BiggerPockets

I have a rehab property under contract at 41 cents on the dollar with approx 15-18K needed in repairs, and my last day of the due diligence period is next Friday.
I've tried quite a bit to find a buyer, but no bites as of yet. Here are a few things I've tried:

- Send e-mail blast to buyers list. Rehabbers and other wholesalers.
- Post about 7 different ads on Craigslist, and repost the ads that have aged.
- Used SellPoint to blast the property out to about 17 various listing sites, including Trulia, Yahoo Real Estate, Local.com, eHouseAds, Lycos, etc..
- Sent a separate direct e-mail and/or called everyone on my buyer's list to see if anyone had any friends, partners or buyers that would be interested.
- Networked with members here and on other REI forums.
- Contacted members that I've met at my local REIA... and planning to attend a meeting next week.
- Dropped the price quite a bit, down to a 2K assignment.
- Called the court house for the next auction, but the next one will not be until end of this month.
- I had bandit signs out, but they have been taken down.

The property is in a rural area and several of the callers were from the area and knew the house, but were not interested. Others do not want to work that far from the city.

I am fairly new and this would be my first deal. Through my marketing of this property, I have added many to my buyers list, but no one for this particular property.

Lesson learned from this experience is to only contract a property in the areas where my buyers want to buy. This will be the last one in a rural area unless I have a specific buyer for the area.

I truly do not want to cancel and would take a lower assignment if needed, just to get the deal closed. What am I missing? Does anyone have ideas that I haven't tried or should I just cancel this one and move to the next?

The question I would have is 41 cents on what dollar? Is that a concrete subject to appraisal or just a Trulia number. Secondly, did you get a real quote for repairs or is it your estimate. Whats the ROI if I rent it. The real numbers would give me a reason to buy.

You should NEVER lock up a property that you dont plan on closing. You should be prepared to close no matter if you have a buyer. This is how professionals like many of us get a bad name b/c people always backing out of deals. Get your private lender ( if you have one ) to make you a loan to purchase. Why not try taking the property to a wholesale company and take a small finders fee? At your numbers if correct it should be no problem. If you are not prepared to close, please stop locking up property.

Tivon: Thanks for the suggestion. I hadn't thought about out of state buyers.

Brent: Property value is an estimate based on the tax value, zillow, realtor.com and comps. Repair costs are also estimates.
AVR: $75,000
Asking: $31,500
ROI is listing as 7% as a rental, with $16K profit as a flip.

That might be the problem. You're estimating the value on tax assessments and online comps which is a no no when it comes to wholesaling.

You need to base the ARV from the recent sold comps from the target area.

Don't close the deal just yet. Slap up some signs all around your city with the house details on it. Have the calls go to google voice.

Then text message all the cell phone numbers the details of the house. I would make a video of the home and have the link in the text message so they can see the home without going to it.

These are all good suggestions. I would see f you can assign to another wholesaler and take a small profit and move on to the next one.

Marlena - Why don't use ask for an extension of time to close and continue looking for a buyer?

Also, I agree with putting up some signs. Go to a sign shop and get some blank corrugeted signs. Make up some "Must sell - Cash" signs with your phone number and put them up in the area. You might shake out a buyer.

One more thing, have you listed it here on BiggerPockets? I once found a buyer here.

There continues to be a lot of advice here regarding how to find buyers for this deal. That is obviously not the problem or issue at hand, it is the numbers of the deal.

As I stated before, such a deal will need to be around 65% and at face value presented, it is at 66% (plus your assignment fee as Jon pointed out). If other buyers familiar with the area have already passed on it, it is likely that all others will as well and ONLY because of price. So, to get this deal done, you will have to re-negotiate the price so that you can create enough spread to make it a worthwhile deal.

The numbers above include the assignment fee. I initially had it listed higher with wiggle room for negotiating, but have come down on the assignment to get it moved. I'd rather take a $1500 assignment than having to cancel.

Re-negotiating the contract may be the solution. However, before doing that, I'm going to call the rehabbers that live in the area that have passed over the deal to see what they would be willing to pay for the property.

One thing I have noticed, is that there is not much negotiating on price from other investor buyers. Most requests are on terms, in regard to owner financing. Is it common for investor buyers to Not negotiate price with the wholesaler?