Experts highlight the importance of sales training for all fractional ownership agents

Source: www.opp.org.uk

Resort developers and fractional promoters need to learn to match fractional products to the right consumers with the right sales methods, according to fractional specialists.

Speaking at a dedicated session at the recent OPP live in london - the session highlighted how agents should sell fractional, an industry panel agreed that agents and marketeer's need to be trained to understand the variety of vacation ownership products on the market.

“A good agent will already be able to underrstand and qualify a client with what they need,” said Paul Anderson of model provider Fractions Abroad. “But agent and promoters this industry are generally very bad at matching products to buyers. If a customer doesn’t match your price range or is mortgage-dependent and you can’t help them, they could walk out the door. You’ve got a motivated buyer so you’ve got to meet their needs.”

However, agents will not want to sell fractions if they are too small, he added. “They do not have the desire to sell high multiple shares because the income is too small for the work involved. If you expect your agents to work 12 times as hard to sell 12 fractions instead of one whole ownership property you have to compensate them sufficiently.”

Education vital

US property lawyer Andy Sirkin said industry education was fundamental but “educating brokers is a long-term process involving intensive training." He also added that, in most cases, agents were still better as introducers. "Getting fractional ownership to market through the mainstream broker community is a huge step. Local agents can work well as a referral network. They don’t complete the sale but pass the leads on to your in-house sales team. The leads they pass on can be tracked so the local agent doesn’t feel his sales are being hijacked.”

Many agents used to selling full ownership can feel threatened by the idea of fractional said Peter Kempf of DCP International. "Brokers need to understand that fractional isn’t in competition with whole ownership. Just expecting your local agent to be able to sell a fractional scheme is unrealistic. They will only be able to make five to 10 per cent of your sales. However there is a good opportunity for local agents to make fractional resales at high-end resorts, as happens in the US at places such as Vail and Aspen.”

IFA challenge

Other members of the panel argued that developers could use alternatives to agents. “Lots of people are interested in the fractional concept but it’s up to the developer to choose the products and the sales force to go with them,” said Lisa Migani of the First National Trustee Company. “If agents aren’t suitable for small shares, a developer may want to set up a timeshare-style sales force.”

Paul MacSherry, VP business development at The Registry Collection, highlighted several developers already using in-house sales teams to sell small fractions. “But there are other routes to sell” he added. “For example, IFAs are very excited about fractional and think they can sell it by the bucketloads."