Why & How to Promote Your Neighbor's Listing
Some neighbors see the value of helping others, helping their neighbors, and see how it helps themselves & their own community when it comes to helping neighbors with their home sale. Many however don't realize what all they can do. In this article, I wanted to share more about why helping your neighbors is a good idea, and what you can actually do to help.
Why Help Your Neighbors Sell Their Home?
Positively Impact Property Values for Homeowners
Did you know that the primary method of valuation of homes is comparable sales? That means that every sale in your neighborhood matters for your own home value. Having a higher home value increases your net worth if you're a homeowner.
Positively Impacting Neighborhood Quality 1 Home at a Time
If you're a tenant or homeowner, helping others with their home sale can sometimes mean that a new neighbor is also an owner-occupant, since investors are looking more at their bottom line than they are looking at finding a space that is pleasant and nice. The lower the home goes for, the higher the likelihood that it's an investor. You might not be aware, but an owner-occupant is more likely to take better care of their home, such as their grass and exterior maintenance, improving the quality of the neighborhood one home at a time.
Ability to Choose Your Neighbors
Most people don't get the opportunity to choose their own new neighbors. By supporting the marketing efforts of those selling a home in your community within your own network of friends, you can positively influence the possibility of someone that you already know and love being your new neighbor.
How to Help Your Neighbors with Their Home Sale:
Maintain Your Home Exterior
One of the best ways that neighbors can help is by maintaining the exterior of their homes, whether it means keeping your roof in good shape, weeding, mowing the lawn, or keeping your vinyl siding clean. I've even asked sellers to pay for their next-door neighbors' grass to be cut since the neighbors didn't care enough to. It's that important. If paint is coming off of your home or your fence, repainting or re-staining to match can also help wood last longer.
Don't Play Loud Music Audible to Other Homes
If you have a tendency of "sharing" your music with the neighborhood, consider putting that on the back burner. If you like to play loud music, consider using noise-canceling headphones or earbuds, but keep in mind that playing too loud, whether on a speaker or in your ears, can hurt your hearing for the rest of your life gradually without you being aware.
Clean Up Trash at Your Home
If you have trash visible in your yard from the street, even if you didn't put it there, cleaning it up can help new prospective neighbors feel more welcome in the community. I've even asked sellers to clean behind their next-door neighbors before due to the high volume of trash in front of their house because the neighbors didn't care enough to. It's that important.
Maintain Your Vehicles
If the exterior of your vehicle is rusty, taking care of it sooner rather than later will help improve the lifespan of your vehicle. If your car really needs a wash, consider getting a car wash if your next door neighbors or neighbors a few doors down just listed their home or if you know they're about to.
Offer to Put a Directional Sign in Your Yard
While some agents may not have directional signs, many agents do, and as long as there isn't an association rule against it in your neighborhood, it can be highly beneficial to your neighbor to put directional signs in your yard, especially if you live on a corner lot of 2 intersecting streets. With median market times in Hampton Roads & Richmond being low, as long as the agent's marketing is even decent, and it's not overpriced, it shouldn't take long for the home to sell, so having a sign in your yard shouldn't be for too long. Directional signs are often relatively small, too.
Share Agents' Listing Post With Others
Whether you're sharing about it with someone in person, emailing others you know about it, or sharing an agent's social media post of a home in your neighborhood from a place like Facebook, there are a number of folks that you can share a listing with. If you're wanting to share a post from Adam, here are my social media links, with most listings ending up on my Facebook business page, sometimes my Instagram, & sometimes my Linkedin.
Email Others
It's also possible to email others you know about a home in your neighborhood, whether you're emailing someone you know is looking or emailing a number of your contacts to let them know about a home. When doing so, it's best to share with them a link to the home with the listing agent's contact information so that they can contact the listing agent directly if needed for questions or a showing. With some websites, like Zillow, the listing agent's information can be not as straightforward to find.
Why Help Others?
Christian Reasons to Help Others
Most people are familiar with the golden rule, which some aren't aware comes from the Bible. That rule states, "Do to others as you would have them do to you (Luke 6:31)." The next verse takes it a step further, stating, "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them."
You may have heard 1 Corinthians 13 in church, at a wedding, or you may have even memorized it. It essentially states that all we do, if love is absent, means relatively nothing. It states if people have spiritual gifts that they exercise (v 1-2), give everything they have to the poor, & even if they are burned at the stake as a martyr (v 3) that it doesn't matter if they don't have love.
You may have also heard or read the parable of the Good Samaritan that Jesus shares in Luke 10:25-37. In it, Jesus is first asked by a man about how he can inherit eternal life. Jesus asks him what he thinks, and he responds with the greatest 2 commandments, to love God and to love neighbor. The man then asks, "And who is my neighbor?" Jesus then shares a story. A priest and someone else whose typical role was in ministry (a Levite) pass by the other side on the road while someone is dying after being attacked & robbed. Someone of a different ethnic and religious background, a Samaritan, stops, helps the dying man, bandages him, takes him to an inn to get better, and offers to cover his expenses. Jesus asks, "“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”"
Did you know that "Christians" who don't have love in their hearts are not true Christians according to the Bible? 1 John 4:8 says, "Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love." 1 John 4:20 says, "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen."
Christian love is something that doesn't depend exclusively on other people. Because it's rooted in the love of God, it's something that can still occur even if the only thing around us is hate from others. We can still have the power to love and to forgive. 1 John 4:19 tells us, “we love because he first loved us.” John 15:1-17 talks about how meditation on the Bible, obedience to the Bible, walking with God, and the love of others and God are complementary elements that ultimately produce wonderful levels of joy.
Philosophical/Faith-Based Reasons to Help Others Outside the Bible
The Bible isn't alone in this idea, with many stating things along the same lines from a wide variety of belief systems.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, a leading proponent of transcendentalism, stated, "Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself."
Mahatma Ghandhi said, "Love is the strongest force the world possesses and yet it is the humblest imaginable."
Science-Backed Reasons to Help Others
"Studies have found that acts of kindness are linked to increased feelings of well-being. Helping others can also improve our support networks and encourage us to be more active. This, in turn, can improve our self-esteem. There is some evidence to suggest that when we help others, it can promote changes in the brain that are linked with happiness." - Mental Health Foundation
"One reason behind the positive feelings associated with helping others is that being pro-social reinforces our sense of relatedness to others, thus helping us meet our most basic psychological needs.
Research has found many examples of how doing good, in ways big or small, not only feels good, but also does us good. For instance, the well-being-boosting and depression-lowering benefits of volunteering have been repeatedly documented. As has the sense of meaning and purpose that often accompanies altruistic behavior. Even when it comes to money, spending it on others predicts increases in happiness compared to spending it on ourselves. Moreover, there is now neural evidence from fMRI studies suggesting a link between generosity and happiness in the brain.
Recent research suggests yet another way our well-being can benefit from practicing pro-social behavior: helping others regulate their emotions helps us regulate our own emotions, decreases symptoms of depression and ultimately, improves our emotional well-being. "- Psychology Today
A new meta-analysis in the journal Psychological Bulletin shows that helping others also improves your own health and happiness... Past research had already discovered that people who engage in these kind of behaviors are happier than those who do not.
They also have better mental and physical health.
But until now, evidence was lacking about the link between prosocial behavior and the positive results it brings to the “helper.”