Ways to target houses

[Ahmad Darensbourg]

Just was curious, which way to target houses is more efficient?

Tax-delinquent, searching online websites, Craigslist, direct mailing ? Or, any other methods I left out ?

[Steven Leigh]

They all have tradeoffs:

Tax delinquent: VERY good response rate per lead, but the list can be hard to obtain and may take a lot of work to filter through it. Sometimes it's free on your county website, sometimes you have to call the county and jump through a lot of hoops.

Searching online websites: Not sure what you're searching. County website? Seems inefficient. Zillow? Even the FSBO properties are probably way overpriced. Make offers on them, sure, but don't expect miracles. People who have taken the initiative to post even a FSBO are probably more motivated by price than the typical seller that wholesalers look for, which is someone who needs help and doesn't really know what to do.

Craigslist: Some wholesalers have good luck with Craigslist, and you might be able to find good deals if you JUMP on them when they are first posted. Set up an account with IFTT to filter out by certain phrases (like -arv -http -www) so that you get rid of some of the wholesalers' ads and then it will email you any results that match your search but don't those phrases. This way when you get an email there's a chance it's a possible deal.

Direct Mailing: The most expensive option, but the most reliable over time. It's not always the best way to start, and it's a numbers game. For every 1,000 mailers, you'll probably get about 40-50 calls, which will likely result in about 1-2 deals on average. Mailers will cost you about $500-700 per thousand. 

I'll add one:

Driving for dollars: This is probably the best way to get started. Drive around neighborhoods and look for distressed properties, code violations (paper on the door or window), vacant houses, etc. Then go home and look up all the addresses on the county website and mail to them. Vacant house where the mailing address is the same as the property? GREAT LEAD! Find the owner and you may be the only one marketing to them. Use a service like beenverified.com or just see if you can do whitepages.com or Facebook and find them.

Here's a great article on driving for dollars:

https://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2013/05/0...

Good luck!