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Updated over 8 years ago, 04/03/2016
Guy's can I please get some feed back from the community
So I been debating rather or not to give this letter to a former landlord I rented from! I'm trying to figure out how to go about pretty much asking him to be a mentor, but I find my self struggling with it not knowing what to say. What do you guys think::
Hey Mike. I rented from you I think it was late 2012 early 2013 in your 4plex on elm St. in Wabash. My name is Cody I rented a unit with Sarah until I moved out. I recall you telling me you owned 21 properties throughout Wabash at the time. At the time I had no thoughts at all about getting into Real Estate Investing. Here lately I have been thinking HIGHLY about getting into Real Estate Investing in the Kokomo area. I’ve been listening to ton’s on podcast, blogs, and forums Etc.. I was wondering if I could do a Free part time intern ship with you on the weekends. For a couple months or so. I’m willing to do any physical labor help you clean up a property help rehab whatever dealing with real estate. I’m just trying to get a little bit of hands on experience before I start to purchase some property’s. I would like to just get a little more insight from someone who Is actually in the real estate industry, and that’s been in it for along time. If you find yourself really busy, and just really not wanting to I completely understand. No hurt feeling here. I just thought I would ask. If Interested just give me a call when you can or just shoot me a text whenever.
Of course i added our last names so he can maybe recall who I am just didn't add here for privacy reason's I guess. And also added my phone number of course at the end of the letter. ANY feedback is very much appreciated. Please give your honest opinions if you think its a dumb idea please let me no. Thanks BP!
Hi Cody
I am not a very experience real estate investor, but I would love to add whatever value I can here.
I love your thought process and humbleness. This attitude of yours is gold. Protect it and keep that fire alive as you grow in your real estate investing career.
Few questions for you:
1. Do you live in the vicinity of this potential mentor of yours? (I am asking this to check how feasible will it be for you to keep up your commitment of weekend apprentice)
2. Are you willing to accept grammatical corrections to your letter as well?
3. Have you considered calling him up instead of a formal letter?
Regards
Sachin Acharya
first, are you asking just the guys and not the ladies on biggerpockets.com? cause the title of the thread says "guys".
second... how about not wasting the ink and call him to say, do you need free help for whatever you need (except scrubbing toilets, etc, etc)?
#2 General Landlording & Rental Properties Contributor
You used over 200 words to say - Hey Mike remember me, I rented from you in 2103. Have you ever considered mentoring a young and eager real estate investor.
Don't put the burden on him to call you. If you want a mentor you need to impress him. Fewer words more action. Track him down, take him to coffee.
I would call him and tell him that you want to take him to dinner. You rented from him years ago and are wanting to intern under someone. If he's not interested that's fine but you'll still take him to dinner.
Hey Cody! It is great to see someone trying to better themselves, thumbs up for that!
As for pointers, here is what I would change...
If the guys got 20+ property, he values his TIME more than anything. He won't want to waste his time on someone who he doesn't feel is committed. More importantly, he will only want to invest in you if you can bring him some sort of value. So your goals for this letter should be 1) Tell him what you want 2) Tell him why he wants to help you 3) Sound assertive. Sound confident.
Most importantly I would change the tone you are writing in. This isn't a friendly "long time no see" letter. THIS IS BUSINESS. I would avoid using phrases such as "I think" or "I just thought." Everything you say should have an obvious purpose.
Next I would check the grammatical errors. He may or may not care, but I can't picture this mentor ever reading a letter and saying, "This guys grammar is too good, I don't like him."
Lastly, keep it short and simple, but make your point. Only repeat if you feel it is that important. Do not add details that have nothing to do with those three goals.
Instead of "I recall you telling me you owned 21 properties throughout Wabash at the time. At the time I had no thoughts at all about getting into Real Estate Investing. Here lately I have been thinking HIGHLY about getting into Real Estate Investing in the Kokomo area."
Try " I have become obsessed with learning about investing in real estate and remember you telling me you owned 21 properties."
