Suburban Atlanta Tax Delinquents

[Kofi Carpenter]

Beginner wholesaler here and while I have been a lurker for several month on BP, this is my first post. I need to take action, so I'm willing to stumble through each step until I can get my first deal done!

About 2 weeks ago I received my first list of tax delinquent home owners from the county in my target market, but I don't really know what I'm looking at since this is a raw data. I need to establish who the most motivated sellers may be on this list and for efficiency's sake, focus my firstdirect mail campaign on these owners.

Does anyone have any advice or best practices when targeting tax delinquent owners? How long before this list becomes stale? Do I need to order this list monthly? Is their a minimum amount owed or late for x days I should hone in on? 

Has anyone had any added success door knocking with tax delinquents? Sounds risky, but also like it may produce greater returns.

Money is tight and I really want my first direct mailings to yield the most leads. Sending 1000 pieces for my first campaign isn't do-able all at once.

Thanks!

[Rick Baggenstoss]

Hi Kofi - You shouldn't expect or need to make money from a single, less than 1000 piece mailing, as a newbie.  

You're mailing to a very competitive list.  The most motivated sellers on this list have already received a dozen letters, some hand delivered, some calls.  The most motivated picked up the phone and have found someone they trust and are working out a deal in some cases.

You might look for a piece of data which helps you narrow the list. Owner occupied, out of state, ownership type (LLC, Bank, Estate, etc.), property value, area desirability for investors, etc.

Go to an actual tax sale, you'll see that half of the list is a list of worthless properties.  These properties stay on the list.  You don't want to mail to those. 

Hope that gets you started.

Rick