All Forum Posts by: Ryan Dossey

@Mike Cumbie Gotta love having friends in the industry.

@Austin Works flick me a PM. Got competitors on here lol.

@Account Closed RVM's are also definitely illegal. I have a few friends who were using them and who are now in litigation over it. Attorney Generals are involved in a few. 

I'll start... $14,058

The "does direct mail work" thread was so much fun that I thought that we should chat about the alternative. If you are NOT marketing for your own deals it's going to still cost you something. What did you pay or make on your last deal. 

You do NOT have to say if you're a wholesaler or the end buyer just comment the dollar amount. 

If you didn't buy it from a wholesaler but bought it off the MLS what was paid out in commission that could have been your equity?

Does direct mail work... This deal cost me under 3k to get. 

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/771158-41-583-flip-profit-after-5-months?highlight_post=4532088&page=1#p4532088

Your goal as an investor is to build out your MFE.

Marketing Funnel Equation. If you put in X amount of dollars what comes out the other side? 

For me... I put in $2,000 and it spits out either a rental or a flip/whoetale that we will profit $17,000 on average on. 

This is predictable, repeatable, and worked consistently for us for 5+ years. A lot of investors are just so afraid of wasting $$$ that they never start. So they end up paying a fortune more than they need to for thin deals.

@Austin Works The key man isn't just targeting equity owners.

You need to go more niche' than that. Seniors with two-story large homes who may want to downsize. Probates, Back Taxes, Code Enforcement, IRS Liens, Etc. 

You'd spend a fortune blanketing owner-occupants. You can get hyper-targeted and do well with them. 

We buy deals from owner-occupants all the time. I'm actually expecting a contract back on an A-class asset today from an owner occupant off of a "creative" list. 

@Nicole Heasley Beitenman it really comes down to can you afford not to in my book. If you're flipping or buying rentals you will have a significantly higher equity position and/or larger profit if you're sourcing your own inventory.

I recently polled investors and the average reply I got was that they're paying $10,000+/- to wholesalers per deal.

If I didn't source my own deals I would have over $500,000 less equity in my assets easily/conservatively.

It definitely does cost money. Most investors are anywehre from 2-5k to get a deal.

The difference though is that is a house they bought at their #'s. Even if you're buying off the MLS imagine just getting to that owner directly first and being able to deposit the 5-7% commissions as equity to your side of the balance sheet.

BP in general is pretty anti-wholesaler but they're also the ones who have figured out how to find their own deals. If you REALLY want to be in real estate being able to source deals is paramount to your success. 

Marketing done consistently, creatively, and with adequate follow-up is EXTREMELY easy to make it pay for itself. You just have to be willing to go through some trial, error, and a few thousand dollars. 

Less than 8% of my entire portfolio was purchased off the MLS or from wholesalers. They are also some of my thinner deals. 

I'd rather "risk" some cash hunting for deals than wish I had them. Feel free to PM me and I can give you some of the run down on the personal financial side. 

My motto is to "Keep the best and wholesale (wholetale or flip) the rest". It's been extremely lucrative for us and is consistently a multi-six figure net income that also pays for all of our new buy/hold acquisitions. 

Appreciate ya! - Ryan 

For anyone who's reading this who is interested in a few actual free ways to get deals... 

1) Make sure that everyone you know knows that you're looking for deals. I cannot count the # of times I've heard from someone in my circle that they forgot what we do. Or heard from a friend that they had the same thing happen. 

2) Set up saved searches on Craigslist with things like fixer, handyman, investor, tlc, diy, as-is, etc. This will cost you nothing and will have you chatting with motivated sellers in a day or two. 

3) Have a virtual assistant (or do it yourself) crawl all of the for rents on craigslist, FB marketplace, zillow, etc looking for the mom and pops. Send them a PM asking them if they'd consider selling instead. I bought an 80k duplex for 30k that pulls in $1,350 a month from this. 

4) Look in the newspaper classifieds. Oldschool retirees will post ads when they want to sell. 

5) Get a list of properties with code enforcement issues from your county and start friending people on Facebook.

6) Walk up to every garage sale you see and ask if they're selling. 

7) Network with the realtors in your area who are doing the most cash sales. Chances are they have pocket listings. 

If you're looking for consistent lead and deal flow it's not free. Neither are realtor commissions or wholesale fees. 

It's very clear that Jerry likes SEO and sells a service for it. 

@Sharad M. is one of the most legit investors I know who can MORE than back up what he's saying. (I've been using his CRM and it's GLORIOUS)

I'm a buy & hold investor and we bought over 140 units in the past two years with the vast majority of them coming from direct mail. We also wholetale, wholesale, and flip multi six figures in profit per year. 

That being said... I also have had the #1 ranking SERP brand in my market for that time frame as well. I LOVE seo. It gets me 1-2 deals a month. The lead quality is great.  I also love PPC advertising. It gets us another 1-2 a month.

Direct mail, however, is one of the only LEGAL niche's that is scalable and not in a gray area. 

All of the guys I know who are doing 50+ deals a year (us included) are using multiple avenues with a large portion of their deal flow coming from Direct Mail. I do not know a single investor doing 50+ deals a year with just Seo in a single metro. 

It's like Facebook advertising. People will "try it" do it wrong and blame the medium. If you're sending dishonest marketing, 3rd notice postcards, using crappy data, etc you're going to get bad results. Junk in. Junk out. 

Just so there's no personal attacks or "questions". Here is the screenshot of my Carrot account.

Marketers tend to get violently protective of their preferred niche'. I'm more interested in growing as an investor and a marketer than I am on dying on the stake of a particular marketing avenue. 

The big dogs diversify, build local community brands, are thoughtful in their marketing, and ensure that their users have an incredible experience.