REI Reply - Too Good To Be True?

[Tucker Cummings]

Wondering if any wholesalers or other investors have used this software service, REI Reply. Seems too good to be true and wisdom tells me that it probably is. But hey, maybe they've cracked the code or something. I think this is a relatively new service, just kicked off in April.

https://www.reireply.com/

Has anybody used this yet and have results that they could share? If it's legit, I might put it into my toolbelt.

Thanks BP Homies!

[Harold Pena]

Yes, now they're answering... but not this morning! and i could give you a thousand reasons why would anyone want to take money! and please first at all, read my entire post with the updates, before you try to explain the obvious! Thank you for your answer and your help!

[Curt Smith]

I've had support call me Sunday afternoon!!! Geeze folks. Join their FB group: REI Reply - Wholesale Automation Software

They are a new small company.  I've been using them to send SMS for about 2 mo now.  It works, they help quickly per my experience.  But I will agree reireply is a very feature rich marketing app and to get started takes some trial and error.

Join the FB group, and if yoiu still need getting started help PM me I might be able to give a few helps.

But hey, you can try out other SMS marketing ytools too;  leadsherpa,  batchleads.io (??),  theautomatedrei.com (simple to learn).  Reireply's value is not so much in the low monthly $49/mo or twilio's low SMS costs 1 cent +/-, its in the full featured campaigning features.  Which to get started you don't need I admit.   It does work nice with propstream for lead up load/skip trace (10 cents each). 

Take care, all.

[Eric F.]

After 4 pages of people with 5 posts saying it changed their lives I was ready to write it off but @Curt Smith is the real deal in my eyes. If he says it is good stuff I believe it. I'm going to give it a try. Even if it does turn out to be terrible I've burned way more than 49 dollars on way dumber stuff in real estate, that is for sure.

edit

He probably does not remember it, but years ago I reached out to him and he gave me some great advice on a niche form of real estate investing, which is why I am saying if it is good enough for him it should be good enough for me. 

[Mohammad A.]

So I know I'm a little late here lol... but I really like the idea of automated campaigns and follow up, plus a fully integrated CRM. The only thing im wondering is if this tool can pull property data like propstream does, because I'd really like to just have one system. Does it have the ability to create targeted property lists with real updated homeowner information and filter it in different ways?

Thanks all

[Curt Smith]

@Mohammad A.  There is no one tool that rules them all.  Freedomsoft.com was developed to be that one place, leads, marketing, CRM, automated offers blabla.   I have not heard they added SMS.  But haven't checked recently.   I can't say how it stacks up to the latest wave of SMS / RVM tools like reireply etc.  Reireply users me included also have propstream for leads, which reireply has a good integration with the output CSV formate from propstream into reireply's skip trace upload (10 cents ea).

FWIW you can find the latest SMS tools via googling:  SMS marketing tool,  Also search in youtube where the wholesalers mention their latest tooling;  leadsherpa and the like.  Just lead management and campaigning, with varying degrees of campaign management vs just one shot send a batch of SMS and manual repeats.  You need to study each tool, is the world we live in for now.

My first hand experience with a few data sources and propstream is that I know of no wider data set then propstream. Connected Investors tool ?? TIP/RIP forgot is young I tried 4.0, they are at 5.0. Tested propelio and young too. I have not recently looked at reipro. Propstream having MLS + mortgage + lien + bankruptsy in my state. Some other states it has late on taxes, divorce, but as court data goes each area has its problems for tools like propstream to pull.

I've got about 3200 leads I'm actively SMS'ing to in reireply.  SMS is cheap but not a golden goose.  Lots of mad home owners replying stop and other bad karma things.   I have got one lead that was a prefect fit for my quest via SMS;  (sub to sellers due to covid etc financial stress) but the house was not what I would want to rehab so after meeting at the house I never followed up.   I did just close on a sub to that also matches my view of a ramp up into 2021 stressed owners due to covid job loss / stress selling their house to me 4 weeks ago sub to, my costs:  $2k to the seller 1.5k closing costs... Thats it!  Creative financing is making money with knowledge,,, LOL and other peoples money and mortgages.  But 25k rehab later the house is shaping up to be a nice rental on someone elses mortgage.

My point is SMS and especially RVM are not perfect technologies, just they are cheaper then post cards to do a 9 touch campaign to 1000's of leads.  There's legal issues of acting like spam and new regs coming on line etc.  So if you do get into cold call SMS you really need to be soft spoken, kind, and sound reasonable.  Any harsh message is just going to make alot ALOT of folks mad.  IE "I've contacted you 5 times already are you there?  This is my last and final offer to buy your house".  This NOT how you are smart in SMS.  I see these stupid post card messages on my rentals all the time.  Some idiot 20' yr old type wording make us older owners / investors mad (and laugh at how stupid a message).

