The Passionate Advocate: Guidelines for Increasing Sales From Homebuyer Referrals

“Home buyers’ willingness to refer a friend just hit an all-time high…WHY?”

Over the past 41-years of measuring the new-home purchase and ownership experience for thousands of home builders, an interesting pattern in the home buying experience has been repeatedly and predictably confirmed in Eliant’s data.

Here it is: There is an inverse relationship between new-home sales volume and homebuyers’ satisfaction.

And though it doesn’t have quite the punch as Einstein’s E=MC², here is our conclusion:

• During periods of strong sales volume (remember waiting lists and lotteries?), homebuyer satisfaction DECLINES
• During periods of weak sales volume, homebuyer satisfaction INCREASES

There are many reasons for this, too many to adequately cover in this brief post. But although it has a bit to do with changes in staff-to-customer ratios, higher satisfaction during slow sales periods comes down to these factors:

1. When homebuyers are in short supply, each one becomes more valuable
2. When sales office traffic is down, homeowner referrals are like GOLD
3. Local reputation becomes more important than ever; your homeowners drive your reputation with their word-of-mouth stories and posting on social media

So, with that in mind, here is a quick look at the current situation as new-home sales have significantly declined over the past few years:

• This analysis is based on hundreds of thousands of ratings from the homebuyers who responded to our surveys for over 230 builder clients (~70% response rate)
• Check out the strong change in the percent of recent new-home buyers who said they would be ‘Willing to Refer’ (WTR) a friend to their builder:
  • 2022: 78%
  • 2025 (YTD): 88%

What are builders doing to earn this level of improvement? They are improving performance on the seven primary builder-team “Referral Driver Behaviors” identified in Eliant’s joint research with the USC Marshall School of Business. While performance on all seven has improved, three of these Referral Drivers stand out over the last couple of years:

1. Buyers’ ratings of homes delivered complete and in the promised time have improved from 78% in 2022 to 95% in 2025! With most of the Covid-era supply shortages now resolved, the all-important home delivery experience is currently riding an all-time high.
2. Eliant’s research over the years has concluded that almost 50% of a builder’s ability to improve the customer experience comes from field reps making more realistic promises… that they plan to BEAT. In 2022, only 77% of home buyers said their builder had met its promises. In 2025, this has improved to 90%, a truly impactful change.
3. The Key: From our USC research, the #1 driver of “Willingness to Refer” turned out to be the way sales associates pro-actively keep buyers informed of construction progress before the buyer has to ask. In 2022, our All-Eliant Builder Score for “Pro-Active Communication of Construction Progress” was only 84%. So far in 2025, this critical performance has improved to 93%. It would be impossible to overstate the impact of this improvement on buyers’ willingness to refer!

Reminder: Focus on the seven Referral Driver behaviors. Create recognition and performance bonus programs which reward improvements in the activities which drive buyers’ willingness to refer a friend. An increase in sales from referrals will follow.

 

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Bob Mirman is CEO/Founder of 41-year old Eliant, with offices in California and North Carolina. He has written three complete issues of BIG BUILDER magazine, published two best-selling books and well over 160 articles in various building industry magazines. Using lessons learned during his first career as a Clinical Psychologist, Bob directs a seasoned team of Eliant’s Client Success Managers to assist homebuilders in managing their local reputations and driving sales from referrals.