The secret to HMO rent to rent letters that work. Hint: Handwritten coloured envelopes is not the answer!
So far we’ve brought in contracts worth over £2m with letters.
Today’s episode is about a subject I love…
Rent to rent letters.
This is the thing the helped HMO Heaven, our rent to rent business, grow fast.
But there are a lot of myths out there and today’s episode is all about what makes rent to rent letters work.
It’s how to be irresistible to your perfect customers.
And I know you’re going to get some new insights and takeaways here.
Let’s dive in to letters…
First off I’ll get back to basics in case you’re wondering what letters I’m talking about.
With rent to rent our aim is to manage HMO properties (house of multiple occupation aka house share).
And one of the best ways to let HMO landlords know about our existence is to write letters to them.
We can do this because the names and addresses of HMO landlords are available to the public.
It's a super successful strategy and we get most of our new properties through direct marketing letters.
It's the way you can speak directly to your customers.
There’s a phenomenal return on landlord letters when you do them right.
Landlord letters cost us less than the price of a first class stamp for each letter.
So far we’ve brought in contracts worth over £2m!
You know why landlords want to work with you.
If you missed that episode go back and listen to episode 5 where we go into the reasons why landlords want to work with you.
This is about how to put that on paper.
It’s about how to be irresistible to your perfect customer,
In writing.
Do letters really work?
The question people ask me often.
So many people are sending letters now,
how do I stand out from the crowd?
What is the secret to letters that work?
It's clearly solving landlord problems
In their language and
Creating enough interest in your solution to cause landlords to phone to you to find out more.
"That's so obvious!" I hear you cry.
“That's not a secret, Stephanie!”
Well, if that's the case, why do we see so many letters that don’t do this.
What NOT to do
One of our landlords keeps all the letters he receives from people wanting to rent his HMO, and recently he brought a batch in.
I was totally shocked that about 80% of them had very similar wording.
Here’s what not to do if you want to get the best possible results:
Don’t focus on you and what you want
“We are looking to acquire eight domestic, multi-let properties in the area, and we are aware that some landlords are looking to get out of the business, and we were wondering if you were considering, or would consider selling any of your properties.”
Don’t use clunky business speak
For example using phrases like HMO/multi-lets, is clunky.
Make your language conversational as you would talk to people rather than business speak.
Don’t speak to your reader impersonally
The end of one letter I saw said “for those who are interested”
Say something like, ‘if you would be interested’, that’s speaking to your reader directly.
Don’t apologise for writing
For example, I saw a number of letters which started “I hope you don't mind me writing to you. I found your contact details on the Imagine and Council online register of HMO landlords”.
The opening line is apologetic and unnecessary, and it positions you as the writer as being of low value.
You have a great solution for a difficult problem, so don't apologise for sharing it with people.
Don’t end with a weak call to action
Be clear about what you'd like your reader to do next, and what's in it for them.
What I want to say to you is don't send one of these copycat letters without any personality or authenticity.
So many people are writing to landlords that it's important to stand out.
And the simplest and most effective way to be unique is to be you!
This does really work,
IF you do it right.
So let's move on to what we should be doing.
Er what do I write?
Sitting in front of a blank piece of paper can feel daunting.
Even professional writers can find this difficult.
That’s why we share our tried and tested letters which work brilliantly well.
✅ CLICK HERE to buy the letters ✅
We’ve talked about what you shouldn’t do.
So what should you write?
Start with your customer, focus on landlords’ problems and how you can solve them.
Talk your customers' language and to do that, really listen to what people say when they're talking to you about their HMO problems and use those words.
The number one aim of your letter is to inspire landlords to call you to find out more.
Give the sizzle and not the steak. Don't overwhelm with too much information.
How to send your letters
This is where I’m going to be controversial.
The old guard says that you should hand write your envelopes and use coloured envelopes.
And I don’t agree.
Here’s why…
Should I hand write the addresses on my direct to vendor letters?
People suggest that you do this because landlords are much more likely to open them.
This may or may not be true.
What is definitely true though, is that the more letters you send to your target customers and the more consistently you send them, the more leads you will get.
And this is where handwriting will stop you getting results.
Let me explain.
Handwriting your envelopes is very time consuming and means that you will usually end up sending much fewer letters.
