# How fast should an estate agent reply to an enquiry? > How fast should an estate agent reply to an enquiry? Why minutes matter, what a useful first reply says, and targets for portal, social and web leads. Source: https://owlvox.com/blog/estate-agent-enquiry-response-time Published: 2026-10-02 Category: Lead response ## In short - An estate agent should send a useful reply to a new enquiry within minutes during opening hours, and in any case before the buyer has heard from another agency. - An automatic acknowledgement is not enough for a property enquiry: a useful first reply answers the buyer's question, offers two or three real viewing times and asks a qualifying question. - Sensible response targets for an estate agency are 15 minutes for portal enquiries during opening hours, a reply while the buyer is still on their phone for social messages, and within the hour for Facebook lead ads. - Meta only lets businesses send free-form WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger messages within 24 hours of the customer's last message, so a Friday evening DM should not wait until Monday. It is Friday, 19:42. A buyer on the train home finds a three-bedroom semi on a portal, likes the garden and presses the enquiry button. She does the same on two similar houses listed with two other agencies. Your branch closed at six, the manager is at a valuation that overran, and the negotiators are out on the last viewings of the week. By Saturday lunchtime one of the other agencies has replied, offered her 10:30 on Sunday and asked whether she has a mortgage in principle. Your reply goes out on Monday at 09:20. It is polite, accurate and too late. This article covers how fast is fast enough, what a first reply needs to say, sensible targets for each channel, and how to hit them without asking your team to live on their phones. ## The short answer is minutes, not hours During opening hours, aim to send a useful reply to a new enquiry within minutes, and in any case before the buyer has heard from anyone else. Once a buyer has a viewing booked with another agency, your house is competing for the second slot of their Saturday, not the first. Most agents know this from experience. The enquiries that turn into viewings are rarely the ones answered the next morning. That is not because buyers are impatient. It is because they asked three agencies the same question and one of them answered. ### Buyers enquire with several agencies at once Nobody browses one agency's stock. A buyer looking for a three-bed within a mile of a particular school will enquire on every house that fits, and in most towns those houses are spread across several agencies. Each enquiry takes them a few seconds. Your reply is one of several that may arrive. That changes what speed is for. You are not replying quickly to seem keen. You are replying quickly because the first agency to offer a sensible viewing time usually gets it, and a buyer with a full Saturday has less appetite for a fourth house. ### Lettings run on a shorter clock In lettings the window is tighter still. A well-priced two-bed flat can attract more applicants than there are viewing slots, and the tenants who see it first are the ones who get to apply. A tenant who messages at lunchtime and hears back the next afternoon has often already viewed something else. ## What counts as a useful reply Speed only helps if the reply moves things forward. "Thank you for your enquiry, a member of the team will be in touch shortly" is an acknowledgement. It tells the buyer you received their message, which they already knew. A useful first reply does three things: - It answers the question they asked: is it still available, is there parking, is it chain free. - It offers two or three real viewing times from the diary. - It asks one or two qualifying questions: buying or renting, a property to sell or not, mortgage in principle or not. ### An example A portal enquiry asks whether the semi on Elm Road has off-street parking. A useful reply says yes, there is a driveway for two cars, offers Saturday at 10:30 or Monday at 17:45, and asks whether the buyer has a home to sell. One message answers the question, offers a slot and starts qualifying. The buyer can say yes from their phone. ## Sensible targets for each channel Channels behave differently, so it helps to set a target for each rather than one rule for everything. ### Portal enquiries These usually arrive as emails in a shared branch inbox, which is where they tend to wait. During opening hours, treat them like a ringing phone. Fifteen minutes is a demanding target, but a realistic one if a named person owns the inbox. ### WhatsApp, Instagram DMs and Messenger People who message expect a conversation, not a letter, so reply while they are still holding the phone. There is also a hard rule here. Meta only lets a business send free-form messages on WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger within 24 hours of the customer's last message. A DM from Friday evening first read on Monday morning is outside that window, and your options for replying narrow considerably. ### Facebook lead ads Someone who fills in a lead form has just tapped an advert. A few hours later they may not remember which agency it was. Call or message within the hour, while the advert is still on their mind. ### Website forms and missed calls Website enquiries are often the most considered, because the person went looking for you. They are also the ones most likely to sit in an inbox nobody checks at weekends. A missed call with no voicemail is an enquiry too, so check the call log before deciding the phones were quiet. ## Where the minutes actually go Few agencies are slow on purpose. The time usually leaks out in the gaps between people and channels. - Portal enquiries go to a shared inbox that everyone assumes someone else is watching. - Instagram DMs reach the marketing manager, who is not a negotiator and is not sure which properties are under offer. - WhatsApp messages land on a negotiator's own phone, so when they are on holiday the conversation goes with them. - Saturday brings plenty of enquiries and also takes everyone out of the office on viewings. - After the branch shuts, nothing happens until the morning. That last gap deserves its own plan, and we look at the options in [out-of-hours property enquiries](/blog/out-of-hours-property-enquiries). ## What to change this week None of this needs new software to start. It needs a clear picture of where you are and a few decisions written down. 1. **Measure where you are.** Take your last 20 enquiries across every channel. Note when each arrived and when the first useful reply went out, not the automatic acknowledgement. 2. **Give every channel an owner.** One named person per shift for the portal inbox, social messages and the website form. Put the names on the rota, not in someone's head. 3. **Hold back viewing slots.** Keep two or three slots a day free for new enquiries, so negotiators can offer a real time in the first reply instead of promising to check the diary. 4. **Write three reply templates.** One for sales, one for lettings, one for a property that has gone under offer. Each should offer viewing times and ask about buying position or move date. 5. **Decide who covers lunch, Saturdays and after six.** If the answer is "whoever notices", that is the problem in one sentence. 6. **Check again in a fortnight.** Run the same 20-enquiry check and see which channel is still slow. ## Where Owlvox fits Owlvox answers enquiries the moment they arrive on WhatsApp, Instagram DMs, Facebook Messenger, Facebook lead ads and website forms, in English, French or Arabic, day or night. It asks what a good negotiator would ask (budget, bedrooms, area, timescale, buying or renting), searches your own listings and only quotes properties you actually have. A near-miss is offered as a maybe and named as one, and if nothing fits, it says so. It remembers the conversation across channels, so nobody repeats their budget. Once it has a phone number and enough context, it can call the buyer with an AI voice agent, within your calling hours and with consent recorded, and book the viewing into the diary with a reminder the day before. Anyone who asks for a person is handed straight to your team. It is in early access. You can see [how Owlvox works](/how-it-works), and if it suits your branch, [request early access](/early-access?from=blog). ## Frequently asked questions ### How quickly should an estate agent respond to a property enquiry? Within minutes during opening hours, and before the buyer hears from another agency. Buyers usually enquire on several properties with several agencies at once, and the first agency to send a useful reply with a viewing time tends to get the viewing. A reply the next morning is often too late for a weekend slot. ### Is an automatic acknowledgement email enough for a property enquiry? No. An acknowledgement confirms that the enquiry arrived but does not answer the buyer's question or offer a viewing. A useful first reply answers what was asked, offers two or three real viewing times and asks a qualifying question, such as whether the buyer has a property to sell. ### Do lettings enquiries need a faster response than sales enquiries? Usually, yes. Well-priced rental properties often attract more applicants than there are viewing slots, and tenants who view first tend to apply first. Treat a lettings enquiry like a ringing phone and offer a viewing time in the first reply.