In SMS you really have to think about short, kind, reasonable, messanging.  More so then with DM post cards.

This is my reireply 1st sms out to the home owner, the message varies over a 9 touch 4 weeks between campaign;

Hi {{contact.first_name}}. My wife and I like the area of your house at {{contact.address1}}. Are you interested in selling? We specialize in helping owners who maybe having financial struggels and need to sell to move on in their lives... Wishing you and your family to be safe, Curt

== I still get negative replies, some very negative. There's alot of negativity out there. I'd hate to have to deal with any of those folks! REI'ers are a great bunch to hang with. :) LOL

[Eric F.]

A week in and my review is basically: This software is 75% of the way to being awesome, but the missing 25% really hurts it. The learning curve is really large and it has some limitations that really hurt how I feel about it. A few small tweaks and it could be really good. 

[Eric F.]

I'm starting to lean towards this having enough problems that despite the massive monthly cost savings, this program just is not consistent and reliable enough if this is your business instead of a hobby. For example, I was told you can send 100 texts per number each day, and I was under the impression all 100 went out within like 10 minutes, but they go out in such highly spaced batches it just isn't worth it. You have to know when your initial text goes out, because the response is going to be instant, and you better reply to their reply instantly, but if you don't know they are going out then you cannot make sure you are there. My personal experience is if you don't respond to a text within say 5 minutes you are probably not talking to that person ever.

The other day I sent 100 texts, got some responses, and assumed they all went out. A couple of hours later I guess round 2, maybe the second 50, went out, which I was not ready for, and I missed the window to respond timely. 

I'd rather spend 300 a month on a subscription + texts on batchskiptracing and actually know when my stuff goes out vs 75 a month on a subscription and texts on this software and have no idea when all my texts are going out, not being able to stop a campaign unless I delete it, and just praying that the complicated steps I took when setting up my campaign don't backfire, or crash, or nothing goes out, or whatever.

[Kyle Johnson]

I'm new to real estate investing I literally just made this profile I have like 12000$ in savings 

my thought is shoot even if they have my cc I can just cancel the whole cc and report fraud 

im considering getting rei reply because I know the cost of technology my experience is in digital marketing

im 25 and I'm laughing at the people who can't afford a 49$ loss at maximum

and you are calling yourself a investor?

what the heck

49$ is chump change 

Don't allow yourself to be a chump

[Kyle Johnson]

I'm new to real estate investing I literally just made this profile I have like 12000$ in savings 

my thought is shoot even if they have my cc I can just cancel the whole cc and report fraud 

im considering getting rei reply because I know the cost of technology my experience is in digital marketing

im 25 and I'm laughing at the people who can't afford a 49$ loss at maximum

and you are calling yourself a investor?

what the heck

49$ is chump change 

Don't allow yourself to be a chump

[Curt Smith]

@Eric F.  Actually the pacing of sending is what I've been wanting in reireply.   It reduces your chance of getting tagged as a spammer.  BUT my experience doing about 3500 leads per month in 100-150 chunks on 5 phone numbers is that the sms do go out tightly spaced.   I'd like to help with your observations but I don't think I can from what you've said.  I haven't see the same trickling out behavior. 

A help for all, add yourself as a contact and add all tags to your contact.  So when a campaign fires off your phone also gets that text.  That way you know when a batch is going out.  When you are doing some 35 campaigns, often 3 sets per day over 30 days you will be getting replys sprayed back pretty evenly.  IE not everyone replies immediately.  I see replys immediately and up to a day or more later.

Given the delayed replies and practicality with any automated tool I don't see a practical solution OTHER then using their smart phone app.  Its pretty good.  Makes your phone beep when someone replies and you can type a response via your phone.  For me, when I get home I may do a more detailed reply via my laptop.  I use the Edge browser for the reireply web app.  I have 3 tabs open into different sections of reireply at the same time...

Today at 11am I'm going on my 2nd sales call for a house deal via reireply.  I'm marketing to low equity owners much different owner attitutes then what most are doing to high equity.  I pull my leads from propstream.com and am buying custom leads from custom lead vendors of 30-60-90 days late on some debt and financially stressed owners.   FWIW no lead source so far is better then the other.   Everyone seems to be sitting tight thanks to forbearance and PPP/EIDL from their employers.  Everyone I listen too on youtube is predicting a new wave of foreclosures and rampig up stress into 2021.