And you’ll send out letters less often. That is where your results will be lower than others who are automating.
And yes you could outsource the handwriting of the envelopes. This then adds another unnecessary expense as you can get great results without it.
When you automate the sending of personalised letters which resonate with your readers’ problems.
And when you send the right number of letters each time
And when it’s easy to do it consistently.
You’ll get much better results.
In short, you don’t need to hand write your envelopes to get great results.
Should I use coloured envelopes?
We heard the advice about handwriting envelopes and using coloured envelopes when we were starting out in 2016.
And we looked into it.
The envelopes were expensive.
And I didn’t relish the idea of writing over 300 addresses (or organising outsourcing of it to a VA and arranging delivery of envelopes and stamps to them.
So, we decided to try automation with Stannp.
We tried a few different companies but found Stannp to be the best.
Each letter is cheaper than the price of a first class stamp so it we did it by hand it would take us days if not weeks to get our letters done, and we’d need to pay for coloured envelopes, paper, ink cartridges to print the letters, plus the stamps.
It looked like it would cost us more than double to DIY our letters.
And our results were SO good we’ve never wanted to try DIY.
When we first started Stannp didn’t offer coloured envelopes.
They are now offering this.
There’s an extra charge.
We use white envelopes and are delighted with the results.
In short, you don’t need to hand write your letters or use coloured envelopes to get great results.
How does Stannp work?
I’ve been surprised by how many people don’t know about this and were going to send their letters by hand. You will love this system as it helps you send more letters in less time, for less money.
❌ Complicated mail merge
❌ Printing hundreds of letters
❌ Buying multi-coloured envelopes
❌ Handwriting the addresses on those envelopes (yes this is what people are doing!) I’m sure the handwritten address on the 1st envelope looks great… but what about the address on the 50th envelope or the 250th envelope!!
❌Matching the right hand written envelope with the right letter
❌Manually stuffing all those envelopes
❌Sticking stamps on your envelopes. Hundreds of them. By hand!
Here’s how it works:
✅ You have one electronic version of your letter.
✅ You have one spreadsheet with your landlord name and address data.
✅ You upload your letter to stannp with tags of where to insert the first name and the address.
Stannp does the rest!!!
In the letter there are personalisation tags which are placed where the first name and address will appear.
This enables your letter to include a personalised greeting such as Dear Nicky or Hi Nicky rather than a generic greeting such as Dear Landlord.
And it enables your envelopes to include Nicky Taylor and the address, rather than just the address.
Automatically.
And how much does all this cost Stephanie?
That is the best part my friend, it costs less than the price of a second class stamp, so you simply can’t beat them by buying paper, coloured envelopes, printer cartridges and stamps.
What matters though is the RESULTS!
Contracts worth over £2m. From letters.
✅ CLICK HERE to find out more about Stannp ✅
The Main Thing
The main thing about your letters is to send them.
Landlords can't ring you if they don't know you exist,
So let them know.
Send your letters, and let them know very soon.
Like so many things in life.
One is not enough.
Be consistent.
Make sure that you send your letters out regularly.
Whether it’s every month, every 2 months or every 3 months.
You decide what is best for you.
Consistency helps you stay front of mind.
Even if a landlord doesn’t call immediately.
They often save your letters.
We’ve viewed properties where landlords pull out a stack of our letters!
Get your letters sent!
To summarise what to say in your HMO landlord letters
Focus on them and not you
Make your letter focus on solving the landlord problems using landlord language
It's about the sizzle and not the steak. Don’t overwhelm with detail
And if you’d like our full templates for everything to include in your landlord letter to create unique letters for you, that’s available too.
✅ CLICK HERE to buy the Landlord Letters & 5P Formula ✅
To summarise how to send your rent to rent HMO letters
Use Stannp. It’s impossible to send your letters for less as Stannp is less than the price of a stamp.
You’ll send more letters, more consistently with an automated system and you’ll get more leads.
Schedule letters for months ahead so that you don’t have to spend time on it each month and leads are coming in on autopilot.
Do what most people don’t do!
Loved letters?
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And remember.
Believe Bigger, Be Bolder and Be a Gamechanger!
See you next week.
Stephanie & Nicky
xx
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