Talking House in the news.

Up for sale and on the airA radio transmits a sales pitch from a property on the market to house hunters who can hear it in a car at the curb; now we're talkin' house

BY JONATHAN McCARTHYSpecial to NewsdayApril 7, 2006

Pat Sullivan needed to sell her house. Her five-bedroom cape in New Hyde Park, listed at $584,500, had been on the market with an agency for months.So she decided it was time to find a new agent - one who would do whatever it took to sell her house.

"We wanted the agent with the most to offer," said Sullivan, whose house is now in contract with prospective buyers.Little did she know that her house would become one of a small percentage of homes on Long Island to use a new service that - so to speak - lets the house do the talking.The technology is called Talking House, and Sullivan's agent, Laurie Miner of ERA Caputo Realty in New Hyde Park, is one of a growing number of agents using the system in the area as another way to sell a home as the market softens.To make it work, the agent records a message onto a VCR-size transmitter that gets placed in the house. The transmitter then broadcasts the message on an AM radio frequency in digital format. The broadcast can be heard for 300 feet.A sign is placed in front of the house referring potential buyers to the radio frequency - and the house, in theory, should sell itself."It is very successful," Miner said of the technology, which has brought her more inquiries on properties she has listed. "It makes your house stand out, and I've gotten more inquiries just based on curiosity alone."Tuning into potential buyersFor Sullivan's cape, Miner said she used two separate recordings. The first one touted the house - how many bedrooms and bathrooms, and the decor. The second message talked about the neighborhood, the school district, nearby parks and some of the services other than real estate that Miner provides."Your family will love this beautiful brick cape here at 507 North 11th Street," the bubbly cheerleaderlike spokeswoman said in the first recording on 1670 AM. "Parents, how would you like to have your kids attend the award-winning New Hyde Park schools?" she asked on the second.As soon as the transmitter was installed in February, Sullivan said, traffic to her house picked up. And now she's living in Tampa, Fla., hoping the extra advertising will have netted her a final sale.The transmitters cost roughly $300, and the service is provided as part of a contract that sellers sign with a registered Talking House agent. Homeowners cannot buy the transmitters themselves.For Miner, Talking House gives her an edge with both buyers and sellers in an industry that has been racing to keep up with competition on the Internet. Miner says that 60 percent of her clients are currently using the Talking House service. According to a recent survey by the National Association of Realtors, 77 percent of buyers used the Internet to search for a home in 2005. That's up from 2 percent just 10 years ago.It is the uniqueness of the Talking House service that seems to attract most agents."Almost 80 percent of new agents fail in the first year because they don't get enough listings," said Scott Hagerman, who is a Talking House "success coach," which means he markets the product. "This makes them stand out."That was true for Sullivan, she said."For me, ERA came up with stuff that other agencies weren't doing," Sullivan said. "I wanted to get the most for my money."Broadcasting ingenuityStanding out from the crowd and offering value to his clients is part of the reason that Mark Anthony LoCorriere said he began using the Talking House product. An associate broker with Coldwell Banker in Port Jefferson Station for the past 12 years, he first started using Talking House after it was mentioned in a real estate magazine

"It is great for the seller of any specific house," LoCorriere said. "People are intrigued by it, and it causes a commotion in the neighborhood."The Talking House product is designed for use by agents and by homeowners selling their houses themselves. Each transmitter comes with a marketing plan. Agents are instructed to use the device not only on their listing, but on their own house as well.

Miner has a sign in her own front yard in New Hyde Park, where the message speaks about the services she provides as an agent and explains that although her house isn't for sale, she can help you get into the neighborhood."If it helps with one house or one client, it pays for itself," Miner said. In hopes they may tell their friends or neighbors about her service, she also rents the transmitter boxes for $60 a month to sellers who are not using an agent.Talking House is in just 1 percent of the nationwide real estate market, with some 12,000 agents registered to use the product. There are roughly 20 such agents on Long Island to offer the package, according to TalkingHouse.com.The company started in Fond du Lac, Wis., and has been offering the product for 20 years. It switched from analog radio to digital radio four years ago and went national five years ago when it was sold to Broadcast Marketing Llc of Illinois.Its marketing plan is considered key to the company's success. Representatives claim a 95 percent satisfaction rating with agents who have used the product for at least three months.Each transmitter comes with tips on how to make better recordings and provides agents with a presentation to help close the deal with potential customers."Most of the time, I don't have to say a word," said LoCorriere, who has used the product on more than 10 listings this year and offers it to all his clients. "I get more comments on that than anything else I offer. People are impressed."Real estate agents "often run into problems with training," explained Hagerman. This is often because they are all independent agents working for themselves. Other agents in their broke`rage are also the competition. "We help give them a plan and a strategy," he said.Sending the right messageIt is a strategy that not every agent thinks will work."The Talking House allows people to eliminate a house before they should," said Kathy Martin, an agent with Century 21 Northern Shores in Northport. "Sometimes [the recordings] don't do the house justice."Martin has specialized on the North Shore, specifically eastern Nassau, Huntington and Smithtown, for 25 years. "You have to weigh the benefit of technology before utilizing it," she said. "Buyers and sellers are more sophisticated and much more knowledgeable."LoCorriere said he has similar concerns."My job is to get buyers into a house, and you don't always know what will turn a buyer off," he said. To combat that, LoCorriere said he tries not to oversell in his recorded messages. "People want to hear about the house, not me," he said.For Martin, the best way to get an edge on the competition is to know the inventory. "Most clients have already started their search on the Internet," she said. "I go to as many broker open houses as possible so that I can speak intelligently about the houses in my area."The thing that may hurt the product most in the long run, however, is popularity, LoCorriere said. "It is a novelty. If it were more prominent in the market, it ... wouldn't be so special."Talk about your homeTalking House transmitters are offered by registered agents. There are more than 20 agents registered on Long Island. You can find one by visiting www.talkinghouse.com.The cost of the service is normally part of the commission deal arranged with each real estate agent, and prices can vary.If you are selling your home by yourself, you can rent a Talking House transmitter from a registered agent. Agents charge between $60 and $70 per month for use.Talking House transmitters are not for sale to the general public. - JONATHANMcCARTHYThe Talking House transmitter weighs only 4 pounds, but its "high-tech look will impress," says the company. It will record a message of up to five minutes on its inner computer chip and program it to repeat immediately with no dead air time. You can set it to play on any AM station, but 1610 is the most popular, the company says, because it's available everywhere.