marketing to investors

[William MacBride]

I'm really new to this and I just want to get some basic clarification about how you get started "hooking up" deals between motivated sellers and investors.

My understanding is that a lot of people starting out in real estate get in as "middle men" of one kind or another. It seems fairly obvious how you find properties for sale to begin with, but how do you find "investors" - everyone one from hard money lenders to rehabbers or even end buyers? I get that you have to "market" the house to prospective buyers and investors.

one of the things that's confusing me is, frankly, the internet. For instance my girlfriend just showed me a house she was looking at off some list of houses for sale in california. Then to get an estimate of its value she went to "zillo" .com and did a quick search and it gave her a number, the "tax assessment value" which is different from the "fair market value" I guess. This all seems too easy and I don't see what the role of the finder or middle man really is. but mainly here I'm asking like: ok so you've got this house, how do you get someone inetrested in buying or investing in it wen they could have just looked it up on that site themselves and eliminated the middle man?

But even aside from all that, lets say I find some house that isn't listed on some site or other, and I think a rehabber would be able to fix it up and sell it for a reasonable profit. What's the most usual route to take to find a list of rehabbers or investors? How do I put together this "buyer list" I keep hearing about?

thanks,
Will