Speed to Lead in Real Estate: What the Data Says and How to Actually Hit It

Speed to lead is how fast you reply to a new inquiry, and in real estate it decides who gets the client. Mike DelPrete's 2024 secret-shopper study sent more than 100 inquiries to over 25 brokerages during business hours. 47 percent never got a response at all. Of the ones that did, the median reply took 39 minutes and the average took 8 hours and 17 minutes. Zillow tells its Premier Agents to text a new lead within two minutes. Sifta closes that gap for you: when a lead lands, it texts you within seconds with the reply already drafted. You send it from wherever you are.

Here is why the number matters so much. Zillow's own buyer research found 80 percent of recent buyers said their first impression of an agent's responsiveness was very or extremely important. A buyer who fills out a form on a listing is usually filling out three. The first agent who answers like a human gets the conversation. The second gets a polite no. The problem is not that agents are lazy. The problem is where they are at 2:14pm on a Tuesday: in a showing, on a listing appointment, or driving. The lead arrives as an email or a portal notification, the phone is in a pocket, and by the time it comes out the moment is gone. DelPrete's open-house data makes the same point from the other side: 42 percent of agents never collected the visitor's contact information, and a third of those who did never followed up, so 62 percent of in-person shoppers heard nothing. Speed to lead is not a discipline problem. It is a coverage problem. Somebody has to be watching when you cannot be.