Tire kicker or serious buyers only

brien23

brien23

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Brien
How to weed out the tire kickers or a serious buyer on the hook?
 
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What difference does is make? If you're a good salesman you could convert the tire kickers. I don't mind answering a few questions when I'm selling a plane, lets you know what you forgot to put in the ad.
 
I kicked a lot of tires before I bought. Either put up with them and treat them all like buyers or hand the keys to a broker. Everyone is a tire kicker till they find the one.
 
I flirted with buying a couple of years ago, I didn’t really think it was workable, but I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I looked at a few airplanes and talked to several owners, my first comment to them was, I am a tire kicker and if you don’t have time for me I’ll move on. Everyone was very nice. A couple met me at the airport to show me the airplane and offered rides full well knowing I was not a buyer. People should just be honest. I learned a ton during that time.
 
It's sales dude

They are all tire kickers till they write a check

They are all buyers till they dont write a check

If you cant be bothered to try to sell to every lead, pay the piper and get someone who will
 
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If any of your customers are tire kickers you don’t belong in sales. No shame in that, we all have our talents. There are professional salespeople who can handle a sale for you. If you can’t indulge a few shoppers perhaps you should engage the services of one. They’re called brokers.
 
brien23 said:
How to weed out the tire kickers or a serious buyer on the hook?
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If you want to avoid wasting too much time, like all good sales people you need to become adept at qualifying the buyers. Once they finish asking their first round of questions YOU get to ask THEM questions - and those should be geared to helping you assess just how likely they are to actually buy a plane, and how likely they are to buy YOUR airplane. Do that correctly and with a bit of skill and you will weed out 80+% of the time wasters.
 
Wait. So you own an expensive item you want to sell, and the total audience of potential buyers is maybe a few thousand people...and you think you have some special wisdom that lets you intentionally ignore some of those prospective buyers? Seems like the height of arrogance for a seller to intentionally cull the herd, and I hope any seller doing this gets what he deserves.

It’s a pet peeve of mine because I just bought a plane...cash sitting in the bank ready to hand to any owner smart enough to humor me by answering some of my questions. Yet I was amazed by how many people just couldn’t be bothered to answer a simple email or phone call. No matter what I ask, if I take the time to write you an email, at least have the courtesy to respond. You might just be surprised.
 
Vince R said:
Wait. So you own an expensive item you want to sell, and the total audience of potential buyers is maybe a few thousand people...and you think you have some special wisdom that lets you intentionally ignore some of those prospective buyers? Seems like the height of arrogance for a seller to intentionally cull the herd, and I hope any seller doing this gets what he deserves.

It’s a pet peeve of mine because I just bought a plane...cash sitting in the bank ready to hand to any owner smart enough to humor me by answering some of my questions. Yet I was amazed by how many people just couldn’t be bothered to answer a simple email or phone call. No matter what I ask, if I take the time to write you an email, at least have the courtesy to respond. You might just be surprised.
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latest
 
You don't know the tire kickers until they make an offer. Some buyers are more serious than others. These days, it's much easier to share more info about a plane than it was decades ago. Some buyers hope you will sell them a plane for 50 cents on the dollar of real value. Others will be more serious. You have to pretty much entertain them all until you make a sale.

The ones I disliked the most for wasting my time would complain about a cracked rubber gap seal or other cosmetic item and expect a $1000 markdown. These buyers never mentioned the avionics, engine, or logbook in price discussions. Just appearance. Cest la vie. When I finally sold my AA1A I got a good price and a happy buyer. He realized cosmetics don't make the plane fly.
 
Vince R said:
Wait. So you own an expensive item you want to sell, and the total audience of potential buyers is maybe a few thousand people...and you think you have some special wisdom that lets you intentionally ignore some of those prospective buyers? Seems like the height of arrogance for a seller to intentionally cull the herd, and I hope any seller doing this gets what he deserves.

...
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"Culling the herd" is precisely what you do.
Because:
1) those "few thousand people" are not all equally potential buyers, not by a long shot; and
2) if you don't make an effort to qualify and screen the potential buyers even if you have a desirable plane, accurately represented and at a reasonable price you are needlessly opening yourself up to the sort of frustrations Lowflynjack describes in some of his posts on this thread: https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/threads/1946-cessna-140-sold.110281/

To be clear, qualifying buyers involves systematically engaging with them, not ignoring their initial inquiry. I agree with you that not responding at the outset is just plain rude.
 
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brien23 said:
How to weed out the tire kickers or a serious buyer on the hook?
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Know your stuff. I had 14 BUYERS for my Tiger with 7 sending contracts on day ONE. I honored the first one to arrive and told the others if he fell through they were next. I had all 9 log books scanned to PDF and a TON of images including close ups of any blemishes so anyone that might travel wouldn't think I was trying to pull a fast one. Images were also in PDF so that they could open a PDF and review at least 10 images, not open each ... one ... separately ... very ... time ... consuming. All had a ton of questions and very specific questions in several cases, but I had their information without saying "I don't know" or "I'll get back to you."

Am looking for a plane now myself to replace the Tiger and am surprised how:

1. Most owners don't know squat about their own AC
2. All brokers can't do any better than,"Why don't you just travel out here and see it?"
3. Having an engine changed 100 hours ago WITHOUT an engine log book for that engine ... where did it come from?
4. Off airport "landing" into 8 feet of salt water didn't seem to rise to the level of NDH for one owner, and no engine inspection.
5. At least 15 mechanical and avionics jobs performed without a logbook entry (owner performed on non-experimental AC)
 
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