18 Steps To Wholesale Your First Deal

Wholesaling your first deal may seem tough, and complicated at first, but once you organize each task in an organized, step by step, checklist it makes the whole process far more streamlined and digestible. 

These are the steps my partner and I followed to wholesale our first property in 2019. The thing felt like an emotional roller coaster but it worked out in the end and we closed. My hope is that by following this framework you will find value, and be one step closer to organizing your own path to the closing table! Here are the 18 steps we followed to untangle the mess, and wholesale our first deal: 

1- Identifying The Targets- which lists should you be marketing or prospecting to? (Distressed properties) physical distress, probate, code violations, tax delinquency etc.

2- Organizing Data in a CRM or a spreadsheet and the tracking of KPIs. Personally, we used a simple Google sheets database in our own business, before transitioning into more professional grade CRM software later in the process. We did our first deal with a free and simple software setup! No need to overcomplicate things.

3- Determine Marketing Or Prospecting Strategy- are you cold calling, direct mailing, using bandit signs? Door knocking? Facebook? The strategy you choose should take into account your personality, your skill type, and your stomach for business situations. If you know you hate salesmanship for example, consider a marketing approach, as opposed to a prospecting approach.

4- Initial Contact- qualifying the leads based on these 4 criteria:       

Price.

Condition of property.

Timeline to sell.

Motivation factors/level.

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5- Upload The people Who Want To Sell Into Your CRM- Earmark them for follow up focus on the people who want to sell not tire kickers. Your CRM should be split up into the 4 categories mentioned above. Those are really the only pieces of data that matter right now.

6- Comp the property- is it a deal or not a deal? Use Zillow or your preferred comping software to figure this out. Remember to use at least 3 similar properties close to the subject property, and built within a 10 year span of the subject property.

7- Appointment with the seller- This is where you meet with the seller and make your initial offer. This is where you figure out exactly what the seller's problem is, and can you solve it?

8- Offer Acceptance- They accept your offer and have signed the contract!

9- Disposition Checklist- disposition is the process one goes through before marketing deals to cash buyers. The checklist consists of these 4 items:

• 1-Open escrow with your attorney.
• 2-Take Pictures of the property.
• 3-Determine price you want to sell contract for (build in a profit margin).
• 4-Set a time for access to the property for inspection.
  
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10- Disposition Marketing- Blasting out the property via email to your cash buyers list, and calling if they don't answer the emails. This can be done through any number of specialized email clients, software platforms, and CRM’s. Make absolutely sure that you are following legal, and corporate policies while using any marketing approach.

11- Inspection- Set a time where all the buyers show up for their inspection and to view the property. This is basically a showing. The goal here is to create a feeding frenzy, and have as many investors as possible go through the inspection at the same time.

12- Review Offers- select the offer that you get for your contract. You don't necessarily want the highest offer. For example: a super solid cash buyer who can close quickly and without issues can be better than other buyers who may offer you more cash, but may end up giving you more of a headache—which ended up happening to us initially. 

13- Collect Non-Refundable Earnest Money Deposit- without this deposit the deal is shaky. We need to know that the buyer is committed. Get it immediately, and as quickly as possible. Get a minimum of $5000.

14- Getting The Title Clearance- Your real estate lawyer will help you out here. A clear title means no liens, clouds, judgements, or tax defaults. Nothing delays closing more than title issues!

15- Getting The Closing Docs Signed- by the seller of the contract as well as the buyer of the contract. Encourage the buyer to go in as soon as the title is ready, this should be weeks before closing, so everything goes smoothly. If the buyer is using hard money try to have it settle at least 48 hours in advance of closing. The goal here is to get everything squared away early, so that closing goes smoothly.

16- Funding Of The Deal- be aware of the time/date when funding for the deal actually arrives or clears.

17- Closing & Recording- This is where the deal gets closed and recorded with the county.

18- Getting Paid!- Organize getting keys for buyer(s), and getting your assignment fee either wired to your LLC’s bank account, or through a physical check.