Selling a home these days means getting prospects over two fundamental anxieties--the worry that the home will lose value and the fear that the buyer will lose his/her job. Those two concerns are justifiable given the uncertainty surrounding the current economic environment, and builders have adapted, finding programs that guarantee home values or offer mortgage payment protection plans.
Most of the time these programs have wonderfully comforting names that aim to replace nervousness and angst with something akin to a spa-induced calm. Some of my favorites include Ryland's Reassurance program, Lennar's Peace of Mind program, M/I Homes' Worry-free Mortgage Plan. So, it caught my attention last week when I was at a ULI dinner and heard about Bigelow Homes and its Recession-proof Home.
It was bold and a little sassy--enough so, as it turns out, that Fox News picked up on it. (You can check out the clip here.) Now, if you take the time to watch the clip, I'm guessing that, like me, you might take issue with the newscaster's take on the program, which at one point likened mortgage payment protection programs to credit default swaps. (Seriously?)
But portentous press aside, I thought it was encouraging that the word was getting out in the mainstream that for every con to buying a home today, there was a pro. A dissection of Bigelow's recession-proof home shows that the program hinges on seven points:
- Down payment assistance program
- Mortgage payment protection program
- Home price protection program
- Flex design
- Guaranteed heating costs
- Comprehensive warranty
- Low interest rate
Of course, there's some fine print associated with some of these elements, but that's not really what's worth noticing for this discussion. This is really pretty genius marketing. I love the way these elements, which, let's face it, most any builder offers, are packaged. It clearly identifies all the major mental blocks to buying a home and says, "We've got you covered."
The other cool thing is that the recession-proof home micro site hosts a nicely executed video, featuring none other than company president Jamie Bigelow, which illustrates all these points. It's simple and compact, giving prospects the basics of the program and a peek at what a Bigelow home looks like.
And the good news is that it's generating sales leads. One local source familiar with the company said that th week before the program began, the company's traffic was six; one week post program launch, the company had 76 visits and six sales. Not too shabby.
