All Forum Posts by: Rusty Eddy

One way around needing a brokers license is if you are a principal, meaning you have a financial interest in the property. Such as a Master Lease Agreement (aka Sandwich Lease), you arrange to be the master tenant from the owner, then sublet the property.

Hi,

Does anybody have any experience with an online lookup service, preferably free but a low cost pay site is OK. For example, anybody have experience with spokeo, or something better?

Much Thanks!

- rusty

Hi Matt,
That is a really good idea asking title, escrow and mortgage agencies. I had not thought of that but is pretty obvious in hind sight!!

Thanks Hazel that is a helpful set of metrics to go by, the closing rate being probably more important than total sales.

It looks like this info will have to come from the MLS, I can't find any obvious sources that will provide this info in a manner that will be easy enough to analyze.

Thanks for the feedback, good article on the irvinehousing.com blog as well.

Unfortunately I did not find realtor.com to helpful. I did a search on Long Beach and got 97 pages of Realtors from spanning all the way down to Dana Point. I then tried putting 'Wrigley' in the keyword and got one.

I was hoping there was a way to get a count of properties sold in an area by a particular Realtor.

I did end up hooking up with somebody that seems really sharp, by doing the obvious: calling signs in the area :)

Hi All,

General question for a specific situation.

What is the best way (ways) to determine what are the most active listing agents in a given area? (I have done the obvious, drive around and write down names of existing listings.)

I do not have MLS access but would like to determine who the most successful agents are in a particular area.

Specifically, I am closing on a property in the "Wrigley" area of Long Beach, CA. It is an old property, very small duplex. We are considering a couple options, do we want to remodel the duplex as is. Convert to a single family (most properties in the area are single family), finally do we want to add 500-900 sqft.

We have done our own cost/value analysis, for various scenarios, now I'd like to get a good agents opinion. Also, since this is our first property in this area, we will likely want to list it with an agent.

So I'd like to find the big hitters in the area.

We are rehabbing the properties, Ironically I got the properties through a wholesaler, actually somebody that we are involved in a current deal with.

Generally, for REOs dealing with the listing agent is the way to go, or more specifically before it is actually listed :) The REOs have gotten thin so finding them is tough right now, but I do have a couple agents forwarding pre-listed deals.

If you were in a buyers market, you could work through a buyers agent, they would have to be really aggressive and willing to continually submit offers on first day listings, and expired listings,etc. It could be effective but would take a lot of work and require an unusual amount of persistence.

It is about time for an update, thanks for asking Jake. All thanks for the very helpful and encouraging words! It is amazing how helpful people are willing to be. When I first wrote this post, I wasn't involved in any local REI clubs, I've since started to become plugged in and have made some great connections. Including great mentors in Will and Mike at Nationwide (big props!)

I have been hanging around long enough to find people are able to wholesale properties in OC, bargains can be found but it is hard and as stated margins are really tight, particularly trying to squeeze in a wholesale fee. Generally OC has high prices with tight margins making the ROI lower than other places, with a higher capital outlay.

As of today, we are about to close on our first escrow, and will likely close on a second escrow by friday. Both of these properties will be light rehabs in LA. LA is much, much larger providing more possibilities, though the competition is heating up there as well. So the journey begins!!!

Having said that, opportunities seem to be popping up here in OC on occasion, maybe slow changes in the market, but probably in direct relation to starting to build a network. Without a doubt, the relationships you build are your most important asset!

For the near term, I'm focused on the two properties at hand. Will continue contacting REO brokers. My next step will be finishing up a whole marketing campaign to contact sellers directly, I'm actually looking to looking for Free&Clear/High Equity seller financing deals, with the intent of hanging on to a couple here and there..

I'd actually like to do a couple other things as well, but as you all know, I need to take one step at a time :)

Thanks for asking!

I figured I need to start doing direct mail and contacting sellers directly.

I just started working on getting building some lists with listsource.com and grabbed with a list of NOD's, etc.

However, the door hanger strategy sounds like something I will try.. Now putting together some mailers and I'll do the door hangers also.

Thanks for the feedback!

As I have been finding out, it is really hard to do in OC, in the current market. not impossible though.

LA is and the inland empire are easier. Comparatively speaking OC is pretty small and has a lot of people with a lot of money. LA and IE are much larger with a bigger spread in inventory. We are in a "manufactured market", at the moment.

I'd venture to guess that nailing short sales or doing some door knocking may be the way to go for now..