I've been targeted by a postcard mailer. I won't sell. Thoughts on engaging anyway?
Aurora, CO · Member since 2018 · 11 posts · 4 votes
I've been targeted by a postcard mailer. I won't sell. Thoughts on engaging anyway?
Most Popular Reply
Investor · Scottsdale Austin Tuktoyaktuk · Member since 2021 · 4k+ posts · 4k+ votes
2yQuote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
So I live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods of Aurora, CO. One guy has been mailing me "Will take in any condition!" postcards for a few months now. I have no intent to sell, and the prospective buyer (a RE broker) lives about 10 miles west of me.
Here's the thing: the photo he used for the front of my house is 4 years old. It's very obvious that my landscaping was under construction at the time of the picture. On one hand, I am annoyed he isn't bothering to update their records. I want to yell at him that if he's going to offer to buy my property, at least have post-pandemic photos. The waste and mental load of throwing away postcards is small - but it's real.
On the other hand, I wish there were ways to engage this guy in a way that would be to my advantage. I just have a complete failure of imagination of what this might look like. My frustration is clouding my judgement.
How would you deal with this situation?
Very odd response to a simple annoyance.
You can call him and ask him to please remove you from his mailing list. He will do so and he isn't doing anything illegal.
He is having a company produce the mailers and he has no control over the image used. He has never been by your house. The post card company is using the google image from the last time the google car drove down your street.
And most importantly, he has no clue, who you are.
He has sent out a minimum of 5,000 random post cards, costing $5,000 probably more, and he talks to whomever calls him. Out of 5,000 post cards, he will get maybe 5 phone calls. 4 of which are to take them off of the mailing list. But, the one person who does want to sell, saves $20,000 in real estate agent fees along with $10,000 in repairs and saves the uncertainty of how long it will take to sell on the MLS.
He then fixes up the property and sells it and makes maybe $30,000 and sends out another mailer that costs $1 a piece to send out. Again, he doesn't have a clue who you are and only cares if you are that one guy who wants to save a lot of money, if you want to sell and not have to pay a real estate agent.
Do you also get upset when Wendy's Burgers sends you an ad that says "come buy our burger and save $.50, we have no idea who you are, we don't particulary care who you are, but we want to sell you hamburgers that aren't actually ham, they are beef"?
It’s an interesting world and you are one that makes it so.
25 Replies
- Investor · Scottsdale Austin Tuktoyaktuk · Member since 2021 · 4k+ posts · 4k+ votes2y
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
So I live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods of Aurora, CO. One guy has been mailing me "Will take in any condition!" postcards for a few months now. I have no intent to sell, and the prospective buyer (a RE broker) lives about 10 miles west of me.
Here's the thing: the photo he used for the front of my house is 4 years old. It's very obvious that my landscaping was under construction at the time of the picture. On one hand, I am annoyed he isn't bothering to update their records. I want to yell at him that if he's going to offer to buy my property, at least have post-pandemic photos. The waste and mental load of throwing away postcards is small - but it's real.
On the other hand, I wish there were ways to engage this guy in a way that would be to my advantage. I just have a complete failure of imagination of what this might look like. My frustration is clouding my judgement.How would you deal with this situation?
Very odd response to a simple annoyance.
You can call him and ask him to please remove you from his mailing list. He will do so and he isn't doing anything illegal.
He is having a company produce the mailers and he has no control over the image used. He has never been by your house. The post card company is using the google image from the last time the google car drove down your street.
And most importantly, he has no clue, who you are.He has sent out a minimum of 5,000 random post cards, costing $5,000 probably more, and he talks to whomever calls him. Out of 5,000 post cards, he will get maybe 5 phone calls. 4 of which are to take them off of the mailing list. But, the one person who does want to sell, saves $20,000 in real estate agent fees along with $10,000 in repairs and saves the uncertainty of how long it will take to sell on the MLS.
