After you have signed the listing contract with your agent to sell your property, you have some decisions to make. One of those is do you want your agent to conduct open houses. The obvious answer probably is- sure why not- the more the merrier. It will give my home more exposure and help sell it quickly. But maybe you might think about this. Once your agent lists your home on the multiple listing service (MLS), your home now is now being seen world wide. Why is that? It’s the internet. Never before have homes for sale enjoyed this new medium for exposure. There are many national organizations that have websites that allow users to search for property available for sale. They all have agreements with each MLS to receive feeds from those MLSs. And don’t forget each agent that has a website, also receives those same feeds that also gives the user the ability to search for property too. So do open houses really accomplish much? Not really. Has a visitor ever purchase a home from an open house? The answer is yes, not often though. But not to look contradictory, consider this. That buyer most likely is already represented by a real estate agent. The home most likely was already going to be shown by their agent. The first rule in selling your home is to make it available. That usually means having a lock box on the property. You can also make it available without a lock box. Rule #2 is, you want “quality buyers” in your home, not just looky-loos spending a Sunday afternoon fooling around. There is another reason in considering open houses and that is safety. More of those issues in Part 2.