I’m in cold climates so we don’t do the outside of the house drain lines.

I cold call.

I have been driving for dollars and cold calling to find distressed properties to wholesale.

Then you can mail or cold call or both.Other cheap or free methods are driving for dollars, craigslist, Realtors, FSBO sites, expired listings, foreclosure sites and bandit signs if allowed.If you have the funds you can use billboards, newspaper ads, other offline publications., TV commercials, radio ads, motivated seller websites, SEO, pay per click/adwords, facebook, Linkedin, Youtube, and other forms of online advertising and boosted/promoted social media postings.Bottom line is integrity and consistency.

As a California real estate assistant, it sounds like you're allowed to do the following:-cold-call prospective customers (although not regarding a specific property, transaction, or product), -assist with open houses,-conduct a comparative market analysis (i.e. identify comp properties), -arrange appointments, -give entrance to a property to inspectors or other authorized 3rd parties, -prepare and design advertising, -prepare documents and transaction instruments, -deliver and obtain signatures for documents (although you can't discuss the contents), -accept money for trust funds (i.e. earnest money or similar), -relay certain information between the agent and the principal, and -review transaction documents for completeness and compliance.Hope this helps. 

Then you can mail or cold call or both.Other cheap or free methods are driving for dollars, craigslist, Realtors, FSBO sites, expired listings, foreclosure sites and bandit signs if allowed.If you have the funds you can use billboards, newspaper ads, other offline publications., TV commercials, radio ads, motivated seller websites, SEO, pay per click/adwords, facebook, Linkedin, Youtube, and other forms of online advertising and boosted/promoted social media postings.Bottom line is integrity and consistency.

Also, in my experience being kind and respectful as opposed to cold/letter of the law, prevents a large amount of retaliatory activity.

You can send letters and email but cold calling is by far the most effective method but you really need to know what you’re doing, how to open the conversation, what questions to ask and more importantly when to listen and not talk.

. - Cold calling- Door knocking- Finding dilapidated houses and looking up the owner's info (if the investor is a flipper or BRRR investor)Good luck out there!

If the building inspector was the one who condemned it, do I just start cold calling building inspectors and asking if there are any homes they condemned in the area recently?