He then fixes up the property and sells it and makes maybe $30,000 and sends out another mailer that costs $1 a piece to send out. Again, he doesn't have a clue who you are and only cares if you are that one guy who wants to save a lot of money, if you want to sell and not have to pay a real estate agent.
Do you also get upset when Wendy's Burgers sends you an ad that says "come buy our burger and save $.50, we have no idea who you are, we don't particulary care who you are, but we want to sell you hamburgers that aren't actually ham, they are beef"?
It’s an interesting world and you are one that makes it so.
- Aurora, CO · Member since 2018 · 11 posts · 4 votes2y
1. The image on the postcard does not match Google Maps. It was taken roughly one week after, given the progress of construction. Someone else took the time to photograph this neighborhood again.
2. The ratio of mail that wants my money, my possessions, my vote - compared to the mail that wants my time, my attention, my presence - tells me society has only two expectations for me: spend money or get out of the way. I do have a problem with the mass of Wendy's & Kroger & Home Depot & Democrats & Renewal By Andersen & NPR & Verizon & solar panels & Republicans & wholesalers.
The mail tells me my place in the world and it is depressing. I am a consumer first, a target for faceless charities second, barely a citizen, and nobody's neighbor. It may sound dramatic and needy, but that is how I see it.
Given this, it should make some sort of sense that I must force my way to create relationships and value from the smallest of openings - if I am to create a environment where I feel good about my place in the world. Wendy's does not care; this man might.
- Real Estate Broker · Hyde Park Tampa, FL · Member since 2019 · 2k+ posts · 3k+ votes2y
Two thoughts:
You cannot make more time - and, as such, time is more precious than money. Do you really want to waste/invest a minute value in this guy? Let's face it, he's just throwing darts hoping he'll hit something - anything. He doesn't know your house or it's value; he's not worth your time. Leave the trash on the curb.
And, then consider this: "Never argue with stupid people. They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience." (Source unknown).
You've got better things to do. Take the trash out.
- 2yTheresa HarrisPro MemberMember since 2019 · 15k+ posts · 11k+ votes
Why bother? You are wasting your time and his. Call him and ask to be taken off his list if it bothers you that much, otherwise just put the postcard in the recycling bin with the other junk mail and move on.
- 2yKerry Noble JrPro MemberInvestor · Indianapolis, IN · Member since 2018 · 2k+ posts · 1k+ votes
You never know how much value they can bring you.....go for it
- 2ySteven WesolowskiPro MemberRealtor · San Antonio, TX · Member since 2023 · 276 posts · 42 votes
Sometimes, you gotta go "crank-yankers" mode and have fun with these type of businesses --they may have several referrals in return! Call the guy. Inform him, "Hey this [NAME] over here in [neighborhood]. I get your postcards every day, how are ya?" They will then state how well they are and then ask you best time to go over buying your property. But then, reply, "Oh, but reason for my call is that you guys have my landscape wrongly featured on the photograph of my property you guys keep sending me for the past 4 years?! I have have one of the most beautiful lawns in all of Aurora, but you guys got it all wrong on your post cards?! Look, oh man, I wish this industry wasn't full of bold-face liars, what else can you guys NOT do for me??" and just have fun with it.
- 2yBruce WoodruffPro MemberContractor/Investor/Consultant · San Diego / Phoenix · Member since 2021 · 12k+ posts · 15k+ votes
I wouldn't waste any time on anything that is not productive for you. There is a thing called a trashcan. Every day when I get the mail, most of it goes right into that thing (most without even opening). Just include his offerings in the trashcan group. Over and done.
- Contractor · Scottsdale, AZ · Member since 2010 · 2k+ posts · 3k+ votes2y
First and foremost - You need to chill out, dude. Stressing over stuff like this is going to shave years off your life. Believe me when I say this is coming from a place of love. Chill.
Second - As an active real estate investor, I welcome these wholesalers who call, text, email, and send mailers. It only takes a minute or two to engage with them, introduce yourself, and share your buy box. You never know which one of them might bring you a deal some day.
