How Do Top Agents Find Seller Leads in 2026?

By Jacqueline Smith

Jacqueline Smith started in real estate in 2015 and sold 52 homes her first year in the business as a solo agent. After considering growing her own team, and exploring different team models, she decided to partner with Place in 2017. The partnership allowed her to fast track her growth, and provide better systems and models to her agent partners. Her and her team in Vancouver Washington now close over $165M in annual sales volume, while keeping the quality of the agent and client experience at the forefront.

If you need more listings, you need more conversations with people who own homes and are thinking about selling. So, where do you find those people? You can always pay for data through services like PropStream, RedX, or LandVoice, and that’s a legitimate route. But the listing opportunities most agents are missing are the ones already within reach, the ones they simply aren’t tapping yet.

Here are three ways to find them without spending a dime.

1. Treat your open houses as a listing tool, not just a buyer hunt. Many agents host open houses focused only on finding buyers, and we tend to find what we look for. If sellers and listings aren’t on your mind, buyers are all you’ll come away with. Shift the goal toward connecting with other homeowners, and your whole strategy changes. Start before the open house by talking to the neighbors, door-knock at least 50 homes around the property, and 100 or more if you can, though 50 is a reasonable place to begin if door-knocking is still new to you. Invite those neighbors in, and let them know that if they’re curious what their own home could sell for in this market, you’d be glad to prepare a valuation.

You can set meetings before or after the open house, offer to return that Saturday with your research, or invite them to stop by for the valuation during the open house if things are quiet. The more consistently you host open houses with that intention, the more often these opportunities surface, particularly when you ask the people who walk in whether they own a home they’ll eventually need to sell. Ask different questions, and you’ll get different answers.

2. Reach out to for-sale-by-owner listings and focus on adding value. A for-sale-by-owner isn’t someone to avoid. They own a home, want to sell it, have put up a sign, and believe they’ll save money without an agent, which is rarely the case. You can find them on Zillow without paying for data, on for-sale-by-owner sites, or by pulling over when you pass a sign.

You can even share the research with them. The National Association of Realtors has found that owners typically net less when selling on their own than they would when listing with an agent. What matters most with an FSBO is the willingness to walk alongside them, add genuine value, and be the plan B they turn to if they need one. On average, an FSBO takes about 45 days from putting up the sign to listing with an agent, so a real follow-up plan is what keeps you connected until they’re ready. If the fear of reaching out is what’s holding you back, that’s worth working on first.

3. Don’t overlook the lists you already have. Your open-house leads, your sphere, your past clients, and even the sign calls and buyer leads sitting in your CRM are all sources of listings. A buyer lead can easily turn into a seller lead, because someone who came in looking to buy may well have a home to sell.

In our area, 67% of people are homeowners, a number you can look up for your own market, which suggests that roughly two-thirds of the buyer leads in our database are also seller leads. If you never ask the question, you’ll never uncover the answer. The solution is simple: add one question to the conversations you’re already having, “Do you have any properties you’re thinking about selling in the next few years?” The relationships you’re already nurturing are often where this pays off first.

Every lead-generation lever you’re already using to find buyers can surface listings, too, the moment you add that one question, and none of it requires buying a list. If we can support you in growing your listing business, we’d be glad to hear from you.

Call or text us at 360-800-1334, email us at Jacquelinesmith@place.com, or visit jacquelinesmithleadership.com. Reach out anytime, and let us know if you land a listing because of this.