Also, don't forget to add multiple ways to contact you (phone, email, address, facebook, skype, twitter, instagram, snapchat, myspace, whatever!).
I hope this helps Cody! Last thing I would say is don't expect a reply. I've gotten a very low response rate on contacting other landlords outside of the wonderful bigger pockets community (where I'm still batting 1.000!). If he doesn't reply, don't think it is your letter. It is very possible that he doesn't have the time to even reply to your letter. Don't let it bring you down, just move on to the next actionable step that can advance your RE knowledge!
Thank you for your insight. Can any of you tell me how to go about editing the title? I've been trying to figure out how. Not sure though if there is a way to... I was meaning for anyone to give me some feed back.
@Sachin Acharya for your insight. I am going to being sticking with my humbleness, and ambition while getting into real estate even more. I did reread this a few times and noticed quite a few grammar errors I will correct them before I send it, IF I decide to send it. I live about 20 minutes away from him. I have thought about calling him, but I don't have a phone number for him, or I would.
@George P. No I was meaning Guys as the whole community. I see what your saying though I should of worded the title different. I did consider giving him a call, but I don't have a phone number anymore to reach out to him.
@Thomas S. I notice it is pretty long asking him to pretty much be my mentor. I don't want to straight up ask him to be my mentor though. I'm really trying not to put a burden on him to call me. I'm trying to beat around the bush about it, but not trying to get to ridicules about it. That's why I was asking for some insight from the community to see what some of your thoughts were about it. Yes i'm not the greatest about keeping it short and to the point on the forums I apologize. Also just trying to persuade him a little.
Slight variation on @Thomas S.'s suggestion... Introduce yourself, mention having been his tenant, aspiring to be a rental property owner and that you'll be in the area, then ask him to lunch / brunch / dinner, ... Let the mentoring thing work itself out in conversation. If you get no reply or if you get a "no" reply, don't take it personally.
Also, please learn the correct use of apostrophes and such.
"Cody's" is the singular possessive form (something belongs to Cody).
"Guys" is plural (more than one person).
The rule generally holds true for nouns and other pronouns.
The rule reverses on the word "it", however: "It's" is a contraction of "it is". "Its" (no apostrophe) is the possessive form.
David J Dachtera
"Success is not a destination. Failure is not an event. Success is a process, failure is a choice."
- DJ Benedict
#2 General Landlording & Rental Properties Contributor
My posts are always extremely lengthy, always way too long. But I know better.
If you want to get ahead don't beat around the bush. Straight and to the point, don't waste his time making him wait for you to say what you mean.
And don't write a letter. Man up and meet him in person, or call him on the phone. Letters are for school girls. (in my opinion)
Originally posted by @Cody May:
So I been debating rather or not to give this letter to a former landlord I rented from! I'm trying to figure out how to go about pretty much asking him to be a mentor, but I find my self struggling with it not knowing what to say. What do you guys think::
Hey Mike. I rented from you I think it was late 2012 early 2013 in your 4plex on elm St. in Wabash. My name is Cody I rented a unit with Sarah until I moved out. I recall you telling me you owned 21 properties throughout Wabash at the time. At the time I had no thoughts at all about getting into Real Estate Investing. Here lately I have been thinking HIGHLY about getting into Real Estate Investing in the Kokomo area. I’ve been listening to ton’s on podcast, blogs, and forums Etc.. I was wondering if I could do a Free part time intern ship with you on the weekends. For a couple months or so. I’m willing to do any physical labor help you clean up a property help rehab whatever dealing with real estate. I’m just trying to get a little bit of hands on experience before I start to purchase some property’s. I would like to just get a little more insight from someone who Is actually in the real estate industry, and that’s been in it for along time. If you find yourself really busy, and just really not wanting to I completely understand. No hurt feeling here. I just thought I would ask. If Interested just give me a call when you can or just shoot me a text whenever.
