All Forum Posts by: Braden C.

@Michael Plante We send out offer letters for a lot of investors around the country. None of them are handwritten or yellow letter type, they're all professional. Most of the time a price is included but I've also seen where it's a $_______________ and allows the potential seller to write in a number. 

@Jef A. There was a really good thread a couple of days ago about the legality of texting, RVM, and cold calling using auto-dialers, I wasn't able to find it but admittedly didn't look very hard. Texting is the only gray area but it's being argued by legal experts that even offering to buy the house is offering a service and therefor you could be sued and/or fined for every single text you send out. STIR/SHAKEN is required to be put into place by every major cell carrier by June 30th, 2021, most have already done so. When I get cold calls now from "investors" it's marked spam call on my caller ID. 

@Gary Gristick How many properties is a really tough question to answer because it's going to vary from market to market and of course, what your list criteria is. Most people just getting started are typically sending 500 or so letters per week and once they close their first deal, start to ramp up. Investors who consistently closing deals every month send out thousands of pieces per month. 

For your letter, I prefer a professional letter over a typical yellow letter. You can give the potential seller so much more information to build credibility for yourself and to also not have someone call and waste your time. For example, I have a sentence in my letter that says "Of course our goal is to make a profit, but we want each transaction to be a win-win situation". That right there tells the potential seller that I am not going to overpay or that I am not some developer trying to buy up the neighborhood. It also let's them know that I want it to be a win-win, and I won't be trying to take advantage of them. 

You'll have to tweak things to see what works for you. The biggest thing is to just START, don't overthink it. New investors spend hours and hours trying to crack a code when there really never was one. The sooner you start, the sooner you'll be to getting deals! 

@Gary Gristick Like @Braden Smith said, listsource is very popular, I also like propstream a lot. But again, like Braden said, 400 is a very small list and really limits your chance of success. Direct mail absolutely works, but it isn't cheap so if you're on a tight budget, I would suggest something different. 

@Colin Williams I wouldn't stick with just one buyers criteria, it's a sellers market and everyone is hungry for deals. He might only like 3/2 houses but I guarantee another investor would buy a 2/1 if it's a good enough deal. By limiting your criteria to one particular buyer, you could be missing several other opportunities. 

@Justin Puetz I've always kept it business to separate work and family. Direct mail has always been my biggest marketing strategy and no matter what, you get some people upset for receiving a piece of mail in their mailbox. I've received some rather nasty calls over the years and don't want to risk some nut job knowing information about my family. Several years ago I had a guy call and say he was also an investor but thought what I was doing wasn't fair because he couldn't afford to send direct mail out and I was hoarding all the deals for myself, he told me he hoped I died. Also, I live in Florida and we tend to attract some of the nation's finest quacks. 

1. I wouldn't use a dialer. Google STIR/SHAKEN, this is something that all major cell carriers must implement and ambulance chasing attorneys are hungry for cases. I was listening to a radio segment a few weeks ago and the attorney specifically said he's going after auto warranty, debt consolidations, and real estate investors. 

2. Do you feel like you need one right now? If you don't know what they need to do, or what you would want them to do, you probably don't need one. If/when you want one, you can look on sites like upwork and find decent help for a few dollars an hour. 

3. That's a great starting number, once deals start to come in and you have more working capital, you can scale. 

4. I still to this day call hot leads on my own, I don't wait for anyone on my team to do it. So it depends on the lead type, if you're just cold calling lists, I would outsource to someone. 

You're asking great questions! Let me know if you have any others. 

@Weina Shi It depends on how many letters you plan on sending. Sit down and do 10 or so yourself, time how long it takes and then do the math on how long it will take you to do an entire campaign. Without commercial equipment, it's going to take a very very long time if you plan on doing any type of volume. 

As for lists, propstream is great for addresses and they also offer skiptracing to get phone numbers. With phone numbers, I believe around 60% accuracy is pretty common. 

Are you getting results? Landing deals? Are you taking so many phone calls that you can't handle any more? If not, then you need to increase in order to reach a number where you start to land deals. 200 every twenty days is a very low number, most investors doing consistent deals are sending out thousands per week. Just like with any type of marketing, it takes several "touches" for get a response from the lead. Think about how many times you see the same car/beer/cell phone/etc., commercial on TV over and over again. 

The fact that you're taking action puts yourself ahead of most other newbies who have analysis paralysis, so good for you! Keep working at it and figure out what works and what doesn't. If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. 

@Erik Gensler Letters have a better reply rate than postcards, they cost more but your cost per deal is actually better. Yes, there might be a couple hundred "wholesalers" in your area, but I'd bet only a handful are sending DMM as most wholesalers don't have any capital for DMM. Carrot sites are relatively inexpensive and all look the same when you first set it up. Have you done any customization to your site? Have you made it so you appear to be the most trustworthy home buyer in all of Portland?