets done.
How often will I hear from you once my home is listed?
Often. When there's activity on your home, I'm in touch almost daily with showings and feedback. When it's quiet, you still get an update from me at least once a week, so you never have to wonder what's happening.
Should I wait until summer to sell my Seacoast or lake home?
Not necessarily. Seacoast and lake homes sell after peak season too, and waiting for summer can cost you a full year. Let's look at what's selling near you right now before you decide.
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