All Forum Posts by: Ian Ross

Hey Brandon,

Great job on taking the first steps in your real estate investing journey! Wholesaling is a fantastic way to get your feet wet! 

There are a few ways to reach out to cash buyers, but one of the most effective (albeit labor intensive) is to join local Facebook groups focused on real estate investing, and look for posts where someone else has asked about who is a cash buyer in that group (I've done this myself). Those members will usually give very brief info on themselves, and list an email address. Once you have compiled enough addresses, you can contact them directly, explain how you got their address, and let them know your plans.

You will want to ask what types of deals they're looking for as an investor, and what kind of deals, and wholesalers they've worked with, they haven't been happy with in the past. Make the email about learning what works for them, and not about what you can do for them. If they respond positively to your initial email, you can then pursue further conversation and build a better relationship.

Welcome to the crazy world of real estate wholesaling! You're gonna do great.

I completely 2nd what Brad said. Despite what a lot of TikToks may say, wholesaling on your own with any kind of consistency requires at least a small financial investment, depending on how you want to approach this. My initial costs were around forming my LLC (a nice to have in something as litigious as real estate investing) and having a lawyer look over my various contracts. They continued on to paying for skiptraced data and using software/services to help coordinate and automate, before ultimately leading to higher costs (my highest cost is labor).

This all comes back to the post above from Brad Jacobson: You should look to partner up with an existing wholesaler or investor. Atlanta is a tough nut to crack because of how saturated it is, and going this solo without spending any money will require quite a bit of luck up front, which is never how you want to rely on starting your business.

Best of luck on your wholesaling journey!

I do not doubt that if you put yourself in front of enough motivated sellers that you will get a multitude of deals and make money that most people can only dream of. When I talk about building rapport with a seller, and using the techniques involved, there's a lot more involved than simply getting them to move forward with me. A lot of the houses I get under contract are from skip traced lists of residential properties with certain "distressed" criteria, and I am very rarely the first or last wholesaler to speak to them. Like any sales training, a lot of this involves standing out from your competition. 

It has not been my experience that investors operate in a vacuum, at least not in my markets. Taking the time to carefully connect, and building up the specific value of your cash offer, will get any wholesaler who chooses a strategic approach more "yesses" than those that do not. 

Hope this helps.

Hi Laura,

I don't personally know any real estate investors who will be attracted to a "Father's Day Special" on an investment property, and it also seems slightly dubious to list the ARV of the home after someone adds an additional bedroom and bath. People will want to know what the ARV is for that property as a 3/3 right now.

It's not the type of advert the people I work with would go for, but maybe you'll have some luck where you post it on Facebook.

It is certainly possible that the right investors did not see the property when it was listed before, but in general if something is on the MLS at $500k for 6 months before being lowered incrementally down to $400k, most investors are not comping the property at $650k without a significant amount of rehabbing work done to that property.

I'm not saying this can't be done, but I keep going back to the Zillow listing for the same price you have it locked up for as a big issue.

I'm a bit confused as to your setup, but it sounds to me like you are contracting the property at the same price it's listed on the MLS for, after it was already dropped $45k. If that's the case, you'll need an investor willing to pay over the MLS listing for you to make a profit. Since the owner has already lowered the price, it seems unlikely to me that the property is hot enough for an investor to pay you a wholesale fee rather than just wait until they can buy it themselves at $400k.

Usually if you're wholesaling an on-market property, you will want it locked up at such a lower price that an investor will be paying less than the listing for you to still charge an assignment fee.

James, I would assume that setup and process works for many.

For my business, that agreement you pasted doesn't cover enough of the situations to arise for us to feel comfortable moving forward (i.e. Inspection period, prorations, insurance, close of escrow, deposit info, etc.)

If you know a wholesaler in your market who has found sustained success with that contract, they can definitely go into more depth as to how they deal with various circumstances should there be an issue.

Sure, @David Choe! I'm using Call Tools for my dialer and I used a service to match me with my VA, but now I deal with my VA direct from here on out.

While I agree with you in theory, Jerryll, that a lack of transparency and overthinking are often a huge detriment to both the investor as well as the homeowner, there is a lot of room for having a game plan and strategy for talking to someone about selling their house for cash without being scammy.

For instance, most homeowners have no idea what a wholesaler is, and declaring yourself as one before giving context often confuses sellers, and that ultimately turns them off. If you haven't built rapport, saying, "If you are interested in selling your house for cash I can help" can result on people hanging up on your or saying No instinctively before giving you a chance to explain the benefits of your cash offer.

There seems to be a big misconception that using sales tactics in wholesaling is scammy, and homeowners will see it that way. 

If you sound like a telemarketer on the phone, that's sure to be the case. But if you go through discovery questions and carefully outline the value of your cash offer (besides just the number), and how that offer will work, you will end up securing far more deals than if you just called them out of the blue and said, "I can help you sell your house for cash."

Simply put, you will get more qualified and valued deals by using a strategy.
  

Hi James,

I always open escrow immediately once I have a property under contract, namely because the title company/real estate attorney is listed on the contract to begin with, and it's important to be honest with a homeowner about the earnest money deposit you've put down.