I suggest everyone on this thread do deep study into direct marketing via the BP's marketing group threads on all forms of DM.  See whats working.  IMHO its a all of the above times, post cards, door knocking, SMS, face book PPC and ads in marketplace...  Best to all.

[Andrew Fuller]

This has amazing features, but I have not pulled the trigger yet, I've learned to give seemingly amazing **** some time, and check out reallll reviews first. ninety-nine dollars per month is ok if its month to month, but to throw five hundred upfront to them and lose is not good at all. anyone else checking/checked it out, please share good and bad?

[Anthony Ellison]

@Andrew Fuller  I have it. I admit I was skeptical at first but it works well and the automation saves me tons of time. I'm a one man army still working a 9-5 so being able to have things running in the background is a plus for me.  

AS far as cost goes I think they are still running the $49 in exchange for video testimony deal. Might want to check that out.  Also you will need a twilio account to pay for your numbers text and such. $100 bucks on
twilio  lasted me a while.

[Anthony Ellison]

@Curt Smith adding yourself is also a great way to check to see if your numbers are being reported as spam.

[Nick Q.]

@Curt Smith Which 30-60-90 list vendor are you using? When we were mailing that list, we used Citracado.

[Curt Smith]

@Nick Q. yes Citracado has been the better of hte 2 re actual leads.  Others PM me for the contact info.  BP doesn't like contacts posted in forums.

BUT no list including citracado's are responding well right now given stressed owners may be in forebearance for now and maybe getting pay from employers who took PPP etc.  Stress will ramp up into end of year and really be hitting it in 2021 as banks start ramping up forclosures and news starts circulating of folks loosing their homes making marginal owners nervous.   

The goal today, Sept 2020, is to be tuning up your marketing tools, tactics, start spending $$ getting the pieces out, SMS out, even though you aren't getting any responses (many anyway).   Becase its the bold, the take action folks who will be in front of the train when it starts to leave the station.

I'm working on my 2nd sub to lead via SMS/reireply, this one I'm planning on buying.  Right now seller has given me a signed bank info release form to verify loan numbers.  I walked the house (full of trash).  Seller is willing to "sell for what we owe".  the exact scenario I'm certain will ramp up 100x or more into next year.

I'm pulling low LTV (>70% LTV), owner >3 yrs <10 yrs, value in the starter home price range, from propstream.com and uploading and skip tracing in reireply.

I have no insight into high equity sellers.  Others here or in the marketing forum in general might comment on how to filter and the response rate.  My resposnse rate for actual real leads is extremely low, extremely low.  But SMS is low cost.  For the bad phone numbers from the skip trace I think I'll down load those and do a post card to put something in their hands.  When you blast SMS to a skipped list,  you'll get back alot (ALOT) of folks complaining "I'm not Joe..."...   Its not simple like you'd think.  LOL

Repeating what others have said;  blind SMS has spam violation risk, fines, etc.  The fines are much worse then getting caught doing bandit signs.   There's staying under the radar tactics that one must follow but no guarrantees.  I felt a need to tell folks that SMS is good, and bad and has risks.

[Eric F.]

Originally posted by @Curt Smith:

I'm pulling low LTV (>70% LTV), owner >3 yrs <10 yrs, value in the starter home price range, from propstream.com and uploading and skip tracing in reireply.

Who does REIreply use for their skiptracing? I skip traced through Propstream and found the data to have much lower quality than BatchSkipTracing .com. Of course, there were still a ton of incorrect numbers like all skip tracing services, but it was better than Propstream.  How is REIReply's data? Have you used BatchSkipTracing .com to compare?

"I'm working on my 2nd sub to lead via SMS/reireply, this one I'm planning on buying. Right now seller has given me a signed bank info release form to verify loan numbers. I walked the house (full of trash). Seller is willing to "sell for what we owe". the exact scenario I'm certain will ramp up 100x or more into next year."

Tremendous. I'm hoping to rack up these deals next year as well. 

[Curt Smith]

@Eric F.   I only did one skip trace in propstream, at $0.30 ea I felt wasn't a good deal.  The skip trace built into reireply only returns 1 phone number and has lots of wrong numbers.  I don't have a percent nor a percent that doesn't get a look up.  IE for others;  send in a list of 100 leads to any skip trace service and you'll get back between 40% and 70% with (some) number.  Then the next metric is how many of those are actually the correct number?   

I don't have any metric.  Sorry!   I spend 99% of my time clicking DNC (do not call) when they reply "I'm not John" or "wrong number".   This is just a fact in marketing!  It increases your total cost per closed deal but I know of no way to avoid this.