Of course i added our last names so he can maybe recall who I am just didn't add here for privacy reason's I guess. And also added my phone number of course at the end of the letter. ANY feedback is very much appreciated. Please give your honest opinions if you think its a dumb idea please let me no. Thanks BP!
I have to agree with the others on here. Call the guy and say what you wrote. If you don't have his number, do the investigating to get it. Don't be lazy!!! You can stay humble but if you send that letter prepare to be taken advantage of. Free landscaping, painting and toilet scrubbing. How can he lose?
I wouldn't offer to buy him anything, you don't really know what he would want in return. He may just want some help getting one of his units ready to rent. You will learn a lot more from him that way.
Be real! If you want something from him don't waste his time. If he says ok meet me at ***** Friday at 5, be there at 4:45 ready to work. Remember you want something from him, not the other way around.
@Roger Vi Thank you very much for your pointers. They definitely have me thinking a little different about how I should go about writing him, and asking him about it. Thinking about what I typed out. It has me laughing at my self. It doesn't sound very friendly at all, and the grammar is horrible. Grammar definitely is not my strong point at all. As you can obviously notice. I'm also not good at all with communicating with others I try my best. My mind is just constantly going, and never knowing what to say. Social Anxiety is always getting the best of me. Awesome information though that you just gave me it's great. I'm going to retype it, and try to be a little more formal about it, and going to make it shorter, and more to the point. Also going to try not to make it seem so pushy. Your pointers are definitely helpful!! Thanks again.
Call and leave a message if he doesn't answer. Plan out exactly what your message will say and read it if you have to so you're not saying um,er,or something silly. Plan out what you will say if he answers and have questions if he says yes, what do you want to know? It might help to try a few people you aren't as worried about first to build up form and be less nervous.
@David Dachtera, @Thomas S. I'm definitely reconsidering writing him a letter. I understand what your saying Greg. I would honestly rather meet him face to face, and ask him to lunch, or dinner. I don't have a phone number though like I said. I always had to pay rent by money order to a P.O. box. I could actually check public records, and track him down that way. Any other ways you guys can think of on going about finding him? Thanks David for the grammar lesson I was just getting lazy with typing. I realize I shouldn't do that if I'm wanting to run things as a business though. Also I'll admit my grammar never was the greatest.
@Brian Turnbough I'm highly reconsidering writing the letter. My writing skill's are horrendous. I'm going to dig around, and try to find out his number, or approach him face to face. Thanks for the heads up. Sending that letter the way I have it would've definitely put me at risk of being taking advantage of. CAN NOT be having that happen. I'm going to try not to make it seem like he would be wasting his time. I definitely wouldn't be though if he shared his knowledge, I would be more than will to help him out with some of his unit's. Thanks for the insight!!
@Account Closed Thanks for the insight! I would 100% be stumbling my words, and lots of ummm's, and uhhh's. I'm going to try and go about meeting him face to face if I'm able to track him down. I don't think I'm going to write a letter to him. After thinking about it, it does make me feel a little lazy writing the letter. Then again I have I don't know if I'd want to meet him face to face. I'd go blank probably, and not no what to say. As you can probably tell I'm a bit of a nervous person. Thanks again though!!
@Cody May the guy is 20 minutes away from you. If I were you, I would go directly visit him and say something like "Hey, I was just passing by and thought I'll stop to say hi. Not sure if you remember, I have been your tenant before, and I am getting into real estate. By the way, you own a lot of properties, right? That's impressive. Hey, why don't we catch up over coffee?".
I don't intend to give you a script, but just an idea.
The point is, with the letter, the best that can happen is he'll contact you, and you have to do the above talking anyways. The worst that can happen if you visit is he'll kick you out (very unlikely right?)
Look Cody, your strength is your passion and willingness to learn. Use that to your advantage. Grammar and written language is not your best strength. This is why I suggest a face to face meeting rather than a letter.
Most importantly, take action! We are waiting to hear from how it went!