New Wholesaler starting/creating a business

New Wholesaler starting/creating a business

Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes

Hey everyone. I've been listening in on a free webinar every day this week, with lessons on cash buyers, sellers and how to make offers. All week I continued to hear about VA's (virtual assistants) and how important it is to hire them so that I can transition from doing the "admin work" into the "boss" role, essentially taking the dream and making it a real business for myself. I found I can hire VA's on sites like fiverr.com for relatively cheap, the only issue is training them on the business and what I need to be done. My biggest concern being the quality and making sure I don't steer away potential buyers and sellers. Day three of the webinar, the host brings up a service he provides, essentially creating the business for me with trained VA's to find those sellers and buyers, an account manager to ensure I continue on the path the success, and lifetime access to their alliance + flagship programs. The cost of this service is $3,997. Yikes!

I'm going back and forth on whether or not this is something I want to do for a couple reasons. One, I can easily spend that amount of money on direct mail and potentially only see 1 interested seller. Another reason being, the time and energy going into training VA's on the business, ensuring they know the correct response to both sellers and buyers, and ultimately just not losing potential deals, could alone be worth the investment into a team who DOES know what they're doing.

I’m ultimately at a stand still in what I think I should do and would love to hear what some of you fellow wholesalers think.. it’s not worth the money? Or that establishing a consistent generation of leads is worth it? I’m grateful for any and all thoughts/opinions!

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Realtor · NY · Member since 2020 · 167 posts · 169 votes
6y

@Lacey Haessler, wow, those guys marketing department is really good, they we're grooming you for the 'kill', fattening the cow basically, all those seminar days, they we're grooming you all. I completely understand the value of a VA but absolutely not at that cost. What I've done is breakdown all processes into steps, simple to understand repeatable steps, that made it easy for me to train my VA, aka sister who had extra time on her hands. Happy to share any process breakdowns if you go that route. Don't think twice about it, build your business systems and after you are confident in them, then train a VA if needed

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  • Realtor · NY · Member since 2020 · 167 posts · 169 votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler, wow, those guys marketing department is really good, they we're grooming you for the 'kill', fattening the cow basically, all those seminar days, they we're grooming you all. I completely understand the value of a VA but absolutely not at that cost. What I've done is breakdown all processes into steps, simple to understand repeatable steps, that made it easy for me to train my VA, aka sister who had extra time on her hands. Happy to share any process breakdowns if you go that route. Don't think twice about it, build your business systems and after you are confident in them, then train a VA if needed

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Joanne Eriaku Thank you so much for your response. Everything you just said is exactly what I didn’t want to believe, that they subtly kept dropping the importance of building a team all week, just to drop their “quick solution”. And when I learned how much it cost, immediately I felt defeated again, thinking how can I do this now without their help? Man!! Humans are so quick to jump to the easy way out huh?

    I would absolutely LOVE to pick your brain a little bit and get the opportunity to hear about your journey and success if you’d be open to it? My biggest issue I think is consistency, one month I’m all in to make it happen, and then when I don’t see any results I feel defeated and start to back off and look towards a “real job”.

  • Realtor · NY · Member since 2020 · 167 posts · 169 votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler totally up to connecting, we have a lot in common. PM me anytime

  • Flipper/Rehabber · Wilton, CT · Member since 2015 · 4k+ posts · 4k+ votes
    6y

    Look...

    The best way to learn is to do and figure it out. I am not against paying for a system that works, but what that is, is not a system that works. That just sounds like a load of BS wrapped in golden package.

    You really need to try it on your own, figure it out. THAT is how you become good as something. You will never learn what it is like to get out there and get it done when someone does it for you ... they are just holding you hostage. The second you pay, you can't do without them and you are forced to keep paying for the upsales.

    Nahhh, do it yourself.

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Jerryll Noorden thank you for your response! That was one of my concerns as well.. was paying for the service the “easy way out”. I kept thinking, is that your ego talking? Or is it really as simple as nothing good comes that easy.. and you yourself need to create your own business if you want to one day be financially free. I really appreciate your words and spoke a little bit with @Joanne Eriaku last night and feel refreshed to start again today, put my mind to the task ahead and make this happen! It’s not going to be easy, but all it is going to take is some dedication!

  • Real Estate Investor · FL · Member since 2011 · 586 posts · 360 votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler I am a big believer that you should have experience before hiring a VA. I spent a couple years managing my own rentals because when I hired a property management company, I wanted to know what my expectations should be.

    I'd suggest get the experience and when the time comes to hire a VA you'll have a very clear understanding of what you want them to do or not do.

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Braden C. Great insight! “You want to know what your expectations will be”.. love that! Totally right, I need to know the ins and outs myself before I can expect to teach it to someone else.

