Let’s face it, buying real estate leads has kind of a PR problem in real estate. Many will tell you that buying leads is akin to cheating, or throwing your money in the fire. Of course what they don’t tell you is that a lead is a lead is a lead. If you can close them, why would it matter where they came from? Whatever side of the debate you’re on, knowing where and how to buy real estate leads in 2018 is crucial intel.
Here are 4 of the best places to buy real estate leads for 2018:
| Lead Source | ||
|---|---|---|
| BoldLeads | $299+$250 ad budget per month | Fair pricing for exclusive leads, tech, and training |
| Zillow | Varies by zip code: $5—$50 per lead | The primary source for leads |
| Market Leader | Varies by zip code: $20—$60 per lead | Pay per exclusive lead, not per impression |
| REDX | Starting at $29 per month | Most affordable leads |
BoldLeads: Various Plans
Founded in 2013 by a top producing real estate agent and her son, BoldLeads has quickly become one of the most well respected places to buy exclusive real estate leads online. They offer all inclusive, turnkey lead generation plans, but they actually take it a step further and offer a full featured CRM, pre written drip emails and texts and more. Even better, since BoldLeads is still a family owned company, customer service is top notch.
How It Works
BoldLeads works very similarly to most companies offering leads online in 2018. They advertise constantly on sites like Google, Facebook, and other social media platforms and entice buyers and sellers to click over to a landing page where they fill in their contact information in exchange for information, or a free home valuation. You’ve probably seen ads like this on Google: “HOW MUCH IS YOUR HOME WORTH?”
While none of this is very revolutionary, BoldLeads steps out ahead of the competition for three key reasons; exclusivity, training, and technology. Here’s a quick overview:
Lead Exclusivity
One of the biggest complaints I hear from new agents is that the leads they’re calling have been passed around to every agent in their farm area and they respond accordingly. They tell them they’re sick of calls from desperate agents and hang up. If you’re getting leads that are also sent out to 20 other agents, your odds of closing them goes down dramatically.
To help reduce this problem, BoldLeads offers agents, teams, and brokerages lead exclusivity. That means that for seller leads, only one agent will get all the leads from a single zip code. Having an exclusive lead improves your chances of closing dramatically.
For buyer leads, BoldLeads also offers lead exclusivity, but they might open up say, a larger city or town to multiple agents. This makes perfect sense as even the best brokers in the business would likely be overwhelmed with ALL the leads from a an entire city.
Training
As I said above and will repeat a million times in my articles, a lead is generally only as good as the person working them. Hand a brand new agent and the top producer in your office a list of 25 leads and the greenhorn will be lucky to keep anyone on the phone for more than a minute while the top producer will have lined up 4 CMA appointments. This is why training is so crucial to success.
BoldLeads offers a ton of training videos as well as weekly webinars that ensure that everyone will not only understand how to get the most from their tech, but how to nurture and close leads effectively as well.
Technology
Another thing I really like about BoldLeads is that unlike some places you buy leads from (who shall remain nameless) you’re not just getting a list of names and phone numbers in a spreadsheet. BoldLeads has a killer CRM, automated text messaging, available Cloud CMA account, and pre written drip campaigns for nurturing cold leads via email. BoldLeads is also one of the only platforms I know that allows you to have the landing pages (they have 40 to choose from) on your own personal website.
Even better, they actually pull a lead’s social media profiles, and offer partial leads, for example people that only put in their address and left the page. These leads are perfect for postcard campaigns!
They also offer platforms for teams and brokerages that add even more tech goodies like round robin lead assignment and more.
Average cost per lead
Around $6-$20 per lead
This is a tricky one as the number of leads you get from any program can and will fluctuate seasonally, by zip code, due to market conditions or a million other reasons. However, BoldLeads claims that their customers get a minimum of 20-25 leads per month, while some areas will get 60 or more leads per month.
Average cost per month
Starting at $299 + $250 ad budget per month
BoldLeads has very straightforward (and reasonable) pricing. They charge a flat fee of $299 per month to create and manage your advertising, then charge $250 per month as your ad budget. If you’re unfamiliar with online advertising, your ad budget is the amount of money they pay to Google, Facebook, or other social media sites every month. The sites charge advertisers either per click, or per impression. The bigger your ad budget, the more leads you get.
