Workflow card WC-09.1: Lead source to first response (five versions)
From AI for Real Estate Agents (2026 Edition). Facts in, draft out, licensee signs.

Time: estimate: about 30 minutes, once

Trigger. You want a first-response template for each lead source, in your voice, ready to be filled in and sent within minutes of a lead arriving.

Inputs.

- Your voice file and standing instructions (Chapter 3)
- Your license disclosure line, exactly as your state and broker require
- The five lead sources you actually receive (portal, sign call, open house sign-in, referral, social message); drop any you do not get
- Your preferred next step for each source (a showing, a short call, a reply by text)
- Your calendar link or the way you book showings, if you use one

Brief. (paste everything between the lines)

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Role: You are helping a licensed residential agent write first-response templates for new leads. You only use facts I give you. If you need a fact I have not given, ask instead of guessing.
Facts: My name and brokerage: [name, brokerage]. How I book showings: [method or link]. My disclosure line: "[license disclosure line]". Lead sources I receive: [list].
Audience: A person who has just reached out about a property or about working with an agent, reading on a phone, probably talking to other agents at the same time.
Voice: [paste voice file, or: "Plain, warm, specific. Short sentences. No exclamation points. Sounds like a person, not a brochure."]
Rules: Use only facts I give you; ask instead of guessing. Leave square-bracket fields for anything that changes per lead: [lead first name], [property address or description], [thing they mentioned], [referrer name], [price if asked]. Every version answers what the lead asked and ends with exactly one question that moves the conversation. No language about who should live anywhere or who the neighbors are. No references to schools, safety, churches, or demographics. No claims about any property beyond what I provide per lead. No pressure language ("act now," "will not last"). Each text version includes "Reply STOP to opt out" at the end. Each email version includes "[license disclosure line]" at the end. The text versions must read as written by me, a person, because I will send them myself.
Format: Five labeled sections, one per lead source. In each: (1) a text version under 320 characters, (2) an email version under 90 words with a subject line under 6 words, and (3) a one-line "late version" sentence I can add if I am replying more than an hour later. After the output, list every fact you used and which input it came from.
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Check.

- Read each text version aloud. Cut any sentence you would not say on the phone.
- Confirm every version ends with one question, not two and not none.
- Confirm "Reply STOP to opt out" is on every text version and the disclosure line is on every email version.
- Confirm the bracket fields are the only places a lead-specific fact would go; nothing about a property is hard-coded.
- Run the Fair Housing scrub (P-04.1) on all five sections.
- Send one text version to your own phone. Check how it wraps.

Ship. Load the five text versions and five email versions into your CRM or notes app as templates, named by source. Connect them to the new-lead trigger in Chapter 12 so the draft arrives with the lead. Save the brief to your brief library as "First response, 5 sources, v1."

Compliance check. Ch. 4.3 (license disclosure on first-contact material), 4.6 (calls, texts, and bots), 4.1 (Fair Housing). These templates are sent by you, by hand, so they are not automated marketing; the moment a system sends them without your approval, the consent rules in T-09.2 apply.