Every tool allows you to externally skip trace and up load your own skipped list...   I forget how reireply deals with multi phone numbers returned as is the case with many skip services.  I'm sure theres a video.

This is  numbers game, keep feeding lead lists and keep repeat contacting your lists is the tactic.

Eric glad to hear your getting deals!   I had another warm lead reply last night at 1:30 Am.   "Give me $5k within 2 days and its yours" ...   He said he was in some sort of bind.   I replied what I could do, so its a keep plugging away job.  

To be honest folks;   Its more work then I guessed up front when SMS marketing to 3.5k leads over 30 days (excepting Sundays) and updating the automatic Do not disturb filters (triggerig on "never contact me..." replies), answering folks back, settup up new campaigns.  Fooling around with lead lists and chopping them up...   LOL its a job and this is not a reflection on any tool, its the way it is using any marketing tool and system;    

1) dream up a lead type filter to target some seller tyupe

2) experiment pulling those leads;  propstream or listsource or ?

3) pull a few lists

4) edit / cull down using excell sorting.

5) upload to skip trace or upload into your marketing tool (post cards, SMS, RVM etc)

6) fire it off

7) deal with replies,  tuning / maintaining the tools.

8) digging into a replie's house details.  Propstream is excellent,  realtor.com, zillow etc

9) back and forth with sellers.

10) going to visit houses/sellers

11) more deal numbers digging and pondering counter offers

12) signing a contract

13) whew!  now what?   Close or wholesale or ??

14) repeat

I've found this to be almost a full time job.  LOL   Well more accurately a 1/3 to half time job anyway.   Closing and fixing a house def takes up more then the remaining 1/2 a job even as I do hire out as much to contractors.  Nothing in real estate is just writing checks and sipping umbrella drinks on a beach!   :)

[Eric F.]

Originally posted by @Curt Smith:

@Eric F.   I only did one skip trace in propstream, at $0.30 ea I felt wasn't a good deal.  The skip trace built into reireply only returns 1 phone number and has lots of wrong numbers.  I don't have a percent nor a percent that doesn't get a look up.  IE for others;  send in a list of 100 leads to any skip trace service and you'll get back between 40% and 70% with (some) number.  Then the next metric is how many of those are actually the correct number?   

Thanks for the reply Curt.

 Batchskiptrace returns a lot of numbers for each lead for 18 cents a lead. They have a scoring system that predicts the chance the number is correct. They also tell you if it is mobile vs voice. What I do is use the first 3 numbers and ignore the rest. A lot of them are wrong, but sometimes the second or third number is the correct one. I would rather pay more and get all the numbers than less, but only get one number, which I believe their staff told me is only a mobile number. I want landlines as well, especially for older people who might have land or an extra house their kids don't care about.

For multiple phone numbers, I create a new row in excel for each one when I import into REIreply. It is work, but better to work for myself than for a boss. I just finished filtering for mobile only and creating a new spreadsheet. Took about 45 minutes for 1600 numbers. 

For this round I am going to send a similar message to the one you posted about helping owners with financial struggles. I am just going to send one message. My next round of 1500 or so numbers I will use one of their multi step campaigns, and utilize all of it (text, ringless voicemail, etc) and see how it works. 

[Nick Q.]

Originally posted by @Curt Smith:

@Nick Q. 

I have no insight into high equity sellers.  Others here or in the marketing forum in general might comment on how to filter and the response rate.  My resposnse rate for actual real leads is extremely low, extremely low.  But SMS is low cost.  For the bad phone numbers from the skip trace I think I'll down load those and do a post card to put something in their hands.  When you blast SMS to a skipped list,  you'll get back alot (ALOT) of folks complaining "I'm not Joe..."...   Its not simple like you'd think.  LOL

Repeating what others have said;  blind SMS has spam violation risk, fines, etc.  The fines are much worse then getting caught doing bandit signs.   There's staying under the radar tactics that one must follow but no guarrantees.  I felt a need to tell folks that SMS is good, and bad and has risks.

 Hey Curt, thanks for the great responses to my, and everyone else's questions and comments. I'm finding the same -- response rate to my SMS for actual real leads is very very low, but it's a very low cost to send them out.

How are you attempting to stay below the radar when sending SMS in order to avoid TCPA issues? I know platforms like Lead Sherpa and Launch Control are supposedly "TCPA compliant". Does REI Reply have a function where you have to manually click for every single text message you want sent out? It looks like functionality like that would really help defend against a TCPA case.