It’s important to note that BoldLeads offers separate programs for buyer leads and seller leads, each priced at $299+$250 ad spend. However, if you sign up for both buyer and seller leads, they cut the base price to $589. Broker plans are $899 + ad budget.
They also have a $200 onboarding fee if you sign up for a six month contract, but waive the fee for a one year contract.
Contract required?
Yes. Six months to one year
Limited availability by zip code?
Yes
Online Reviews
BoldLeads has great online reviews averaging 4 and a half stars out of five.
Zillow: Premier Agent & Premier Agent Direct
What more can I say about Zillow? They’re the Google of real estate and will likely remain so for the foreseeable future. They own and operate Zillow.com, trulia.com, streeteasy.com, and the recently opened realestate.com. The odds of any American interested in either buying or selling a home ending up on a Zillow site at some point of their search is nearly 100%. By advertising on Zillow you’re essentially cutting out the middleman.
How It Works
Zillow has been tweaking and updating their advertising plans for Realtors and brokerages over the past few years. Today, they have a whole suite of options to buy leads that will work for pretty much any Realtor or brokerage. Here are the two most popular:
Zillow Premier Agent
Zillow Premier Agent is Zillow’s flagship advertising option and one that huge numbers of Realtors have taken advantage of recently. Premier Agent allows Realtors, teams, and brokerages, to put their contact information in the sidebar of an individual listing page. When a buyer lead wants more information about a home, they contact one of the agents in the sidebar.
Zillow Premier Agent Direct
Zillow Premier Agent Direct is a newer advertising option that lets Realtors, teams, and brokerages buy seller leads that Zillow generates in partnership with Facebook.
Average cost per lead
Around $2—$75 per lead
Unlike BoldLeads, Zillow prices their plans by impressions rather than how many leads you get. As you might imagine, a lead looking for a $5 million mansion in Beverly Hills is going to cost a lot more than a lead looking for a mobile home in Florida.
Average cost per month
$250—$5000 per month
$1000 per month+ for Premier Agent Direct
Like the price per lead, an average cost per month can be tricky to nail down with Zillow as their costs fluctuate by zip code, market conditions, and more. Generally speaking though, most agents pay anywhere from $250 per month for leads in very affordable areas, to $5000 per month and more for leads in high end neighborhoods.
Contract required?
Zillow traditionally has one year contracts, but they have recently been rolling out a program that let’s agents bid on impressions in an auction that does not require a contract. This pricing model is not yet offered in all zip codes, so check with Zillow to see if they offer it in yours.
Limited availability by zip code?
While Zillow does say they limit the number of agents working in each zip code, there is no guarantee that a lead you get may not have clicked on another property on Zillow with another Premier Agent in the sidebar.
Online Reviews
Here’s where things get tricky… Since Zillow dwarfs any other source to buy leads by a factor of at least a thousand, many, many people are not happy with the way that Zillow operates. In fact, there is an organized group of agents that are essentially boycotting Zillow because they think Zillow is trying to replace Realtors entirely.
That said, the fact that some Realtors are upset at Zillow dominance does not mean that ignoring the world’s largest real estate site is a good idea. I would argue the opposite actually. Since Zillow is so dominant, the odds of your lead going to Zillow first is very, very high. That means a Zillow Premier Agent may have already pitched a lead you buy from another source.
If you want to learn more about how ZIllow works, check out our in-depth guide to Zillow Premier Agent. Or just give them a call and ask them.
Market Leader: Various Plans
Founded in 1999, Market Leader is one of the oldest and most well respected places to buy leads online today. Market Leader serves more than 250,000 agents in the US and Canada with their CRM and exclusive buyer and seller leads.
How it works
Market Leader sells exclusive leads, which means they only sell one lead, to one agent. In order to generate leads, they use a variety of online advertising techniques, but mostly rely on housevalues.com, a home valuation website that people who want to sell their homes rely on to get an automated home valuation and to request a more thorough home valuation from an agent like you.
