Did you know that custom home builders who charge for quotes are 8 times more likely to win that job compared with competitors who don’t?
According to the Association of Professional Builders, a coaching company for custom builders, builders shouldn’t spend hours providing estimates, and they shouldn’t waste their time looking at plans unless they have qualified their prospect beforehand.
When builders do have a qualified prospect and have looked at their plans to give a ball-park estimate, then it is time to move forward in the sale — and charge for a quote. If a prospect doesn’t want to pay for a builder’s services, it simply means they either do not see value in what they are offering, or they are a price-checker who has no intention of building with that builder. So the best thing to do is disqualify the prospect and move onto someone who will value the builder’s time.
Builders should be clear with their prospects and explain that if they are going to invest their time estimating the job, the customer should be prepared to spend money getting their job professionally quoted in order for the builder to produce a fixed-price contract. Builders cannot deal with everyone that asks for a free estimate, so they should identify the hottest prospects. Because when builders follow this process, they will end up signing contracts at much higher margins.
To learn more about the sales process for qualifying prospects …
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