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Posted almost 14 years ago

Wholesaling Homes: 5 Profitable Nuggets of Advice

Can you imagine how excited you will feel when you collect your first ‘paycheck’ for profitably wholesaling homes?  How exhilarating would it be to have a career finding properties, putting them under contract, and assigning those contracts to a flipper for a profit!  You don’t answer to any bosses, you’re working your own hours, and you are finally living the lifestyle you deserve!  Having such a vision and feeling such excitement is a good start, but what are you going to do to turn your dream into a reality?  As you sit at your computer, researching your future career, you will find that continuously investing in education, (such as purchasing the Real Estate Millionaire’s Blueprint eBook) will help you on your journey to the financial independence you deserve!

 

Wholesaling Homes | Create your real estate blueprint

How do you get home from your favorite restaurant?  Chances are you know exactly what roads to take.  When you are driving in your care and you come to an intersection, you know exactly which direction to go.  You’re prepared on how to get from point A to point B, and it’s almost effortless.  Consider planning your business in this same manner.  An action plan allows you to create your vision, establish your goals, determine your strategies, build your resources, and cement your plan.  Don’t forget to plan out non-negotiable time to focus on your business as well!  Then when your business comes to a fork in the road, you know what direction to take.

Wholesaling Homes | Assemble a team

Don’t try to do this business alone; there’s just no reason when it’s so simple to utilize the knowledge, skills, and resources of others.  Napoleon Hill, author of Think and Grow Rich, tells a story about Henry Ford.  Mr. Ford would surround himself with people with specialized knowledge.  When he needed to know something about a topic, he simply connected with an expert.  Mr. Ford became a multi-millionaire by utilizing the resources of others and not trying to do it all himself.  If it’s good enough for him, it’s good enough for anyone else.

Get out and network with other professionals at your local real estate investing club.  The following are some of the folks with whom you’re required to connect:  Real estate attorney (make sure he’s a litigator), real estate CPA, title agent, Realtor, & Contractor.  The more involved you become in this business, the more team members you will be required to add, but the above is a good start.

Wholesaling Homes | Learn to analyze properties

When you are wholesaling homes, time is of the essence.  A profitable wholesaler cannot afford to wait for a Realtor to analyze a property for them.  As such, it is the responsibility of the investor to learn how to analyze a property quickly and to be familiar with the average prices in their area.  This trait can be established by farming, or driving an area to become familiar with the different subdivisions and it’s average price per square foot.  Don’t forget while you’re farming an area to take down the phone numbers of ‘House for Rent’ signs as well.  The Real Estate millionaire is always prospecting for buyers and sellers!  There will be times that you will require the opinion of an expert Realtor to determine whether or not a unique property has the potential to become a profitable transaction.  But overall, the profitable investor should take ownership of understanding and having access to the most important function of the business: analyzing the property.

Wholesaling Homes | Advertise

When advertising for buyers and sellers, remember this:  ’Everything works and nothing doesn’t’.  The only way marketing fails is if you do nothing.  For best results, utilize multiple strategies.  For example, when I first started out, I posted online, created a website, used article marketing, consistently attended (and hosted) networking events, put out bandit signs – uh, I’m mean, I never put out bandit signs because it’s against city ordinances, farmed properties, and placed newspaper ads in small, neighborhood newspapers.  I generated leads from every type of marketing I did.  Then I started using handwritten yellow letter.  With the above combination, I had more leads than I could handle.  Then I made the dumb mistake of just utilizing handwritten yellow letters.  Once I put all my marketing eggs in one basket, my marketing results came to a screeching halt.  Even my response on the letters was cut in half!  Once I implemented multiple strategies again, business picked up.  I cannot explain why, but there is a synergy that occurs when you have multiple marketing strategies going at once.

Wholesaling Homes | Submit offers

Always submit offers on properties you visit.  The key is to offer what will work for you.  Not every wholesale offer will get accepted.  If your offers are being accepted, you are offering too much!  I remember a mentor getting upset when his initial offer was accepted because he knew he offered too much.  It ended up being profitable, but he knew he could’ve picked it up for less.

Personally, first starting out, submitting offers was horrifying!  I remember that when it came time to submit the offer, butterflies would grow in my stomach and move up my chest and my body would shake so much with nerves I could barely write!  My real estate partner Curt would see a property and (correctly) want to submit a low offer immediately.  Not I!  I had to analyze comps and talk to other before finally submitting the ‘perfect’ offer.  It took a long time for me to get over this fear, but once I did, my business finally took off.  Rebel against paralysis from analysis and give yourself permission to make offers.

Wholesaling Homes | Conclusion

Real estate investing can be a very profitable career that will provide entrepreneurs the financial freedom and independence that you deserve!  However, to achieve such greatness, you are required to treat real estate investing like a business, not like a hobby you learned about on T.V.  If you were going into surgery, you wouldn’t want your doctor telling you that he learned how to be a surgeon by watch the T.V. show ‘Scrubs’, would you?  While real estate investing may not be ‘life and death’ as compared to the health care or other industries, successful investors are real estate professions and conduct their business as such.  If you deserve financial success wholesaling homes, then you deserve to treat your business as a career!

Image: Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net


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