- Rental Property Investor · Rochester, MN · Member since 2017 · 224 posts · 323 votes2y
@Kenneth Westervelt
If you are on this forum, you presumably are or would like to invest in real estate. Call him up and talk to him. He might become a mentor or bring you a deal.
- 2yJoe S.Pro MemberInvestor · San Antonio · Member since 2020 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votesSimply throw the postcard away. Our company does mailings from time to time and without fail there’s typically somebody that pretends they’re offended because they got our postcard.
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
So I live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods of Aurora, CO. One guy has been mailing me "Will take in any condition!" postcards for a few months now. I have no intent to sell, and the prospective buyer (a RE broker) lives about 10 miles west of me.
Here's the thing: the photo he used for the front of my house is 4 years old. It's very obvious that my landscaping was under construction at the time of the picture. On one hand, I am annoyed he isn't bothering to update their records. I want to yell at him that if he's going to offer to buy my property, at least have post-pandemic photos. The waste and mental load of throwing away postcards is small - but it's real.
On the other hand, I wish there were ways to engage this guy in a way that would be to my advantage. I just have a complete failure of imagination of what this might look like. My frustration is clouding my judgement.How would you deal with this situation?
Welcome to the United States of America where people get junk mail. - Investor · Rochester, NY · Member since 2016 · 576 posts · 358 votes2y
Throw away the postcard.
- Member since 2019 · 7k+ posts · 4k+ votes2y
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
So I live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods of Aurora, CO. One guy has been mailing me "Will take in any condition!" postcards for a few months now. I have no intent to sell, and the prospective buyer (a RE broker) lives about 10 miles west of me.
Here's the thing: the photo he used for the front of my house is 4 years old. It's very obvious that my landscaping was under construction at the time of the picture. On one hand, I am annoyed he isn't bothering to update their records. I want to yell at him that if he's going to offer to buy my property, at least have post-pandemic photos. The waste and mental load of throwing away postcards is small - but it's real.
On the other hand, I wish there were ways to engage this guy in a way that would be to my advantage. I just have a complete failure of imagination of what this might look like. My frustration is clouding my judgement.How would you deal with this situation?
Just take it easy, some of those mailers are coming from most likely our friends here in BP too, but what I like is that when I call them back, they answered from Manila LOL and then we chatting about something else.
- Flipper/Rehabber · Wilton, CT · Member since 2015 · 4k+ posts · 4k+ votes2y
All,
Here is my take on this. I think both sides have a valid point
No, he is not doing anything illegal, Yes everyone is doing it,
BUT also ... yes, that makes it F&@(@ annoying.
One person sending you a mailer .. OK. But when 300 wholesalers send you mailers every month, 24 cold calls, and 14 texts, every single week, it just adds up.
It being "legal" doesn't make it "OK" to pester people either right?
I HATE all these "open enrollment health insurance calls", and I HATE these "Your Google Listing is Crap" calls, don't you?
So let's not play high and mighty when we all know damn well we ALL hate these calls and not because YOU are sending mailers too, does it make it "ok" to pester everyone yes?
As I said..
I agree with most of you, and just request to be taken off his list on one end, but I also agree with him. Yes you are doing it, but at least own up to it and say "yes my marketing methods suck and I am annoying the living poop out of people just to get one deal". Own it!
There are FAR better ways to find motivated sellers.
- 2yJay HinrichsBusiness MemberReal Estate Consultant · Summerlin, NV · Member since 2014 · 45k+ posts · 66k+ votes
Quote from @Scott E.:
First and foremost - You need to chill out, dude. Stressing over stuff like this is going to shave years off your life. Believe me when I say this is coming from a place of love. Chill.
