BiggerPockets

Are you going to be looking for an "Option Fee" deposit? I would highly recommend it. You could put:

RENT TO OWN
Low Down, $895 mo.
Bad Credit OK.
555-1212

I would try craigslist and maybe the local paper. Also, put a sign in the front yard. 12-18 month's is a pretty common term for a Lease with Option. Also, if I was you I would make sure you can actually get your tenant / buyer qualified for a mortgage in the lease period, if a mortgage broker tells you they can't get qualified in that time you may want to find another buyer. That is if you want to sell fast, maybe you want to carry for longer? Either way, you can ask a higher price for the home with terms like that. Option fee should be 2-3% and non-refundable if your tenant does not buy.

Jeff

Thanks for the replies, I have the mechanics of the lease option (2 years, 3.5% down 'flexible' non-refundable, qualify in 1-2 yrs, rent credit, etc..). It is posted on craigslist every day in the for sale and for rent sections. I'm hesitant to do the local paper as it's around $650/mo. It is in one of the local papers thrifty-nickel, penny-saver, american classifieds genre.
It has only been on the market for a little under 2 weeks. I do understand that this is still very recent. I just want to make sure I have all my bases covered before 2 months pass by and I'm standing there like an idiot waving at cars and pointing to the home dressed in a chicken suit of out shear desperation. It is a townhouse by the way and I know some people don't recommend rent-to-own's on these.
I've had around 15 calls and emails, some which are looking for rentals, some which are section 8, and some which are delirious. 3 showings thus far but no applications yet.

Forgot to ask, is your home priced WAY above the comps in the area or just slightly above? When offering terms, it's not important to try and price yourself low but you do need to be realistic. I think 10% above FMV should be fine for a 1-2 year Lease Option.

Jeff

I mean flexible down payment not whether it's non-refundable, ideally I'd like 3.5% but if they squirm I'll take half of that. I'm telling people $94,900 which is approx 8% above market price. My rent is $895 where others are straight renting $800-850 and I'm telling prospects $100 rent credit monthly towards the purchase.
HOA does allow rentals, HOA fees are covered in my sub-to debt service of $800 mo., I'm not asking the renters to pay that on top of rent if that's what you're asking.
The townhouse is in an ok area, they look fantastic, great curb appeal, close to Military bases in Colorado Springs which are bringing in another 25,000 soldiers in the next 2 years.
One couple looked at the house for a minute and said it was too small for them, another couple seemed to like the place but they didn't poke and prod too much. They asked for applications but the following day said they didn't think they could do it. Another lady was looking for her daughter, but she did ask if she could re-paint (good sign?).
I'm not sure what is meant by "ghosted" on craigslist. I post once a day (about 8:45 am). I'm thinking it may be better to post around 3:00 so I'm nearer the top when people start getting home from work, thoughts on that approach?

Scott, are you recommending that I post more than once a day per section?
By the way I'm from the Ann Arbor area, I hope the Great Lakes State is treating you well in this market.

I hear what you're saying Jeff. I don't advertise the 3.5% down, in any advertisement that calls for it I say "low down payment, easy qualifying". I only tell people 3.5% if they ask about the down payment and if they seem hesitant or overwhelmed I tell them we can lower that and make higher payments for a while. Perhaps you're right though 2% may be more realistic and I should just start out there.

Andy,

The suggestions of other posters are great. You want to post on Craigs List every 48 hours and be sure to delete your old post prior to re-posting. This helps avoid the ghosting issue. (But, you always want to check your ads to make sure they are live.)

For the last year, we have been running a Lease Option, Rent to Own program in Atlanta. I have a couple of other suggestions of what has worked well for us.

One, if it is allowed (check your county codes), you might want to try to put some bandit signs in the surrounding area. We've done this with great success.

Also, how many sites other than Craigs List are you posting on? There are quite a few out there and some of them can drive in quite a bit of traffic. (Only 25% of our ad-driven web traffic comes from Craigs List) We post our homes on around 50 websites. One that I've found the owners quite helpful at that also drives in a fair amount of traffic is JSCInvestments. Also, are you using postlets? They will syndicate to other sites for you.

We have had zero success with the local paper and I wouldn't recommend it.

If are on Facebook and have friends in the area where the house is, you can always post your listing to your facebook page. If nothing else one of your friend might know someone that the home would work for.

I am not familiar with your market area, but 3.5% would be high in our market. We usually get around 2%.

Good luck!

I will heed your advice and change to 2% option consideration, again not specifically advertised but only when people ask. I have the ad posted on 10 or so websites. We do bandit signs, approx. 62 of them out today.

The websites I have posted are:
craigslist
backpage
kijiji
ahrn.com
rentals.com
rent-to-own.us
rentals.nationalrelocation.com
realestatecolorado.net
rentdigs.com
coloradosprings.olx.com

I will look into postlets, any more good recommendations on websites?

Yes, the place filled about 1.5-2 weeks ago. I believe that because it was a townhouse it was harder to move. I think right now houses are so affordable that people would rather go that direction. I got slightly above market rent and 2% down.

Interesting post. I didn't know about a few of those sites (like classifiedflyerads.com, ahrn.com, rentals.com, rent-to-own.us, rentals.nationalrelocation.com, and rentdigs.com). I've received a pretty good response rate with craigslist and kijili--especially for posts with great pics.