Your First Showing Doesn’t Happen at the Open House

Your first showing doesn’t happen at the open house. It happens online.

Real estate websites have changed everything about how buyers find property.

Thirty years ago, buyers discovered homes by driving neighborhoods looking for yard signs, reading newspaper ads, stopping into a real estate office, or visiting an open house. Today, nearly every buyer has already seen the property online before they ever walk through the front door. The role of the open house hasn’t disappeared, but it has changed.

Even More True for Vacation Rentals

For vacation rental properties, that shift is even more pronounced. Buyers spend weeks, sometimes months, researching online before they ever board a plane. By the time they arrive on Kauai, they’ve often narrowed their search to a handful of properties. And when a buyer arrives on Kauai with a list of their favorite properties, they are pretty serious.

As a seller, if you relied solely on open houses to sell your property, you might be waiting a very long time. The heart of today’s marketing strategy is how your property appears online, and where. That’s where the biggest shift has taken place, and it’s backed up by data.

The Numbers Tell the Story

The National Association of REALTORS® didn’t begin tracking this until the 1980s, but the change over the last 30 years has been significant.

• 1995 — Only 2% of buyers used the internet to search for homes. Open houses, newspapers, yard signs, and real estate agents were among the primary ways buyers discovered properties.
• 1997 — Internet usage jumped to 18%.
• 2009 — About 90% of buyers were searching online.
• 2018 to 2025 — Approximately 95% to 97% of buyers used the internet during their home search. Online listings had become the dominant way buyers discovered property.

From Discovery to Confirmation

Thirty years ago, buyers often walked into an open house knowing very little about the home. Today, they’ve already:

• Viewed dozens of photos
• Read the property description
• Studied the floor plan
• Reviewed the tax records
• Looked at Google Street View
• Watched drone footage or a video tour
• Compared the property with competing listings

And increasingly, they’re using AI tools like ChatGPT to research neighborhoods, understand HOA fees, compare resorts, or ask questions before ever contacting an agent.

The open house has become a confirmation tool rather than a discovery tool.

Where Your Property Is Really Being Judged

That’s why your online presence matters so much. Your buyer is sitting at home saving properties, comparing listings, reading reviews, and researching neighborhoods.

That’s where your property is being judged first.

And that’s where your marketing has to be at its best.

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Aloha!  

Lynda Gill RS Lic. 63088  

Hawai’i Life Real Estate Brokers 808.346.0056  

LyndaGill@HawaiiLife.com