Approaching the Home Owner

[Suzette Bickers]

Just got started in the Wholesaling business with our first house under contract.  We are trying to arrange a contractor for an estimate, and potential showings to the retail market.  But the homeowner (who no longer lives there, lives about an hour and 15 minutes away) is not wanting to give us access to the property with a key and wants to be present for everything (doesn't want a lot of people in his vacant house).  The concept of wholesaling is foreign, as in, for us to "sell his house before we even buy it from him", and he has an issue with this.  How would I turn this guy's thinking around, to see us as a "Realtor" of some sort?  He wouldn't expect to be in the house for showings if he had went with a Realtor, do you think?

BTW, we do have it in the contract that we do have it written that we have the right to market the property in any way, including MLS, sign in the yard, advertising for sale/rent, as well as showing the property to prospective buyers. But, he didn't read the thing before signing, which I know doesn't get him out of the legality of things, but I would like to keep everyone calm and happy, instead of throwing around legal threats.

Also, how SHOULD have I approached the whole deal from the start so he wouldn't have had the misunderstanding that we were buying the house and then later selling?

Thanks!