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blaklabrat

Multitasking

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Ok so I've been scouring the all-knowing and all-powerful Internet :bow: and I've occasionally come across speed bumps. I thought I'd mention how I roll across these bumps by some simple multitasking in case anyone else runs into problems.

 

I was looking mostly on craigslist at first and kept coming across other investors. I tried FSBO.com and came across very little that could help me (most of them seem overpriced, or just more than what the tenant/buyers I've come across are willing to pay). So I started checking out Zillow and with their Make Me Move option that they allow some homeowners to list their houses under I think I've found some pretty promising leads.

 

Now the multitasking. Zillow might give a phone number of the owner to contact for such properties (the properties that are for sale always try to get you to contact a buyers agent), but they don't really provide a name or address or even email sometimes!! So I just go to my county assessors website, plug in the address, and w00t! there is the mailing address of an obviously absentee owner (in an apartment, no less). I can see that the last time the home was sold last in 2004 and it's 2010 market value is $111,642. Still no email address, but I figure I can send a nice note (or maybe even give a nice ring on the celly) and ask if he'd be interested in lease purchasing. From what I gathered from my google snooping he's 27.

 

At the risk of sounding creepy, these are ways I've found to use the Internet to help me look for sellers. I've also made an excel spreadsheet cuz I realized it is entirely too hard to remember what Clist ad I emailed when they respond (eek!), and I need to be more organized.

 

This might be child's play to some of you vets, but I thought I'd share the (cheap) methods I've been using to get info. I also ran across another investor today on clist. Her and her husband just rehabbed a nice house and are trying to sell. She said she'd be interested in doing a lease purchase if they can't find a buyer in about a month or so. I'll be meeting them at my first REI club meeting Wednesday! She was very friendly.

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Awesome job getting things rolling! Keep building momentum and do NOT let it die down!

 

You're using the internet resources in a great way, you're playing "Detective" to get the information you need.

 

Guessing that since he bought it in 04 he's probably upside down on the mortgage or very VERY little equity, so it might be a short sale situation or maybe a lease purchase. If I were interested in the property and wanted to talk with the owner, I'd send a yellow letter just saying:

 

"Hi *name*

 

I'm interested in potentially purchasing your house at 123 Main St.

If this is something you'd like to discuss, please call me at 555-1234

 

Thanks

-Ayse

555-1234

 

P.S. If you are not interested in selling your house right now, hang on to this letter in case things change in the future!"

 

or something to that effect. If he's the slightest bit interested, he'll give you a call after 1, 2, or maybe 3 letters over the next several weeks.

 

That's my approach for getting ahold of specific property owners.

 

Or you could just go put a "RENT TO OWN" sign with your number in his front lawn. I betcha he'd be on the phone with you REAL quick.

 

(Just have a good story ready about an assistant who's bad with directions and must have put the sign on the wrong property... then transition to what he wants to do with the property since you're on the phone anyway haha)

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Or you could just go put a "RENT TO OWN" sign with your number in his front lawn. I betcha he'd be on the phone with you REAL quick.

 

(Just have a good story ready about an assistant who's bad with directions and must have put the sign on the wrong property... then transition to what he wants to do with the property since you're on the phone anyway haha)

B) That'll get the phone ringing in a hurry!

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HA! Sounds like the time I had the locks changed on the wrong house...seriously..oops!

He called about the house because of my sign, and I started telling him the details, and he cut me off...he said..that's my house!!!

Oh....er...

so I gave him the lockbox code...

He said "Lockbox? For what?"

"Oh..yeeeahh...um..I had your locks changed..."

"WHAT?!"

I let him keep the lockbox....

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B)

Wow, I can imagine he was pissed.

 

I'm thinking I may have to direct mail my potential sellers. It worries me because of my limited budget, but it seems like all the free online resources are flooded with investors trying to do the same thing. Finding tenant/buyers isn't a problem, but finding sellers definitely is (I read that here even before I was informed by yet another investor I came across on Clist).

