The Luxury Real Estate Playbook: What Laila Hassan Does in the First 72 Hours After Taking a $2 Million Listing

When a $2 million home hits the MLS, most buyers have already heard about it. That is not an accident. For agents operating at the top of the Jacksonville luxury market, the real work begins weeks before the listing goes live — and the agents who understand this are the ones consistently selling high-end properties faster and for more money than the competition.

Laila Hassan, founder of Christie’s International Real Estate First Coast and one of Jacksonville’s most recognized luxury specialists, has spent years refining a pre-market approach that treats every listing like a private event where the guest list is carefully curated before the doors open to the public.

Why Luxury Buyers Are Different — And Why That Works in Your Favor

Before diving into tactics, it helps to understand the psychology of the luxury buyer. Laila has found that clients purchasing homes north of $1.5 million often operate very differently from buyers in the mid-range market — and in ways that actually make the agent’s job more productive.

“People at that level, they’re so much easier to work with sometimes,” Laila explained. “An attorney that’s been an attorney for 20 years knows more than an attorney that’s been an attorney for five years. People want the 20-year attorney. They trust you. They know that you have a reputation for getting things done, and they just let you ride.”

This trust dynamic is the product of demonstrated expertise — not just a brokerage brand or a polished website. Luxury buyers have typically made enough significant decisions in their professional lives to recognize competence quickly. They delegate accordingly. The agent who projects deep market knowledge and decisive confidence earns a latitude that mid-market clients rarely extend.

That said, Laila is careful not to romanticize the segment. She acknowledges that a single $2 million transaction can be more complex and time-consuming than four $500,000 deals, and the commission math — while favorable in gross terms — reflects a lower percentage than many agents assume going in.

The 72-Hour Pre-Launch Strategy

Laila’s answer to what she does in the first 72 hours after taking a luxury listing is revealing precisely because it reframes the question entirely: by the time most agents are thinking about photography and MLS input, Laila has already been selling the home for two weeks.

“I’m starting before the home goes on the market,” she said. “I know a couple weeks in advance at least if I’m putting a home on the market. So I’m already selling that home immediately.”

Her pre-market process follows a specific methodology built around geographic prospecting and agent-to-agent networking.

Step One: Map the Half-Mile Radius

Laila pulls every sale that has occurred within a half-mile of the listing property and identifies the agents who represented those transactions. This becomes her immediate outreach list — regardless of whether those agents are top producers or not.

“At some point somebody sold in that area,” she noted. “I try to hit the top agents that have sold within a half-mile and say, ‘Hey, I’ve got this home coming up. It’s fantastic. It’s got three bedrooms downstairs, two bedrooms upstairs, fully renovated.’ Whatever it is — I’m pushing that listing ahead of time.”

Step Two: Ask the Second-Degree Question

Laila does not stop at simply notifying agents about an upcoming listing. She goes one layer deeper with a question most agents never think to ask: do the buyers who already purchased in this neighborhood know anyone else who might want to live here?

“I’ll call the buyer’s agent that sold a particular property and say, ‘Hey, your buyer that bought there — see if they know anybody. Maybe you can represent them, or maybe you have somebody else looking in that neighborhood,’” she said.

This second-degree prospecting is particularly powerful in luxury markets, where buyers in a specific neighborhood often have professional and social networks filled with people who aspire to live in the same area.

Step Three: Build Anticipation, Not Just Awareness

For high-demand, desirable locations, Laila’s goal is not merely to inform the market — it is to manufacture excitement before the property is available to show. In a segment where buyers are accustomed to deliberating rather than competing, creating a sense of limited availability changes the negotiating dynamic from the start.

“If it’s a listing in a desirable area, I’m giving people heads up to get their clients ready so we can build up some excitement about that listing,” she said. “A lot of these homes that are moving faster or moving for asking price are in a very desirable area.”

The Christie’s Network Multiplier

Laila’s pre-market strategy is amplified by her affiliation with Christie’s International Real Estate, a brand whose 148 Jacksonville agents are collectively closing over $100 million in volume per month. The internal network creates what amounts to a private marketplace that operates in parallel with — and often ahead of — the public MLS.

When Laila picks up a luxury listing, her Christie’s colleagues are among the first to know. Those agents carry their own rosters of qualified buyers, many of whom are waiting for the right property in a specific neighborhood. That internal circulation frequently generates showing activity before a home is ever publicly listed — activity that can translate directly into faster closings and fewer days on market.

Christie’s agents, Laila noted, treat pre-market communication as standard operating procedure — not an optional add-on.

The Concierge Standard in Luxury Real Estate

Beyond the pre-market strategy, Laila describes her overall approach to luxury listings as concierge-level service — a term she uses not as marketing language but as a literal description of how she operates.

“You have to be prepared to do whatever they want you to do,” she said. “I’ll walk up to one of my listings to show it, and there’s a weed in the yard. I’m pulling that weed out before that client gets there. AI is not coming to pull your weeds.”

This hands-on attention extends to how she handles repair negotiations and seller expectations. Laila is unusually direct with both sides of a transaction — a quality her luxury clients appear to value precisely because they are accustomed to straight-talking advisors in their professional lives.

When a seller pushes back on a legitimate repair request, she does not equivocate. When a buyer’s request is unreasonable, she says so plainly. And when she takes a listing she believes may be priced slightly above market, she puts a price-reduction trigger directly into the listing agreement.

“I won’t take a listing that I know isn’t gonna sell,” she said. “If we’re not getting showings in the first two weeks, we’re doing this price reduction. It’s right there in the listing agreement. I’m investing a lot of money to get a house sold — pictures, drones, videos, twilights, Zillow showcase. If I’m going to invest a couple thousand dollars and my time, we’re gonna do it right, or we’re not gonna do it at all.”

What the Luxury Shift Has Meant for Laila’s Business

Laila’s move deeper into the luxury segment was not purely strategic — it was partly the result of a significant disruption to her previous business model. In 2023 and 2024, a large community that had represented roughly 90% of her volume was penetrated by a new agent from within that group. Rather than fight for market share in a community that was no longer exclusively hers, Laila rebuilt.

She joined the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce as a trustee member, expanded her network into new circles, and leaned into the luxury market with the same methodical approach she had applied to short sales fifteen years earlier. The result: that formerly dominant community now represents about 5% of her business, while luxury transactions have become her primary focus and, by her account, a deeply satisfying one.

“I’ve gotten more into the luxury side of real estate, which I really enjoy. I feel like it’s a very service-driven part of real estate,” she said. “I love to sell houses for more than the last one that sold. It just thrills me.”

The Lesson for Every Agent

Laila’s luxury playbook is not reserved for agents already operating at the top of the market. The underlying principles — pre-market outreach, second-degree networking, building anticipation, and delivering concierge-level service — are scalable at any price point. The agent listing a $400,000 home in a desirable neighborhood can apply the same half-mile radius strategy, the same agent-to-agent calls, and the same commitment to show-ready standards that Laila applies to her $2 million listings.

The difference, ultimately, is not the price point. It is the professionalism, the preparation, and the genuine belief that the person on the other side of the transaction deserves to be served at the highest possible level.

In a market where consumers are increasingly capable of identifying who brings real expertise to the table, the agents who thrive will be the ones who treat every listing — regardless of price — like it deserves a concierge.