Guide
Real estate lead generation: 4 ways to get leads without buying them
Updated
Bought leads are strangers you race other agents to call, and they stop the day you stop paying. These four ways bring you people who already know you.
In short
- You can generate real estate leads without buying any, using your contact list, a farm area, your Google profile and open houses.
- Bought leads are often sold to several agents at once, so every call starts as a cold call.
- Your contact list and open houses pay off in weeks. A farm area takes years, so run them together.
- Each of these costs hours instead of money, and none of them stops the day you stop spending, the way a bought lead does.
- Ways to get leads: your list, a farm area, Google, open houses
- 4
- Spent on leads anywhere in this plan
- $0
- When to send every open-house visitor something useful
- Same evening
- Open houses, which fill a pipeline on their own
- 1 a week
What you get when you buy leads
A bought lead is a stranger who asked a portal a question. They did not ask for you.
- Every call opens as an interruption from an agent they have never heard of.
- The same lead is often sold to several agents, so whoever calls first usually wins.
- You pay either a monthly fee for a share of one zip code or a cut of your commission when a lead closes, whether or not anyone answers the phone.
- The portal keeps the audience you paid to reach, so none of that attention ends up attached to your name.
- The day you stop paying, your pipeline is empty again.
Bought leads next to the four ways below
| Bought leads | The four ways below | |
|---|---|---|
| What you spend | Money, every month | Mostly hours |
| Who makes contact | You call a stranger | They contact you |
| How fast | This week | Weeks for open houses, years for a farm area |
| When you stop | The leads stop | It keeps working |
: What you spend
- Bought leads
- Money, every month
- The four ways below
- Mostly hours
: Who makes contact
- Bought leads
- You call a stranger
- The four ways below
- They contact you
: How fast
- Bought leads
- This week
- The four ways below
- Weeks for open houses, years for a farm area
: When you stop
- Bought leads
- The leads stop
- The four ways below
- It keeps working
1. Work the people who already know you
The people who already know you are your best source of business. They trust you, but they forget what you do for a living.
- Put your phone contacts, past clients and anyone who knows your job into one list.
- Write down who each person is and when you last spoke to them.
- Contact everyone once a quarter, and contact the 50 people most likely to move or refer once a month.
- Ask for the referral in plain words, by asking who they know who is thinking about a move this year.
- A referral arrives already trusting you, which is the whole difference from a bought lead.
This is the whole editor
Highlight a phrase and a clip lands on those exact words. No timeline, no keyframes, no layers.
2. Farm one neighborhood
Pick one neighborhood you can commit to for years and become the person who knows its numbers.
- Send what listed, what sold, the price and how long it took.
- Use mail and a short email, and show up at the school fair and the yard-sale day.
- Owners want these numbers and rarely get them in plain language.
- When an owner decides to sell, your name is already attached to the street.
- Expect it to take years. Only a handful of homes in one area sell each year, which is why few agents stay with it.
3. Be easy to find on Google
People look you up at two moments: after someone recommends you, and when they search their own problem.
- Claim your Google Business Profile as an agent, fill in every field and add photos of you working.
- Ask for a review at every closing, while the keys are still in hand. A specific review beats a glowing one.
- Put up one page of your own that says who you help, which area you cover, how a sale works and what you charge.
- Answer real questions in local groups without pitching. The recommendations come weeks later.
4. Host open houses, including other agents'
An open house is where buyers who have not chosen an agent walk in and start talking to you.
- You do not need your own listing. Most agents are glad to hand a colleague a Saturday.
- Ask every visitor what they are really looking for, and write it down.
- Send each visitor three comparable homes or an honest note on the price the same evening.
- One open house a week, followed up properly, is a pipeline on its own.
One Saturday, run as a lead event
The open house is ordinary. The follow-up that same evening is what turns it into leads.
Book or borrow the open house
Another agent's listing counts
Greet people and learn names
Talk to people instead of pointing at the sign-in sheet
Ask what each visitor wants
This house rarely fits. The next one might.
Send something useful that evening
Comparable homes or a note on price
Add them to your contact list
With your notes attached
Where video fits
Every one of these works better once people have seen your face and heard you talk.
- Film a 60-second answer to a real client question once a week, on your phone.
- Post it, send it after calls and put it in the email you send your farm area.
- The free way is your phone and the captions built into Instagram, TikTok or YouTube.
- Cutroom turns one clip of you talking, up to 3 minutes, into a captioned 9:16 MP4 in about a minute.
What a weekly video costs
| Option | Cost |
|---|---|
| Your phone and the app's own captions | Free |
| A Cutroom edit | 100 credits |
| Export | 20 credits per minute of finished video |
| A 30-second video, all in | About 110 credits |
| Your first video | Free within 7 days, no card, with a Cutroom mark across the middle |
| Lite | $19.99 a month for 1,250 credits, about 11 of those videos, no mark |
Option: Your phone and the app's own captions
- Cost
- Free
Option: A Cutroom edit
- Cost
- 100 credits
Option: Export
- Cost
- 20 credits per minute of finished video
Option: A 30-second video, all in
- Cost
- About 110 credits
Option: Your first video
- Cost
- Free within 7 days, no card, with a Cutroom mark across the middle
Option: Lite
- Cost
- $19.99 a month for 1,250 credits, about 11 of those videos, no mark
Questions people ask
- How do new agents get leads without buying them?
- Start with other agents' open houses, because they give you real conversations this weekend. Then tell everyone you know personally what you do now, and answer local questions in public. All three cost hours, not money.
- How long does a farm area take to produce listings?
- Years. Only a handful of homes in one neighborhood sell each year, and the listing goes to whoever is still sending useful numbers when an owner decides. Your contact list and open houses pay in weeks, so run them alongside.
- Are bought leads ever the right call?
- Sometimes, as a short-term filler with a written follow-up plan. Not as a foundation: the portal keeps the audience, every call starts cold, and the pipeline empties the month you stop paying.
- How big does my contact list need to be?
- Regular contact matters more than size. 200 names you contact every quarter beat 2,000 names you never contact. Start with the 50 people most likely to move or refer someone, and contact them monthly.
- Do I have to make videos for this to work?
- No. Every one of these works without a camera. Video just makes people remember you faster. If you will never be on camera, an avatar can present instead: that needs Cutroom's Basic plan at $39.99 a month and costs 350 credits a minute.
Work your list, farm one area, be easy to find and run the Saturdays. Your first video is free.