I'm finally ready to start my wholesaling business! Well, almost...

[Simon K.]

I've finally decided to take the first steps necessary to start a business with a focus on wholesaling houses. In the future, I'd love to do rehab projects; some I'll sell, some I'll rent.

But anyway, I'd love an expert's critique of what I've done so far, as well as what I plan to do ASAP.

- Established an LLC. with the state of Georgia.

- Purchased domain names; two for buyer squeeze pages, two for seller squeeze pages, one for LLC.

- Set up Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ for the LLC.

- Followed more than 500 other people (on each social networking platform) who work in real estate, most in REI.

- Began preliminary work on creating all five websites (focusing on the buyer squeeze pages, so I can gather a solid buyers list before putting a property under contract) but it turns out that I'm not too good at the technical side of things, so I think I'm going to hire someone on Fiverr to put everything together. I'll start writing up the content, and he/she can just copy and paste. Is it a good idea to hire someone internationally to do the work for cheap? The reviews I'm seeing are all excellent.

- Designed company logo for business cards, letterhead, etc. At this point, I'm only going to order business cards.

- Started figuring out how to use Listsource correctly. I compiled a list in the area I'm targeting (LOTS of houses that investors would LOVE to get their hands on) and am using the following criteria: 40-100% equity, 01/01/1900-01/01/2006 last market sale date, SFR, mailing and property address complete, exclude corporate owned, absentee owned in-state, absentee owned out-of-state, exclude trustee-owned. I'm getting a list of about 700. Is this a good sized list that I can begin my marketing with? If this list sounds good, I plan on purchasing it.

- Started narrowing down my marketing ideas. I plan on writing my first 200 or so letters, and then sending on the rest with a company who can do that for me.

- Signed up for a Google Voice account to use for calls from potential sellers. I plan on letting all of the calls go to voicemail, but systematically check it throughout the day just so I can screen out all of the unmotivated people. I'll be able to call people right back from the Google Voice too, so I can already start running comps, finding the property on a map, etc. when I"m on the phone. I'll call them back once I've finalized the numbers and set up a time to meet or at least see the property.

- Found an investor friendly title company.

This week/weekend, I plan on getting everything figured out for the websites, as well as compiling a more narrowed down buyers list. I'll probably give a few investors a call to see specifically what types of properties they're interested in.

I also want to figure out how I'm going to get the websites set up. I'll look more at Fiverr; I like that some people on there ONLY build squeeze pages. I need to find someone to set up a company homepage that can somehow incorporate a blog, in which I can post recent listings, real estate news, commentary, etc.

Do you think I'm on the right track? I want to finish all of this startup-type work in two or three weeks time, so I can start getting down to business. My goal is to have my first check by May 8th, but maybe sooner!

As always, thank you,
Simon