[Curt Smith]

@Eric F.  You probably know from studying reireply marketing info that they are the cheapest I've seen for integrated skip tracing, 10 cents per lead that actually finds a phone number.    BUT I click DNC on leads who reply "I'm not Joe.." etc and I have 750 out of 3600.  Thats looking like better stats then I would have guessed.  For the genuin folks who say "wrong number" I have only 400/3600 of those.  BUt I really should comb through the replies and add more wrong number tags in my contacts list.  The purpose would to export just th wrong numbers and send those to another skip trace or just send it to yellowletters.com and mail a post card...  I haven't taken action on that yet, but the point is that I can.

SMS is sent via twilio, so you need to set that account up and leave a CC there to pay for the SMS, VM, RVM traffic from reireply.   Twilio costs $0.007  or .7 penny per SMS.  Most of my messages are 2 SMS segments per so they are costing 1.4 cents.  Replies are short so 0.7 cents.  Typicl conversation is under 5 cents.   I checked twilio billing and I'm running about $120/mo just to pay for the SMS traffic.  RVM, VM, recorded calls etc would be in addition but I just do SMS.

@Nick Q. Theres TCPA experts in BP.  I bet searching on TCPA or "blind SMS" etc will find those threads.  I doubt Sherpa's claim!!  To be truely compliant you have to direct mail post cards with your rented phone number or VM number.  When they reply on that number that (per my understanding) gives you 90 days permission to cold call or SMS...  So true compliance is hard and expensive to achieve.

Staying under the radar per collective thinking (not via statute or solid facts more like guessing) is;  rent many phone numbers ($1/mo per number), send only 150(ish)  SMS pre phone number per day.  In reireply a down side the tool does not help you with chopping up a big list.  As a user I have to do that in the lead list by creating a "tags" column in the spread sheet prior to uploading.  So I manually chop a large list into "tags" of 150 or so per that:   "093020claytonCo_lowEq_1, 2, 3, 4 etc". Then in reireply I schedule multi touch campaigns sending a tag over a phone number starting on some day.  Then its automatic for however touches are setup inside that campaign.

The staying under the radar is;  low number of SMS / day / phone number.   Then a soft kind message to not rile the lead.  Which no mater the message theres alot of negativity out there and they are free to type it in replies.  Some reply back nice things even if its a "no".   Its my tactic in SMS to stop future SMS when an owner says "no".   In post cards you keep mailing.  I do this just because through trial an error the more SMS I see that was sent to someone and they reply no/stop/not interested I don't think more SMS will catch them in a time of need and will say yes.   

My guessing and its just my views as a newbie SMS marketure, the folks are do not reply and maybe "soaking" are who I'm tryng to wait out with repeat contacts.  The best part about SMS vs post cards is;  yes high open rate, yes cheap, AND yes it stays in the sellers phone forever where that post card last about 3 seconds between hand and trash and its gone irritreavable.  Where my single SMS could be searched for in their phone if the owner wanted to....   I'll know more after of year of doing this.  :)  Best to all.

[Eric F.]

@Curt Smith

I am curious. Do you only send texts when you are at the computer and can reply right away? If you have already answered this I apologize. 

I will give the REIreply skip tracing a try just to see the quality, but since I cold call as well I will probably stick to batchleads and their mobile and voice numbers. Thanks for all your information in this thread

[Curt Smith]

@Eric F.   Not possible to time when you're sitting there.

Reireply has a very good smart phone app that allows you reply in real time from your phone.  That was said above but burried in the middle of a large reply.  :)   Get the smart phone app it'll be a good enough solution until you get home.

[Eric F.]

@Curt Smith I do have the app. I very much prefer to work at my computer. I hate working off my phone. It is too easy to destroy your life when your work goes everywhere you go. The app is nice though. I called someone I had been texting through it today and it worked great. 

REIreply is not perfect, but it is probably the best of all similar products, at least that I have tried. I only used their web based dialer once and did not really like it, but I should give it some more time and a couple of more tries. I might have to keep Mojo for serious calling, or try CallTools out. A guy I know said he prefers Calltools to Mojo. 

[Eric F.]

Has anyone else noticed a massive drop off in responses to texts the last couple of weeks? Even people telling me to F off has dropped quite a bit. I changed my numbers and it still is lower than it was. @Curt Smith have you noticed the same?

[Kevin Greene]

Originally posted by @Eric F.:

Has anyone else noticed a massive drop off in responses to texts the last couple of weeks? Even people telling me to F off has dropped quite a bit. I changed my numbers and it still is lower than it was. @Curt Smith have you noticed the same?

I have noticed the same. My personal theory is that it's a combination of a hot market and inundation of the SMS space with new investors, with some carrier blocking sprinkled in.