Making offers

[Alan Berlin]

Hello all,

I have been trying to follow BP advice and running the numbers on lots of buy/hold multi-unit properties a day. I come up with about 2 a week that look interesting. I want to make offers that are well below asking price (around 7 CAP range) but all the agents in my area want me to sign a formal offer before discussing it with the seller. I am uncomfortable doing that without seeing the property first. Given that my offer is well below asking price I'd much rather see if the owner would even entertain my offer and then spend the time seeing the property. I've gone the "see the property then make offer" route several times and I'm trying to save time thus allowing me to make offers on more properties.

Do others have similar experiences or am I doing something wrong?  

Thanks ,

Alan