When your home is for sale in London, Ontario, every showing request is an opportunity — and every declined or difficult showing is a potential sale that doesn't happen. Buyers are comparing multiple homes on tight schedules, often with limited time in the city. A seller who is inflexible, hostile, or simply unavailable hands the advantage directly to the next listing on the buyer's list. A $750,000 house in London sold for $709,900 — $40,100 less than asking — because the seller couldn't be bothered to keep the home show-ready. The math on flexibility is straightforward. Ty Lacroix, Broker at The Envelope Real Estate Group, has spent 24 years watching sellers win and lose offers based on decisions unrelated to price.
Being flexible for buyers to see your home in London, Ontario isn't a courtesy — it's a strategy.
Have you thought carefully about how and when buyers will be able to see your home? Because the moment a showing request comes in, that buyer is making their first real contact with your property — and how that experience goes sets the tone for everything that follows.
Make It Easy to Get In the Door
Wherever possible, schedule showings the way most homes in your area are shown — whether that's by appointment or through a lockbox system that allows buyer agents to book efficiently. The buyer viewing your home may be looking at multiple properties across a large area in a single afternoon. Their schedule is tight, their patience is finite, and the next home on their list is a few minutes away.
Make the buyer and their agent feel welcome. Be as flexible on timing as possible. And remember: if a qualified buyer is willing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on your home, the least you can do is be available when they want to see it.
Two Real Stories
An $879,900 home in London. The seller was too busy and couldn't keep the house tidy enough for showings. The result? The home sold one month later for $839,000. The $40,900 that disappeared wasn't taken by the market — it was given away by a seller who prioritized convenience over preparation.
Last weekend, my clients and I arrived at a scheduled showing at 11:55 AM for an 11:30 to noon window. The man in the house ranted that we were disrupting his day. We left without getting past the screen door.
That home had been on the market for 51 days. I wonder why.
What Buyers Are Actually Experiencing
Many buyers are reluctant to feel like they're intruding. The decision to buy a home is emotional and stressful — they're already anxious before they ring the doorbell. A hostile reception, a declined showing request, or a home that clearly wasn't prepared for them doesn't just lose the showing. It loses the buyer entirely, because there's always another home on the list that welcomed them.
Would you drive to a car dealership on a Thursday afternoon if you knew there was a chance they'd turn you away at the door? Would a family visiting London for the weekend have to reschedule around a seller who can't make time? Or would they simply buy somewhere else?
You don't have to go overboard. You don't have to rearrange your entire life around every showing. But be flexible — because that next buyer walking through your door could be the one who makes you an offer. And the one who walks away because you weren't ready might be too.
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