The last two months of mailings have yielded some of the best response rates so far. I’m very excited about this and even more so because the quality of the responses have been good as well. I have been concentrating my direct mail towards Out of State owners and areas where Lance and I have been driving around and recording addressed of houses that look to have investment potential (I call these Driving for Dollar leads). Out of State Owners The Out …
Offer Accepted!
This news deserves a post of it’s own… Lance just informed me that our offer on the Cracked (aka duraflame) House was Accepted! With a buyer in place already this looks to be our first wholesale deal. Contracts are being prepared as I type. More details will follow as we progress, stay tuned…
Inching Closer To Our First Deal
First I want to apologize for not putting out a Marketing Monday post earlier this week. I wanted to write up a post about how my mailers have been doing but just never got a chance to do so. The phones have been ringing off the hook this week after I sent out 200+ letters and we’ll at get a chance to view some more houses soon. On to the good news… MLS Access Resolution I finally got my MLS access activated …
A Cracking Good Deal?
Lance and I have been in negotiations with a seller on a 3 bed 1.5 bath house. This past week we (We meaning Lance) were finally able to get inside the house to take a look. Have you ever seen the show Hoarders? This place might fall a bit short for that show, but it was definitely a mess. The first time Lance and I went to the house, the owner was not there so we just were able to …
Marketing Monday: Mystery Solved Plus An Excel Tip!
After getting another 20 “return to sender” direct mail pieces from the same list, totaling 40 now, I knew there was something I did wrong. After a little digging I figured out that I accidentally used the property street address with the owner’s city, state and zip as the recipient address. DOH! What a waste of $30 in stamps. So, how did I make this mistake? It was a combination of excel formulas and me being in a rush. I …
Real Estate Investor Website Tip #4: Setting Up A Free Blog
One of my most important tools for networking and meeting other real estate investors is this blog. It makes it easy for other investors to find me instead of me always having to hunt them down at REIAs or through other means. That’s huge because I don’t have a lot of free time after I get done marketing to home owners and dealing with the responses. Blogging isn’t for everyone, but you should definitely give it a try so you …
More Confusion with my Real Estate License
In my post last week (Real Estate License Stuck in Limbo) I figured out why my mls account was suspended and was told by the NCJAR that I needed to get my transfer forms filled out and signed by my “New” broker and include a $15 check. Well there seems to be more to the story then just that… I called up my broker and explained the situation to the nice lady at Realty Executives. I figured I’d be told …
Marketing Monday: What To Do With “Not Deliverable”
I send out, on average, 80 letters each week to Out of State Owners and addresses that we get from driving for dollars. I get the mailing addresses from the tax records, clean them up a bit and then import the list into SI Lead Manager so I can print out the letters. The process works pretty good. Normally I would get 2 to 3 returned envelopes each week for a variety of reasons… No Such Address Left No Forwarding …
Real Estate License Stuck In Limbo
Last week I found out that my mls access had been suspended for some reason unbeknownced to me. I tried to contact them last week by email and phone but couldn’t reach anyone because of some strange holiday hours. This was kinda pissing me off because I had just paid the $450 North Central New Jersey Realtors association fee so my account wouldn’t get suspended. When I spoke to the NCNJRA yesterday I found out that they did have my license …
Marketing Monday: How To Categorize This Caller?
Working a full time job during the day makes it impossible for me to answer most of the phone calls I get from people responding to my direct mail marketing. Not only that, but finding the time to return all the calls is near impossible as well. There are lunch times, or while you are cooking dinner or before going to the gym. How many calls can you actually return in a given day before 8pm? Not a lot, at …
What A Pain!
Over the past few weeks, pretty much the entire month of April, I haven’t logged into the MLS at all. Lance has access as well and he’s been sending me the comps for properties that we’ve needed to get the ARV on and I’ve been concentrating on getting as many mailers out as possible. Well today I went to log in and I was greated by this message…. Your account is currently suspended. Please contact GSMLS for further information I …
Must Read Blog Posts & 36 Days Down
I am actually having a little bit of writer’s block today so I decided to link to some of the best blog posts I’ve read the last few weeks. One of the best ways I know of at getting your mind focused and thinking outside of the box is to read other people’s thoughts. If you get the chance, read some of the posts below and tell me what you think. Great Blog Posts That I’ve Read This Week …
Marketing Monday: Dealing With “Those” Calls
I get about 10 calls a week from my direct mail marketing and almost with out fail the callers have been nice. I’ve counted myself lucky so far as the harshest of calls has been the person who asked me “what kind of scam I am running“. Another not so pleasant response was a guy who mailed back my letter with large words written in sharpie saying “Get a Real JOB!” Sending out letters to people going through probate can …
We Heard Something That We’ve Never Heard Before
Lance and I have been having pretty good success with getting the phones to ring from our direct mail marketing. This represents and huge step forward from where we were back before the new year. On average we are getting 10 to 15 calls a week and the amount is only limited by the number of mailers I can afford to send out. Out of the all the callers, we end up looking at about 2 or 3 houses a …
Real Estate Investing Websites Tip #3: Picking A Host
The Web Host is where all your websites will be stored and served to your viewers. Without a host you cannot create a website. Over the years I’ve tried out a few web hosts and have settled on 1and1 for now. It’s been very reliable and has allowed me to do what I’ve needed. Other hosts I would highly recommend are Hostgator, Bluehost and HostMonster. They all offer similar packages so choosing just comes down to personal tastes, feel and …