How I Am Attempting to Find Deals in a Competitive Market

Unless you have been under a rock the past several years, you may have realized the real estate market across the country has become extremely competitive.

At the moment, I am attempting to employ a few strategies to find off-market leads, that almost anyone can do with a small budget! I am currently using two methods for identifying target properties to contact.

Driving for Dollars

This is a simple strategy that involves driving neighborhoods that interest you and seeing if there are any properties that might have some deferred maintenance.

Some of the things I look for:

• Old or Damaged Roof
• Old or Damaged Siding
• Boarded Windows
• Overgrown Lawns
• Snow Not Shoveled
• Dumpsters in the Driveway

The goal is to find either a vacant property or a property where the homeowner may be interested in downsizing.

Propstream

Propstream is a website that compiles public real estate data nationwide in a simple-to-use tool. It allows users to pull properties falling into the criteria they selected. For example, some lists you may be interested in pulling may be high equity, absentee owners, or expired listings.

The only downside of Propstream is that this does cost $99/month to use.

Once you have your list of properties from either Driving for Dollars or a Propstream list, you’ll need to figure out how you will get visibility with these homeowners, and see if they are motivated sellers.

There are many ways to approach this and I’m employing multiple strategies at the moment!

Cold Calling

Using Propstream’s skip tracing software, you can submit name and address information to get contact details for the homeowners.

You can then send a text or call them and gauge their interest in selling. There are many scripts you can find online and I would recommend trying them out to see what is comfortable for you.

Direct Mail Letters

This involves sending a letter directly to the homeowners. There are many mailer templates that you can use and you can also hand write them for a more personal touch! This takes a little more patience than cold calling but it’s a great way to get your name out in the neighborhoods you’re interested in.

Direct Mail Postcards

Similar to the letters, the postcards should be eye-catching and have a strong call to action (i.e. call me now to sell your house fast). There is less room to personalize this type of mailing, unlike a letter, but is an extremely efficient way to get in front of the homeowner. Services such as Vistaprint offer mailing services for marketing materials you create. You can upload an excel document of all of the addresses, saving hours of work!

Hopefully, as we all try to continue to find deals and grow in today’s market, some of the above strategies can bring in leads for those with a small budget or time constraints!