How to get a mass amount of motivated sellers on low budget?

Question

Not having lots of money for marketing is my downfall. There is so much I wish I could do if only I had the money to do it, but I do not have the money to pay for the things I need. I am currently using the direct mail strategy to reach motivated sellers. I would be doing way better if I could be sending out a ton of direct mail all at once. Hopefully, that would get me a least a response or two.I HATE working a 9 to 5 J.O.B. like many people. I hate having to go begging for another JOB opportunity somewhere else even more. Whatever I am spending for marketing is coming out of pocket from what little I earn from my day job. That is not much. How should I go about getting better results from my marketing with a very very low budget? If I do get the money I need for the best results, it would take a few months just to save up the money to pay for it.  I feel like I'm stuck in a bad spot right now trying to figure how I am going to come up with the money I need to fix my situation.

Mike Russ · Answer

@Tony Marcelle - Here is the link below to your county auditor site assuming you are looking near Bessemer, AL.   I briefly looked through the site, you can search records but I do not see a way to run bulk reports might be worth a call to the auditor's office to check.  However, you can find how long people have owned a particular property,  what they paid, their tax information and payments they have made or not made in some instances.

It is a good source to find if people are behind on taxes or if you are looking at multi-family you can look at the purchase date to find landlords that might be ready to move on.  The ability to find this data is significantly enhanced if there is a bulk reporting feature (i.e. show me all duplexes in XYZ school district, sold prior to 1990).  I would call the auditor and tell them what type of report you are looking for and see if they have it online or if you could possible submit a public records request for them to prepare.

Lastly, if you have a specific property or neighborhood you are looking at, the county site has a parcel map that you can use to get specific property data, I included this in the second link below.

Hope this is helpful, let me know if you have any other questions!

-Mike

http://eringcapture.jccal.org/caportal/CAPortal_MainPage.aspx

http://jeffco-al.maps.arcgis.com/apps/View/index.html?appid=b5118cb926c64ebeac59c8d0b01f6e45

Tony Marcelle · Answer

I have never heard of CoStar. My list comes from somewhere else. I am starting to focus my interest on other motivated seller leads that other investors are not targeting. I heard some bad things said about cold calling. How accurate is the truepeoplesearch.com?

Tony Marcelle · Answer

Hi Mike. How do I find my county auditor site? What am I looking for on this auditor site? We're you referring to pre-foreclosure leads?

Mike Russ · Answer

@Tony Marcelle

Hi Tony - I understand your situation because I am currently there but I see my first deal on the horizon.  I scrubbed the county auditor site and found a motivated seller that has owned a property for a long period of time and was ready to move on. I would advise to use your county auditor sites to the max extent, this can be done free of charge in most instances. Find owners that have owned a property for a long period of time. Also, make use of your counties court records site, try to find foreclosures before they make it to the sheriff sale. These are two things only take your time and effort, if you want to to do direct mail or calls after finding the lead, your costs are minimal.

Good luck!

Mike

Tom Shallcross · Answer

@Tony Marcelle - it's not a magic bullet, but you can look to add cold-calling to the repertoire.   Sounds like you already have lists from places like CoStar.  Leveraging those lists you can find phone numbers on free online sites like truepeoplesearch.com and reach out.

I've had luck with absentee-owners.  Just say to them that they might not be the person to help but we saw you were the owner of 123 Main St and we've been purchasing similar SFH/Multi in the area (if you have been, and go ahead and name drop).  We're looking to make another purchase in the next 2-3 weeks and just calling to see if you have any interest in entertaining a cash offer on the property.

You get a lot of no's, a good amount of curious sellers not really looking to sell, but you also get a few yes's in there that would love to sell.  Life events happen and landlording can be very stressful for numerous reasons.  I have a full-time job, but in my spare time started calling a list of 150 absentee owners in a small mile radius and have put a 3 unit, a SFH, and hopefully another SFH (the last SFH is in the closing stages of negotiations) under contract making very minimal calls/week.

List was $150 and obviously have to account for the sweat equity of my time.  If this continues to work, a VA can take those responsibilities to free up more time.