How to Use Facebook Marketplace for Rentals
Facebook Marketplace is a convenient platform for reaching out to potential renters in your market, but is it as robust as it should be? Find out the pros and cons of this popular social media-based option for real estate marketing, both for renters and landlords.
With 2.91 billion monthly active users, Facebook is still the dominant social media platform for users all over the world. That means that if you’re trying to reach the widest possible audience, and reach them economically and conveniently, with your real estate marketing, you can’t afford to ignore Facebook.
When developing social media strategies for real estate and for rental properties, it’s important to tap into already existing resources while keeping in mind their limitations and drawbacks. What does Facebook Marketplace have to offer and how can you use it to market your listings?
Why is Facebook Marketplace a tool landlords should care about?
Facebook Marketplace allows landlords to get their listings in front of a large audience of local Facebook users. The share-ability of content on the Facebook platform means that a desirable listing may be highly discoverable since a friend-of-a-friend can easily share or tag a prospective tenant to notify them of the listing.
For the landlord, Facebook provides a good place to do some preliminary research on the tenant, communicate with them through Facebook Messenger, and otherwise make initial contact. It should not be considered a substitute for a proper screening process and information derived from Facebook profiles should not be used to screen out potential tenants in violation of Fair Housing laws.
How to use Facebook Marketplace for rentals
If you go to an online listing portal, you will see beautifully presented property listings for sale or rent. This is similar to the service that Facebook Marketplace is seeking to provide to landlords and rental agents. Real estate marketing through Facebook Marketplace offers a chance for you to show off your listing to a far larger online audience than you would be able to connect with at an in-person Open House or with scheduled showings.
Creating listing pages in Facebook Marketplace is intuitive and simple:
- Log in to the Facebook account you want to use to post your listing. This could be a personal page or a business page. If you do not yet have a Facebook account, you can make one at no cost.
- Access Facebook Marketplace, either through search or by clicking on the Marketplace icon.
- Click on Create New Listing.
- Click on “Property for Sale or Rent.”
- Upload property photos.
- Consider having your property professionally photographed so that you can include high-quality, hi-resolution images.
- Do not include photos that are blurry or that are of furnishings or other items that don’t communicate anything about the property itself.
- Put photos in a coherent order, perhaps starting with the front of the property, then moving in an orderly manner through the floorplan.
- Fill out the property information with details about the property including the type, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, the address (which may be kept public or private), rental rate, and other details.
- Create a property description that gives people a sense of what the property offers, including notable features, fixtures and finishes, and neighborhood amenities. Make sure that the language you use aligns with the requirements of Fair Housing guidelines for your area.
- Post your listing on the Marketplace only or look for relevant Facebook groups to post to as well.
- Click Publish and your listing will go live for prospective tenants within a specific geographic radius and will be searchable by all Facebook users.
The benefits for renters using Facebook Marketplace
For many renters, the primary benefit of using Facebook Marketplace is the convenience that it offers. Because so many users are already on Facebook, the Marketplace allows them to check out listings while they’re also scrolling through their Facebook feed or getting caught up on content.
In addition, because it feeds listings within a specific radius, Facebook Marketplace may help prospective renters narrow their search. This can be especially useful for those who are looking to rent in a large city and may have trouble finding listings for a specific neighborhood or geographic location.
What Facebook Marketplace won’t do
Facebook Marketplace will not help you with the nuts and bolts of tenant screening, document gathering and finding the right tenant for your rental property. While casting a wide net may get you plenty of fish, you’ll want to make sure you’re only reeling in the ones that are well-qualified both financially and in terms of their rental history.
In addition, landlords need a way to compare potential renters, gather their applications and supporting information, and manage the approval and onboarding processes. While Facebook Marketplace can offer a starting point, a more robust system designed for the full rental lifecycle provides a more integrated approach.
Want to make your real estate marketing matter more to potential tenants? RentSpree listing pages offer an integrated platform for creating beautiful dedicated marketing collateral, screening applicants, and sharing your listing with your sphere of influence and professional network. RentSpree listing pages are simple to create with a user-friendly process that makes your listings stand out from the competition in your market.