 

To cut down on the pricing, I think I'll hand-write and mail my yellow letters myself (although I imagine this is not very efficient and maybe even more expensive because of postage?). I have the time to do it (I got to work a full week last week, but I'm back to not even being on the schedule for this week), but I don't know if I would be able to get enough mail out to get quality leads.

 

John, how do you get the listings that you mail to? Do you have an agent in your pocket? I met an agent two weeks ago that wants to get into investing and I think I might be able to use her, but what kind of incentive could I offer for her help? I read here that some people just tell the agent they'll send people they can't work with to the agent, but this agent I met is a buyer's agent. This method wouldn't work with them, would it?

 

I might also resort to some cold calls ><. I think I have a pleasant enough voice that people won't yell at me too bad (naivete).

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Michael - A really good friend of mine taught me the sign in the front yard trick. I've never done it myself, but he told me it worked DAMN good. He gave me some other super-sneaky surefire ways to get ahold of sellers, but that's for another day B)

 

John - Would you rate that as the funniest thing you've ever experienced in real estate? LOL

 

Ayse -

 

You'll have to get used to talking with sellers and buyers on the phone sooner or later. Trust me, I tried to find a way to avoid it, but nothing happens until you're talking with sellers and buyers on the phone. Email, letters, text blasts, etc. are all great ways to get TO the phone call, but I'd recommend talking with as many sellers as possible, even if you have NO idea what to expect. Don't EXPECT to get yelled at, but at the same time be ready for just about ANYTHING. The coolest part about talking on the phone is that all you have to do is click a button and it's OVER. Anyone who treats you disrespectfully, get off the phone with them quickly and politely (or not). You don't want to do business with them.

 

Yellow letters cost me .60 ea (give or take a few pennies for ink allowance and screw-ups) out the door, and I know I could get that number down a little bit more by buying envelopes and paper online rather than Staples.

I know what it's like working with a (very) limited budget, and the good news is: You can do this with almost NO money.

It's easier if you've got some $$$ to play with, but it's not really too much harder to get deals done with NO money.

Keep at it! :P

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That was pretty funny.

 

Then my Dallas guy was showing a house, and when the people looked in the garage, there was a car on blocks in there.

the guy said That cars been jacked and stripped!"

My rep said something to the effect of "Oh...no..that's probably just the owners....um..he said he had some stuff here."

"No..I know....that cars hot!" Welll.yeah, of course it was..my rep left and told the owner he may want to call the cops.

 

I went to pick up a sign in a golf course community and it was on the side of the house, so I got it, and was going to put it back up, and the drunk a$$ neighbor that just got off the course brought a golf club over pi$$ed at me because my sign attracts thieves and rapist blah blah blah"..my kids were in the car...I actually had to call the cops.

 

There was an investors house I went to look at and you could still hear rats running thru the walls.

 

I had a house with a pool that wasn't taken care of, so I took my girls over there to catch frogs out of the pool.

 

There was a house owned by someone from overseas, and I agree to meet him to look at his house, and he had his little girl trained to start spraying Lysol thru the house as soon as she walked in, so I'm standing there and she starts spraying Lysol with no warning all over the house starting right in front of me so now I have Lysol in my eyes...as I'm crying like a baby, he asks me to please be quiet because he has to pray to allah before the sunsets, and he lays out a carpet and prays to allah...and I can't see a damn thing...

 

An agent that used to work for me had a listing, that we USED to have, and I just gave it to him to list, and pulled it form LTB, and he gave someone that called on it the lockbox code....turns out she was a crack whore transient and he had to evict her...she got to live for about 6 weeks for free..THank god it wasn't via LTB..or I could have been hosed..careful who get your lockbox codes.

 

We evicted someone and as they left with their big pickup, they put a chain around the big columns on the front porch and tried to pull the porch down.

 

I had a house that the foundation was so bad it made you dizzy. The people I was showing it t made a comment, and I told them it would be fine as long as they didn't have an aquarium.

 

My ex partner got an e-mail from a lady that he had met with and she could afford to pay attention. She e-mailed him and he meant to hit Fwd to me, but hit REPLY and said "Hey, do you have anyone that will let a fat chic with no teeth and no credit into a house?"

 

I can't make this stuff up.

