An agent who had the nerve to cold-call a rich developer in his first week on the job has been rewarded 16 years later with Brisbane’s best auction result of the week.
First National Cleveland sales manager Ryan McCann sold a five-bedroom Cleveland penthouse for $2.8 million on behalf of the owner of Rosewood Homes – 16 years after first making contact.
“He was in the BRW rich list a few years back and, as a rookie, I approached his business […] and I asked him if I could do some open homes,” he told REB.
“I was one week on the job, so I had no listings, no clientele, and no portfolio. I asked him if I could do some open homes on spec homes. He told me they didn't have any roofs on them, so I told him honestly that I didn't have any clients."
“He told me he liked my enthusiasm, so I did some open homes on his properties and actually sold the blocks with the house and land packages for him," he continued.
“He said to me, ‘If you've got that much tenacity to do an open home with no roof on it and you can actually sell house and land packages for me, we've got to do business’.”
The two parties have done business together during the 16 years since, according to Mr McCann.
Mr McCann said the vendor agreed to a $25,000 marketing campaign, with print playing a prominent role.
“We had a $9,500 campaign to start with and the seller told us to go back and sharpen our pencils since he wanted to do it bigger than Ben-Hur, so we came back with half-page ads in the Courier-Mail,” he said.
Mr McCann said he also advertised in the local paper, because that is something that captures the attention of Cleveland residents – including the person who turned out to be the buyer.
“He saw our double-page spread in the local paper and then went online so he could scroll through the photos, but we actually got his attention through the local paper,” he said.
[LinkedIn: What’s the best advice you received when starting out?]