  • Jonathan GreeneBusiness Member
    Real Estate Consultant · Madison, NJ · Member since 2016 · 6k+ posts · 7k+ votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler You don't need to spend a lot on VAs and you don't really need them until you know how awful the job of calling leads is. Once you realize it's not for you, you would go to Upwork, not Fiverr, and plug in Real Estate Investor VA and you can find a lot of good ones overseas for $5-$7/hour. You do a Zoom with them to test their call ability, review their references from other REI inside the Upwork system, and then when you use them Upwork tracks their work time for you. Let me know if you have any questions, but when you are new you do not need a VA before you have back-end systems, mail flow and lead flow. Webinars like that are just a long lead-in for a pitch. Play here in the forums and get all the info for free.

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Jonathan Greene I've heard a lot of people on BP talking about upwork, I think that's something I'll definitely look into! I think I'm finding that until I get my system set up and figured out, there is no point in hiring a VA. Great advice and really great input. Thank you so much!

  • Jonathan GreeneBusiness Member
    Real Estate Consultant · Madison, NJ · Member since 2016 · 6k+ posts · 7k+ votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler I use a system now that has many VAs baked into it, but before that I found my VA on Upwork and she was fantastic. Upwork has a detailed search for what you want and you can see how many real estate-related jobs they have done and their reviews. You want 95% approval rating and up.

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Jonathan Greene again, thank you! I’m looking into it now, just so I have a bit more knowledge on it when the time does come to look into hiring. I really appreciate it!

  • Investor · Austin TX · Member since 2016 · 1k+ posts · 2k+ votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler Dont get suckered by these hustlers! Guys like this are very polished, they have done an excellent job steering you in the direction they want with their "free" content just to hit you at the end with a $4,000 surprise. I have been wholesaling full time for 6 years so I like to think Im qualified to advise you on this one. Everyone wants to be "the boss" but you have to do the work first. You cannot start and run a successful business by hiring people to do jobs that you have never done before. It makes sense to hire people to do things you are incapable of doing. For example, I tried to create a website and I learned that I do not possess the skills (or the patience) to create the type of professional and polished website that I wanted. So I hired someone to do it for me, but I knew exactly what I wanted it to look like. With regards to your wholesale business, you must have a system in place and functioning before you bring in employees (VAs, Admins, 1099s, Independent contractors etc) because if you dont know what you want them to do then how can they do it? I highly recommend that you start out as a one woman operation and create a flow that works for you and creates the results that you want. Once you have that, THEN you can start bringing in people to help you be more efficient, create leverage and increase productivity. The first person I hired was someone to do all my property research and organize and format my lists for my skip tracer because that was a time consuming part of my process that I realized could be done more effectively by someone else. The next person I hired was a VA to make my calls and help me bring in more motivated seller leads. Does this make sense? Dont put the cart before the horse as they say.

  • Irvine, CA · Member since 2018 · 14 posts · 8 votes
    6y

    @Lydia T. Thank you Lydia, such great advice and really motivating worlds. I think your absolutely right and sometimes you just need to hear it from someone else.. I really appreciate your post. And it gave me a lot of motivation and encouragement for my wednesday!

  • Real Estate Broker · Glendora, CA · Member since 2017 · 51 posts · 14 votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler Lacey, I'm not a wholesaler, but I look at a lot of wholesale deals from other wholesalers. I think you need to know the business inside and out before you look to farming out some of the work to VA's. Many of the wholesalers I talk to have no idea how to evaluate a property. They get it tied up and try to pass it on to a flipper with numbers that just don't work. It's obvious they don't really know the business. So first learn all you can about the market you are working in, learn how to establish an accurate ARV and accurate numbers for rehab, holding and selling costs. Then you will know when you really have a good deal and can present it to investors with confidence. I wish you well on you new venture.

  • Orange County, CA · Member since 2020 · 42 posts · 24 votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler Don't work on things you already know you don't want to do if you can afford to outsource it. Some great advice on here and I'm a fan of leveraging teams and technology. Also taught to lead by example so you must be able to preform what you're delegating (even if you don't like to do it yourself). PM if you'd like a few different VA options (I've interviewed several); some do charge for process building and onboarding, some don't; 4k is bonkers!

  • Investor · Austin TX · Member since 2016 · 1k+ posts · 2k+ votes
    6y

    @Lacey Haessler Happy Thursday! Feel free to reach out to me anytime for advice. I am a full time wholesaler/real estate investor (6 years in and I still love it) so I am proof that its possible. Without giving a ton of money to anyone else. You dont need to be the boss until you are making enough money to pay employees. You should definitely learn all aspects of your business first so you know exactly how you want things done so when the time comes you can teach others.

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