Second - As an active real estate investor, I welcome these wholesalers who call, text, email, and send mailers. It only takes a minute or two to engage with them, introduce yourself, and share your buy box. You never know which one of them might bring you a deal some day.
yup if you can get through their off shore phone poeple and get to the actual principal turn the tables.. I have picked up a few clients for myself this way. - 2yV.G JasonPro MemberInvestor · Member since 2022 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votesHe is literally mass mailing this. He isn't giving you any kind of importance, especially not the type that you are giving him. If you're looking to sell, let him know but tell him to be realistic and not predatory. If you're not looking to sell, you need to pick up some hobbies if this bothers you.
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
So I live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods of Aurora, CO. One guy has been mailing me "Will take in any condition!" postcards for a few months now. I have no intent to sell, and the prospective buyer (a RE broker) lives about 10 miles west of me.
Here's the thing: the photo he used for the front of my house is 4 years old. It's very obvious that my landscaping was under construction at the time of the picture. On one hand, I am annoyed he isn't bothering to update their records. I want to yell at him that if he's going to offer to buy my property, at least have post-pandemic photos. The waste and mental load of throwing away postcards is small - but it's real.
On the other hand, I wish there were ways to engage this guy in a way that would be to my advantage. I just have a complete failure of imagination of what this might look like. My frustration is clouding my judgement.How would you deal with this situation?
- 2ySam YinPro MemberLos Angeles, CA · Member since 2021 · 584 posts · 738 votes
@Scott E.
Ditto.
Don't stress.
As an active investor, I engage. It expands my network.
I had some do this to me last couple of years and I engaged. I listened to their offer, I presented my conditions, they worked around it, and I ended up exchanging a few properties and into much larger apartments. Make it work for you. Worse case, it doesn't, you have a few conversations outside your comfort zone, and you are still at square one.
- Member since 2022 · 1k+ posts · 1k+ votes2yI get at least 10 postcards a week. I have a garbage bag full of them. Some actually send me contracts with fair numbers. Still, you'd have to be an idiot to sign or consider any of them. To any novices out there, If somebody offers you real money for your property have YOUR attorney make the agreement.
I never answer my phone, but I was waiting for an important call the other day and one these guys caught me. "What is your interest in selling from 0 to 10?" I said "one". . Then he starts asking for my email, name, etc. "I'm not giving any info to any idiot that calls me on the phone" "How do expect to sell your house?" I'm not expecting to.....If you wanna buy a house send a fat offer to the house you want. Until then you're wasting everyone's time. Click. These people must be on drugs. What a sorry a** job. - Handyman · Pittsburgh, PA · Member since 2018 · 5k+ posts · 13k+ votes2y
"I do have a problem with the mass of Wendy's & Kroger & Home Depot & Democrats & Renewal By Andersen & NPR & Verizon & solar panels & Republicans & wholesalers.
The mail tells me my place in the world and it is depressing. I am a consumer first, a target for faceless charities second, barely a citizen, and nobody's neighbor. It may sound dramatic and needy, but that is how I see it.
Given this, it should make some sort of sense that I must force my way to create relationships and value from the smallest of openings - if I am to create a environment where I feel good about my place in the world. Wendy's does not care; this man might."
Wow. This is simply amazing to read in the Bigger Pockets forums.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids -- and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. Like the bodiless heads you see sometimes in circus sideshows, it is as though I have been surrounded by mirrors of hard, distorting glass. When they approach me they see only my surroundings, themselves, or figments of their imagination -- indeed, everything and
anything except me.
Nor is my invisibility exactly a matter of a bio-chemical accident to my epidermis. That invisibility to which I refer occurs because of a peculiar disposition of the eyes of those with whom I come in contact. A matter of the construction of their inner eyes, those eyes with which they look through their physical eyes upon reality. I am not complaining, nor am I protesting either. It is sometimes advantageous to be unseen, although it is most often rather wearing on the nerves. Then too, you're constantly being bumped against by those of poor vision. Or again, you often doubt if you really exist. You wonder whether you aren't simply a phantom in other people's minds. Say, a figure in a nightmare which the sleeper tries with all his strength to destroy. It's when you feel like this that, out of resentment, you begin to bump people back. And, let me confess, you feel that way most of the time. You ache with the need to convince yourself that you do exist in the real world, that you're a part of all the sound and anguish, and you strike out with your fists, you curse and you swear to make them recognize you. And,
alas, it's seldom successful.
Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison, published in 1952 - 2yDon KonipolBusiness MemberInvestor · The Woodlands TX / Avon, CT · Member since 2009 · 6k+ posts · 10k+ votes
People are getting more and more fed up with intrusive marketing. Junk mail, junk email, text advertising, sales pitch robo phone calls. 5000 contacts = 4500 ignores, 450 mildly pissed off, 48 “lookers”, 1 real buyer, and 1 deeply depressed, almost suicidal individual who believes a random postcard means the end of western civilization. Unfortunately he’s probably right.
- Real Estate Agent · Atlanta, GA · Member since 2022 · 352 posts · 219 votes2y
If you're not looking to sell, why engage? I understand the mailers are annoying, can't knock a hustle if someone is trying to grow their business or portfolio. I am sure he attached his information to the mailer, there is no harm or foul in calling and discussing potential options!
- 2yJohn MorganPro MemberRental Property Investor · Grand Prairie, TX · Member since 2018 · 2k+ posts · 2k+ votes
@Kenneth Westervelt
I get calls and postcards almost daily from people like this. They send out thousands of these post cards and have virtual assistants hired for cheap labor in the Philippines to call people all day long for $5/hour asking to buy houses as is for cash. Over 99% of us ignore these flyers and calls. Not a big deal. But all it takes is one person to sell their distressed property to this investor and it pays for all their material, labor and then some, so it makes it worthwhile. Gurus teach this so expect it to continue. However, I’m down to less than 5 postcards a week and only around 5 or 6 calls or texts per week from these wholesalers trying to buy my rentals. So that’s good news! My wife, daughter and 90 year old dad used to get calls and texts frequently from these people wanting to buy my properties. That was really annoying! But I’ve noticed the trend decreasing fortunately.
- Aurora, CO · Member since 2018 · 11 posts · 4 votes2y
Update:
I got another postcard from the same guy. I called the number to be removed from the mailing list. The person who sent the postcard answered the phone, and accepted my request with no interest in engagement.
I certainly overthought this particular interaction. Hasn't been the first time, probably won't be the last. I appreciate all the commenters who tried to empathise with my situation. Hopefully these habits serve you well in business.
@Jim K. Of everyone who tried, you get it the most. Good on you.
- Investor · Scottsdale Austin Tuktoyaktuk · Member since 2021 · 4k+ posts · 4k+ votes2yAt one of my properties I'm receiving 5 post cards a week from the same person. A glitch in the matrix? I don't even like the post card. No pictures of me on the beach enjoying life.
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
Update:
I got another postcard from the same guy. I called the number to be removed from the mailing list. The person who sent the postcard answered the phone, and accepted my request with no interest in engagement.
I certainly overthought this particular interaction. Hasn't been the first time, probably won't be the last. I appreciate all the commenters who tried to empathise with my situation. Hopefully these habits serve you well in business.
@Jim K. Of everyone who tried, you get it the most. Good on you.
- Handyman · Pittsburgh, PA · Member since 2018 · 5k+ posts · 13k+ votes2yYes, but I'm a failed literati. Franz Kafka helped me. Maybe his work can help you.
Quote from @Kenneth Westervelt:
Update:
I got another postcard from the same guy. I called the number to be removed from the mailing list. The person who sent the postcard answered the phone, and accepted my request with no interest in engagement.
I certainly overthought this particular interaction. Hasn't been the first time, probably won't be the last. I appreciate all the commenters who tried to empathise with my situation. Hopefully these habits serve you well in business.
@Jim K. Of everyone who tried, you get it the most. Good on you.
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