Five essential tips for selling the property to overseas buyers
Property overseas: Understand your buyers and localize your approach
It’s essential to understand your buyers, from the kind of properties that they’re looking for to the way they like to make decisions. Sales and Marketing Director at Spanish homebuilder Taylor Wimpey España, comments:
“It’s really important to understand both the similarities and the differences between buyers from different countries. Understanding what makes a certain group of buyers tick can help you to ensure that the properties you present to them are the ones that best meet their needs. German second home buyers, for example, tend to favour homes on Mallorca over those on the Spanish mainland, while Belgians prefer the Costa del Sol, and Russians often opt for the Costa Blanca.
“British buyers, on the other hand, are drawn towards multiple locations, buying in the Costa del Sol and Mallorca, as well as on the Costa Blanca. Building awareness of these kinds of preferences into your business planning process and marketing activities can help you to engage more effectively with overseas buyers.”
Research the countries you plan to sell to, not just the languages
People move overseas for all manner of reasons. As of 2020, there are 272 million international migrants, many of whom have purchased homes in the countries to which they’ve moved. Then there’s the vast international second home market.
If you plan to target a particular country with your properties, do your homework. Say you plan to use English to French translation services to target property buyers in France. That’s great, but have you also looked at how the French economy is performing, the country’s political situation, what reputation your country has in France, and whether your tourist board advertises there? The better informed you are, the more you will be able to predict your chances of success in a specific country.
Translate your spoken communications, as well as your written ones
Our final tip is to use interpretation services or multilingual customer support (or both) when selling the property to overseas buyers. For both sales and aftercare, multilingual services can make buyers feel comfortable and help you to boost your brand’s reputation. Providing translation services that span both written and verbal communications means that your buyers can communicate with you in whatever format they need, giving them the confidence to buy, no matter what their mother tongue may be.