Blog / / 6 min read
Speed to lead in new-build sales. The first hour counts
The faster your sales office replies to an enquiry, the better your chance of a viewing. In a study published in Harvard Business Review in 2011, firms that contacted a lead within an hour were about 7 times as likely to qualify it. A call answered live is the fastest reply. A form enquiry needs a quick callback.
What the research says about the first hour
The first hour after an enquiry decides whether a sales conversation happens at all. That is the finding of a study by James Oldroyd, Kristina McElheran and David Elkington, published in Harvard Business Review in 2011.
The authors looked at 2,241 US firms. Those that contacted a lead within an hour were about 7 times as likely to qualify it as firms that got in touch later.
Only 37% of the firms replied within the hour.
In new-build sales, qualifying a lead means a conversation after which you know what the buyer is looking for, what they can spend, whether they need a mortgage and when they want to move in. Without that conversation there is no viewing.
How many enquiries go unanswered
Close to half, according to a more recent study of the US property market. In 2024 Mike DelPrete secret-shopped US real estate brokerages.
47% of online enquiries never got a reply from a person. The median reply time was 39 minutes.
| Study | Who it covered | Finding |
|---|---|---|
| Harvard Business Review, 2011 | 2,241 US firms | Contact within an hour: about 7 times as likely to qualify the lead. 37% of firms replied within the hour. |
| Mike DelPrete, 2024 | US real estate brokerages | 47% of online enquiries got no reply from a person. Median reply time: 39 minutes. |
Read together, the two studies say that a fast reply pays and that many firms don't give one.
These are US studies. Why they still apply to your sales office
There is no Polish equivalent. We found no public data on how fast Polish developers' sales offices answer enquiries, or on how many of their calls go unanswered. So the US figures don't carry over one to one.
The mechanism does. Someone buying a flat rarely asks about just one development. In the evening they scroll through listings, send several enquiries and ring several numbers.
Whoever replies first gets to talk about their units first and offer a viewing slot. A sales office that calls back the next day may reach a buyer who has already booked a viewing elsewhere.
What a lead that went cold costs
The same as one that turned into a viewing. You pay for an enquiry when it arrives, however long it then waits for an answer.
- Cost per lead, mass market: 40-90 PLN, typically 60-70 PLN (Seesell, 2026).
- Cost per lead, premium: 90-140 PLN (Seesell, 2026).
- Leads needed per sale: 10 to 50, depending on which agency is estimating (Seesell, Emperial).
At 20-50 leads per sale and 60-70 PLN per lead, one sale costs 1,200-3,500 PLN in enquiries alone. That is our own arithmetic on the agencies' ranges, not a market figure.
Every enquiry left until tomorrow pushes that number up. You have already paid for it, and the chance of a sale shrinks by the hour.
The fastest reply is a call answered live
A call picked up straight away has no response time: the buyer asks and hears the answer in the same moment.
The catch is that your salespeople can't always pick up. They are showing a flat, talking to another buyer, or the office has closed. That is when an AI voice assistant takes the call. It answers from the live price list, books a viewing at the sales office and sends the lead to your CRM right after the call. For what arrives in the evening, see our piece on after-hours calls to the sales office.
Form and portal enquiries are different. The assistant only answers incoming calls and never calls anyone. Those enquiries need a quick callback from a person.
| Where the enquiry comes from | Who replies | How fast |
|---|---|---|
| Phone call, salesperson free | salesperson | straight away |
| Phone call, salesperson busy or office closed | voice assistant | straight away |
| Website form | salesperson calls back | as fast as your team agrees |
| Property portal enquiry | salesperson calls back | as fast as your team agrees |
For forms, one simple rule helps: each day, one named person owns new enquiries and knows how quickly they have to call back.
How to measure your response time this week
In your CRM, compare the time each enquiry arrived with the time of first contact. You don't need any new tools.
- Export the last 30 days of leads. You need the date and time each one arrived and its source: phone, form or portal.
- Find the first contact for each. The first call, e-mail or text from a salesperson. If your CRM doesn't log it, check the phone records and the inbox.
- Work out the gap in minutes. That gives you three numbers: the median response time, the share of enquiries answered within an hour, and the share nobody answered.
- Split the results. Office hours against out of hours, and each source on its own.
Count missed calls like any other enquiry. The response time runs from the buyer's call to your callback.
Then run a test. Send an enquiry through the form on one of your own development websites after 6 pm on a Friday and note when someone gets back to you.
Frequently asked questions
Does the 7x figure hold for the Polish market?
Not directly. It comes from a 2011 study of US firms, and there is no Polish equivalent. Treat it as a rough guide, and measure your own response time in your CRM.
Where does the "21 times in 5 minutes" figure come from?
It is attributed to a study by MIT and InsideSales: contact within 5 minutes instead of 30 was said to make qualifying a lead 21 times as likely. The figure is widely cited, but we only know it from secondary sources. That is why we rely on the Harvard Business Review study.
Does the assistant call back form enquiries?
No. The assistant only answers incoming calls. Your team calls back form and portal enquiries.
What counts as first contact?
The first call or message in which the buyer got an answer from a person or the assistant. An automatic "thanks for your enquiry" e-mail doesn't count.
Where to start
Pick one development and work out its response time over the last 30 days. If the buyers who wait longest are the ones calling in the evening and at weekends, listen to the demo with Zosia. Once you have your numbers, book a 30-minute call and we will show you which of those calls the assistant would answer from day one.
Sources
- Oldroyd, McElheran, Elkington, "The Short Life of Online Sales Leads", Harvard Business Review, 2011, BYU ScholarsArchive
- Summary of the HBR lead response study, Venture Harbour
- Secret shopping US real estate brokerages, 2024, Mike DelPrete
- Cost per lead in the property development sector (in Polish), Seesell
- Cost of a lead for a developer (in Polish), Emperial