They also offer an integrated CRM design center and more.
Average cost per lead
Because pricing can vary by zip code and market conditions, you need to call Market Leader for pricing. That said, since a huge number of agents buy their leads, it’s safe to assume they aren’t priced out of reach for the average agent. One great thing about Market Leader is that they charge per lead, not per impression or a flat monthly fee.
Average cost per month
Because pricing can vary by zip code and market conditions, you need to call Market Leader for exact pricing in your zip code. Leads can range between $20 and $60 per lead.
Contract required?
Call Market Leader for details.
Limited availability by zip code?
While Market Leader does allow multiple Realtors to operate in the same zip code, they never sell the same lead to two different agents. That means every lead you get from Market Leader is yours and yours only. While no company can promise these leads have not been contacted before from other sites like ZIllow, it’s still reassuring to know you will be the only Market Leader agent contacting them.
Online Reviews
Like Zillow, Market Leader doesn’t really have very impressive online reviews. Part of the reason for this is that they have been around almost 20 years, and like ZIllow, are a HUGE company. Agents that have a good or even great experience buying leads from Market Leader may not be willing to leave reviews at all because they want to keep it to themselves!
REDX
Utah-based REDX offers Realtors, teams and brokerages leads. Unlike the other platforms to buy leads we looked at above, you’re not paying for advertising. You just buy leads. That’s it. While that may not sound as exciting, you will be excited when you learn that REDX is order of magnitude less expensive than any other lead source. If you want to step into the ring and finally master cold calling, these are the leads for you!
Keeping in line with the cold caller mentality, REDX also offers cold calling software called Storm Dialer, and a prospecting platform/CRM called Vortex.
How it works
REDX pulls data from tons of local sources like like MLS records, public records and proprietary sources to give agents expired listing leads, FSBO leads, FRBO leads, and even foreclosure and pre foreclosure leads.
Average cost per lead
Less than $2 per lead
Average cost per month
Starting at $29 per month
Like I said, REDX is very affordable compared to other places to buy leads. Their pricing does change a bit for different lead types and whether or not you want their Storm Dialer or Vortex programs though.
Contract required?
No but discounts offered for prepaying
Limited availability by zip code?
No
Online Reviews
No data
Bottom Line
Buying real estate leads can be an excellent way to fill your pipeline and close more deals. Before you sign up to buy leads, make sure you know the costs, what exactly is offered, and how many other agents are being sold the same lead.
Natalie
We have not had much success with online leads but my husband and I are doing well with bold leads. In five months we have listed 3 homes and are working with 2 of the sellers on the buy side as well. We have so many nurtures too. I have a listing appt for a high end home on Friday so I am happy about that too.
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Michael Hamilton
Hi Natalie is it necessary to buy the advertising with bold leads for $299 a month?
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Angela Lacey
My experience with Bold Leads wasn’t good at all. I signed up for the seller leads NOT buyer leads and from the get go it was a cluster. CS didn’t respond back when I realized I wasn’t getting the right leads and finally I had to cancel since it was almost impossible to reach my first point of contact, the sales guy. And it cost me over $500+ per month. They let me out of the 6 month contract but it was a cluster from the get go. There was one customer service lady who helped me the most but getting someone on the phone was a problem to say the least. Think long and hard about signing up for Bold Leads.
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Hi Angela,
Sorry to hear you had a bad experience with Bold Leads. What kind of issues did you have with the seller leads you were getting from them?
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Hey Michael,
Not sure if Natalie is still in the comment thread here, but I can answer your question. The $299 per month is the fee that Bold Leads charges just to run your ads. Think of it as a maintenance fee. Any money spent on top of this (your ad spend) will go toward actually purchasing ad space on various websites. As a general rule of thumb, the more you allocate toward ad spend the more leads you’ll get. That said, it makes sense to start out slow to see if you can get leads that are qualified, and that you are currently able to close at your current skill level.
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Hey Natalie,
Great to hear you’re clicking with a lead source and best of luck in 2018!
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