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I made a couple of calls today. Only got one answer. It wasn't too painful, actually the woman was so busy that she didn't even let me ask any questions except if the house was still for sale. She said yes, rattled off the address to me and told me to drive by and call her if I was still interested... umm, no thanks. Then I realized that she had another house advertised in the same paper so she is probably an investor (since they are both "remodeled") and might be the same investor I was emailing yesterday ^_^ No biggie, though. I mustered up the courage to call and that was a good step for me. Gave me enough gas to call the absentee guy I mentioned in the beginning of this thread. He didn't answer, but I left a voicemail expressing my interest. I will still be sending him a nice yellow letter. I think I'll go somewhere and buy a legal pad to scribble notes on.

 

I got another response from an email also. It was a negative, but I am starting to feel like all the NOs I am getting are driving me toward getting some YESes.

 

And I'll be ordering the manual first thing in the morning. YAY!! I'll be sitting in front of the door waiting for it to get here (Scott Pilgrim style). J/k. I'll be on the comp searching for leads!! Bring them to me! I think I'll also buy my URL tomorrow. And maybe register my dba name... it's only $15 on the secretary of state's website.

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I don't see the need for registering your business name at this point, but the naked investor manual will be the best $97 or whatever it costs you'll spend!

 

Good job on making the calls! Picking up the phone was the hardest part for me, but it'll become more comfortable after while ^_^

And the "yes"s are hidden in a big pile of "No"s, so it's your job to dig through the pile and toss aside all the No's (to follow up with later!) and be ready for when you do find a "Yes"

Welcome to PROSPECTING!

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NICE!!!!! Thanks for sharing those!

And that's over how many years? ^_^

 

8 years....

There was also the lady I showed a house to, and her hubby was overseas in the military.

She liked the house, got me the app and I followed up via e-mail a couple days later to try to get things wrapped up.

I said something about "Let me know if you want to hook up over at the house this week and I can get earnest money so I can take it of the market."

The hubby saw the e-mail and sent me a threatening e-mail about how he was gonna do this and that when he got back, and I should be careful what I say to women...

Apparently he thought his wife,(who I thought looked like she' been maimed in a bullfight), was really hot, and that the reference to "hood up"..was really to..."hook up"

They didn't get the house.

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UGGGHH!!! Now I have to wait until Friday to order the manual. Apparently my husband thinks a laptop is more important than me learning how to make us thousands.. We could buy 5 laptops!! or one really good Mac laptop ^_^

 

oooh! I have another question. Do any of you have a certain time that you call prospects? I'm always up early (before 8am) and I'll find something and think maybe I shouldn't call until 9am. And my husband says that you shouldn't call people on Sundays??? Does anyone find a certain time of day or day of the week to sort of be "off limits", or just more likely to produce irate sellers?

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whoo! glad I am getting some practice talking to people on the phone. I've made three calls this morning... one house was already sold, one said her husband wasn't interested in a lease purchase (although she seemed to be, i should given her my number and told her to give me a call if they change their mind), and the last woman was so nice she took over the conversation. She assumed that I wanted to buy the house for myself and agreed that they might consider a lease purchase if the house doesn't sell. She then went on to explain that if me an my husband need anything we can ask. I feel kinda bad about that one. But! Practice makes perfect right? I've gotten over the fear of actually dialing the phone. What comes out of my mouth after that is sort of up in the air. I'm just having a hard time telling people that I'm an investor. I've read that a lot of people have this problem because of the negative connotation associated with real estate investors. How do you get over that??

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Investor indeed does have negative connotations. . .especially here in south FL, where we seem to be a Who's Who of real estate scams and Ponzi schemes, (remember my Bernie Madoff reference last week ^_^ )?

I prefer to intro myself as the owner of a property management company, offering a unique service to the homeowner. I'm still called dirtbag, reprobate, and other assorted synonyms for the lowest form of life, but with much less frequency. ;) But the reasonable ones listen and I can explain myself and go from there.

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Yeah! I wiki'd Bernie Madoff a couple days ago. Whew, I can imagine he made it hard out there for a pimp.

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