By Colton, Founder of Diviine · Published 2026-06-16 · Category: Real Estate · 7 min read
Connections Plus and Opcity send leads to the agent who responds first. Here is how top performers win the round-robin every time.
Realtor.com is a speed contest
Connections Plus, Opcity, and the newer ReadyConnect product all route the lead to whichever agent claims and replies first. The agent who is asleep, in a showing, or checking email once an hour loses the round-robin every single time. This is not a quality contest at the moment of assignment. It is a speed contest, and only after the buyer replies does quality start to matter.
How the routing actually works
When a buyer submits an inquiry on a Realtor.com listing, the platform pings a pool of agents who have paid for that zip code or price band. The first agent to claim the lead inside the app gets exclusive rights to it for a window of time. If you do not claim it, it rolls to the next agent in the pool. Even after you claim it, the buyer is often still on the site looking at other listings and other agents' profiles, so a slow reply after claiming still loses attention.
The 3 rules top performers follow
- Claim instantly. Median claim time for top-quartile agents is under 30 seconds. Use a push notification, not email, since email checking is the single biggest cause of missed claims.
- Reply by SMS first. Email open rates on Realtor.com leads are weak because buyers treat portal email as noise. SMS gets read almost immediately because it lands next to their texts from friends and family.
- Reference the exact property. A generic opener like "thanks for your interest" reads as automated even when a human typed it. Naming the address and answering the implied question, price, availability, or square footage, gets replies at a much higher rate.
A realistic conversion target
The Realtor.com platform average sits well below what most agents assume, because most claimed leads never get a real reply at all. Top performers combine sub-60-second response, a structured 7-day touch cadence, and a weekly listing nurture for anyone who does not convert immediately. The gap between the platform average and the top-performer number is almost entirely explained by response time and persistence, not lead quality.
A realistic first-week script
Day 0: instant SMS referencing the property, one qualifying question about timeline.
Day 1: follow-up with two similar active listings if no reply.
Day 3: a short check-in asking if they toured anything yet.
Day 7: an email recap with a market note, since some buyers only engage on email by week two.
Objections agents raise about paid portal leads
"These leads are low intent." Some are. But a buyer who filled out a form on a specific listing has already self-identified more than a cold sphere contact. The problem is usually that five agents got the same lead and only one replied fast enough to matter.
"I do not have time to claim leads at 9pm." You do not need to be awake. You need a system that claims and replies on your behalf, in your voice, and hands you the qualified conversation in the morning.
FAQ
Does claiming faster actually change conversion, or is it a myth? It changes conversion because it changes who gets the buyer's attention first. Once two agents have both replied, script quality starts to matter more. But most leads never get a second competing reply, so the first one usually wins by default.
Should I use the Realtor.com in-app messaging or my own SMS? Reply inside the app to claim it, but move the conversation to a direct SMS thread as soon as possible. It gives you a channel the buyer actually checks and keeps the relationship outside the platform's control.
Plug it in
Diviine watches your Realtor.com inbox, claims and replies in under 60 seconds in your voice, and pushes every qualified lead into Follow Up Boss or kvCORE with the full thread attached. See how it compares to running this manually. If you want the mechanics in your own numbers, run the free grader or book a short demo.
What happens after the first reply
Winning the claim and the first reply only opens the door. The buyer still has to decide you are worth continuing with. Keep the second and third messages just as specific as the first: send two comparable listings, note a price change on something they viewed, or offer a same-week showing window. Momentum matters more than polish in the first 48 hours.
Tracking the right numbers on Realtor.com
Track claim time, first-reply time, and reply rate separately from your closed-deal rate. A team can have a great closed-deal rate and still be leaving volume on the table if claim time creeps up during busy weeks. Review these numbers monthly, not quarterly, since portal lead flow shifts with seasonality and ad spend.
Frequently asked questions
How fast must I respond to a Realtor.com Connections Plus lead?
Inside 60 seconds. The platform routes the lead to the next agent if you do not claim and reply quickly; top-quartile agents claim in under 30 seconds.
What is a good Realtor.com lead conversion rate?
The platform average is roughly 2.5% lead-to-closed-deal. Agents with a true sub-60-second response and a structured 7-day nurture run 7 to 12%.
Does Diviine work with Realtor.com Connections Plus, Opcity, and ReadyConnect?
Yes. Diviine ingests the lead email, claims it, replies in your voice via SMS and email inside 60 seconds, and syncs the contact and thread back to your CRM.
About the author
Written by Colton, Founder of Diviine. Diviine is the AI inside sales agent for real estate, answering every inbound lead in under 60 seconds across email, SMS, web chat, and voice.
Keep reading
More on answering leads faster in the Diviine blog, or measure where you stand with the free speed to lead grader. Plans and the 30-day pilot are on pricing.