How to Win Expired and Price-Reduced Listings When Price Cuts Hit a Yearly High
Open your MLS this morning and count the price reductions. Then count the expired and withdrawn listings from the last 30 days. If your market looks like most of the country right now, the number will surprise you.
Price cuts are running at a yearly high, and inventory is climbing back toward pre-pandemic levels. Most agents read that as bad news. They see a slow market, nervous sellers and longer days on market, and they pull back.
Here's the hard truth: a price cut is not bad news. It is a seller telling the whole market that the current plan is not working. Every reduction, every expired listing, every withdrawn listing is a homeowner who still wants to sell and is now open to a better plan. The agent who shows up with that plan gets the listing.
In Chapter 16 of Turbo Agent I teach that market knowledge is the source of real confidence. It is what stops you from taking overpriced listings, what helps homes sell faster, and what makes you credible with a seller who has already been disappointed once. Let's get practical.
Why Price Cuts Are the Best Prospecting List You Have
When the market shifts, most agents keep calling the same people the same way. Meanwhile, the MLS is handing you a list of motivated sellers every single day.
Think about who is on that list. A seller who just cut their price is frustrated. A seller whose listing expired is frustrated and now free to choose a new agent. A seller who withdrew is often waiting for someone to explain what went wrong. These are not cold leads. These are people with a real problem and a clear reason to talk.
Here's the thing: they don't need another agent promising a higher price. They need someone who understands why the home didn't sell and can show them a plan that will work. That is what market knowledge gives you.
Step 1: Build a Daily MLS Hot Sheet Habit
You can't be the market expert if you only look at the market when a client asks. In the book I tell agents to run the MLS Hot Sheet every morning, before the calls start.
Let me give you a quick example of a 20-minute morning routine:
New listings in your farm or niche: what came on, at what price, and how it compares to recent solds.
Price changes: who reduced, by how much, and how many days on market before the cut.
Back on market and pending: what fell through and what is moving.
Expired and withdrawn listings: your prospecting list for the day.
New solds: the true value in your market, because sold prices are what buyers actually paid.
Do this every day and within a few weeks you will know your inventory better than most agents in your office. That knowledge shows up in your voice on every call.
Step 2: Do a Sold-Listing Analysis Before You Call
Before you pick up the phone to an expired or price-reduced seller, know why the home didn't sell. Pull the comparable solds and look at them the way I teach in Chapter 16:
Property type, size, and bedrooms and bathrooms
Price per square foot
Days on market
Sale price versus list price
Features, condition and price history
Who the listing agent was
Track these trends over the last 6 to 12 months. Now you can see the pattern. Maybe the home was priced 8% above the comps from day one. Maybe the photos were weak. Maybe it was priced right but had almost no marketing. When you know the real reason, you stop sounding like every other agent who called that morning.
Step 3: Lead With Empathy, Then Reposition
An expired seller has usually heard from many agents in a single day. Most of them open with "I can sell your home." That is exactly why they get hung up on.
Start with empathy. This seller trusted someone, waited months, and watched it fail. Acknowledge that first. For example, an opener could sound like this: "I saw your home came off the market, and I know that can be really frustrating after all that time. I studied what sold around you in the last six months. Would it help if I shared what I found?"
Notice what that does. You are not attacking the last agent. You are not promising a number. You are offering help to someone who needs it. That is the reframe I teach throughout the book: prospecting is not begging for business, it is serving people with a real problem.
From there, reposition. Show them what the market actually did: the solds, the days on market, the price per square foot. Then show them what will be different this time: better pricing strategy, better marketing, and consistent communication.
Step 4: Handle "Our Home Is Worth More" Without Arguing
You will hear it. "Our home is worth more than that." When prices are falling, this is the objection that keeps homes sitting.
In Chapter 15 I lay out six rules for objections: listen actively, repeat and validate, ask a follow-up question, build trust without arguing, share your experience, and understand their motivation. With price objections, the market data does the heavy lifting.
For example, you might say: "I totally get how you feel. Other sellers I've worked with felt the same way when the market shifted. What they found is that when we priced it based on what buyers were actually paying, it sold faster and they netted more than they would have chasing the market down with cut after cut."
That is Feel, Felt, Found. It works because it respects the seller and lets the numbers speak. You never have to tell a seller they are wrong. You show them what sold.
Step 5: Follow Up Like the Listing Depends on It
Because it does. Most expired sellers don't relist on the first call. They relist with the agent who stayed in touch, kept sending useful market updates, and showed up again when they were ready.
Put every expired, withdrawn and price-reduced seller you speak with into your CRM. Send them a short market update every couple of weeks. Call again. Offer a free market analysis. Consistency is the difference between the agent who called once and the agent who got the signature.
And remember the math. You can make up, in numbers, what you lack in skills. If you are newer, you may not win the first ten conversations. Keep going. Every conversation makes the next one easier.
A Simple Weekly Plan for a Price-Cut Market
Here is an example of how to turn this into a schedule you can follow this week:
Every morning before 8 a.m.: run your MLS Hot Sheet and pull the day's expired, withdrawn and price-reduced listings.
8 to 11 a.m.: make your calls. Expireds and price reductions first, then your database.
11 a.m. to noon: follow up with everyone who said "not yet" and log every conversation.
Once a week: preview homes in your area and attend broker opens so you know the inventory firsthand.
Every day: offer at least one free market analysis to a homeowner.
If you want the numbers behind that schedule, read my post on turning an annual income goal into a daily number. The agents who win in a shifting market are the ones who know exactly how many conversations they need today.
Where to Start
Start with your number. Before you plan your calls, find out how many conversations a day your income goal actually requires. Get your free daily number with the calculator below. It takes about 60 seconds, emails you a personal plan, and invites you to my private weekly email for agents.
This lesson comes from Chapter 16 of my book Turbo Agent, "Mastering Market Insights." The full chapter, along with all 22 chapters, daily tracking and DISC-adapted scripts, is inside TurboAgent Pro, and it comes with a 90-day money-back guarantee. Price cuts are not the end of your business this fall. They are the opening. Now go out and do it!
Individual results vary based on participation, execution and commitment.
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