Agent referrals or straight at buyers. I can only afford one.

Question

I'm close enough to being licensed that I'm working out where the phone calls come from, and every person I ask gives me the opposite answer with total confidence.

Agent referrals: an agent who trusts you sends thirty jobs a year without you spending a dollar on marketing. Three or four relationships and the calendar fills. The thing everyone warns me about is what happens the first time a report kills a deal, and whether you start pulling punches without noticing to keep the referral coming. I don't want to find out I've been doing that.

Direct to buyer: nobody's happiness depends on what my report says, and the buyer who found me on their own is my client in a way that feels cleaner. But it costs money to be findable, the leads come one at a time, and by the time most buyers are looking for an inspector their agent has already handed them three names.

Quick definition since I had to look it up, a referral here just means the agent gives the buyer your name, the buyer pays you, and the agent gets nothing. No money changes hands. That's the version I'd be doing.

I have maybe $3,000 to spend in the first year and roughly two evenings a week. Coffee with agents and sitting in on office meetings, or a website and search spend and reviews. Which one would you put it in.

karen_whitfield · Answer

Agents, and it isn't close on cost per job. The pressure you're describing is real but it's manageable if you decide in advance what you will never soften. The inspectors I've used over twenty years who lasted all had agents sending them work and reputations for writing hard reports, which is not a contradiction. The agents who last want a buyer who doesn't sue anybody in year two.

tonyv88 · Answer

Third door you skipped. Property managers and small landlords. We call inspectors on turns, on acquisitions, on the annual walk, and none of it depends on a deal closing so none of it puts pressure on your report. It's less volume than a busy agent but it repeats every year with the same client. Two evenings a week of coffee with managers would go further than a website.

jordan_ellis2 · Answer

As the buyer in this situation, I took the first name my agent gave me because I had eight days and no idea how to compare inspectors. That's how it actually happens.

mitchell_ray4 · Answer

Pike just made the case, Halyard. Buyers aren't shopping, they're accepting a name inside a deadline. The $3,000 on search spend is buying you a tiny slice of people who behave differently than most people behave.

nataliehsu · Answer

The independence worry deserves more than a plan to be strong about it. It doesn't show up as an agent asking you to change something. It shows up as you choosing softer words on a marginal item because you know whose deal it is. If you go the agent route I'd write your own severity language down now, before anyone's counting on you, and grade against the sheet instead of the situation.

angela_burke · Answer

Both, in order. Agents first because that's where the volume is and you need reps and cash flow in year one. Then use the money agent work generates to build the direct channel, because agent relationships walk when someone changes brokerages or retires and you don't want your whole calendar sitting on four phone numbers.

On your $3,000, most of the agent work costs time instead of money, so what I'd actually spend on is report software good enough that agents want to forward it, and the E&O and general liability coverage. Get the coverage terms in writing and check what your state requires before you take a paid job, since licensing and insurance minimums differ state to state. Trellis's manager channel is the one I'd add in year two.

Agent referrals or straight at buyers. I can only afford one.

6 replies