All Forum Posts by: Anthony Gayden

@Scott Rosslow

In terms of finding good deals it will be more difficult to find them on the MLS. However, I do think it is worth looking through the listings daily for a couple of reasons.

It gives you insight into the what housing in a certain area is actually worth. Basically what I am saying is how can you know what a deal is unless you know how much houses in an area are selling for?

The second reason is that every once in a while a good deal will pop up and if you act fast enough you can win.

Originally posted by @Lucas Machado:

@Anthony Gayden "Driving for dollars" - I would not personally use for direct-mail. I can see the logic in it - but building the list is so hard. Direct-mail is about covering a large number of leads for as low cost as possible. For all you know, there could be a typos on the list of 25 names, they could be listed on the MLS.

Try this. Sign-up for BeenVerified. Find the owners phone numbers and e-mail. Prepare a detailed script about the property and why you are calling. It should not feel like a random cold call like you are a call service. "My name is Anthony Gayden, I am a real estate investor in this area, and am extremely interested in purchasing XYZ property." Reach out directly. One hybrid approach (probably how I would work it), is it send 1 letter and then follow-up with the call. This can bridge the cap as a conversation starter as well as lay the groundwork.

 Thanks for the tips. I certainly do want to start cold calling for leads in the near future. I already signed up for Google Voice for just that reason.

I am trying to target specific neighborhoods and housing types within those neighborhoods, so I thought driving around collecting addresses would help me weed out those properties that I have no interest in pursuing. 

My direct mail campaign specifically went out to absentee landlords of homes valued less than $150,000 in specific zip codes in Omaha. While that is great, there will likely be properties there that I will not be interested in buying. That is cool though since I can attempt to wholesale any deals like that. 

This list is more targeted because they are properties that I want to personally buy for part of my portfolio.

Originally posted by @Jay Hinrichs:

Originally posted by @Anthony Gayden:

@Kyle Lush

Income (cash flow) is everything. 

There are no exceptions to that rule in my mind. Let's look at the people who live in high cost of living areas like San Francisco, NYC, or Hawaii. They bought their homes 30+ years ago when prices were much lower and the homes are now paid off. On paper their homes are worth $1,000,000+. 

The problem is that those homes do not provide those people with income. There are many cases of people being house rich, but cash poor, surviving on small social security checks and government assistance. 

 this is why reverse mortgages were invented.. also remember for those folks that are married  500k of that gain is TAX FREE.. this is the major benefit of owing owner occ in high priced or appreciating markets.. I know I have done the run up 4 times sold, got that whopper fat check TAX FREE  that is truly life changing.. you can use those funds to start business's ( which I have done) semi retire ( which I have done)..   I know when you move into the bigger banking world net worth is VERY important.. banks want tax returns to prove income and financial statement to show you know how to keep some of your cash flow. 

 That is very true Jay, but for someone who does not have a business mindset it won't work that way. That person will not use their home equity to create more cash flow. 

@Justin S.

Appreciation can be a good thing, however I believe that cash flow is the most important thing. This is also part of the reason why I want to invest in value add property rather than turn key. You have much more direct control over the appreciation of a property. 

In terms of your situation, you should be looking for those value add opportunities. That is where I am focusing. 

Just as an example I am buying a property here in Nebraska for $65,000, putting about $25,000 into it, and it should have an ARV of $125,000. If I cash out refinance and get 70% of the ARV, I will get $87,500 of my money back and it should still cash flow $250/month after expenses.

Good morning BiggerPockets,

Last week I started my first direct mail campaign. I bought a list from ListSource and sent out postcards to a few hundred absentee landlords in the area where I want to invest. The postcards will start to go out next week.

Rather than sit on my butt for the next few weeks waiting for responses, I decided to be proactive and go driving for dollars to build my own custom mailing list. 

Well it didn't take long to realize that this was probably the slowest and most tedious way to build a mailing list. I spent 2 hours driving around yesterday and getting addresses. When I got home I had to look up each address on the county assessors website and manually type it into my Excel database. That took an additional 4 hours.

So what did 6 hours of work get me? A mailing list with 25 names. I honestly can't even imagine trying to get hundreds of names for a good direct mail campaign.

@Kyle Lush

Income (cash flow) is everything. 

There are no exceptions to that rule in my mind. Let's look at the people who live in high cost of living areas like San Francisco, NYC, or Hawaii. They bought their homes 30+ years ago when prices were much lower and the homes are now paid off. On paper their homes are worth $1,000,000+. 

The problem is that those homes do not provide those people with income. There are many cases of people being house rich, but cash poor, surviving on small social security checks and government assistance. 

@Ammon Gutierrez

I wasted thousands of dollars and years of my life studying for a career field that I only worked in for 2.5 years. In the end that education made me a great "worker" and nearly guaranteed that I would NEVER be wealthy or make more than a middle class income.

In other words college was a waste for me. That is not to say it would be a waste for everyone, but for me it got me no closer to my true goals, which have to do with entrepreneurship and being wealthy.

I'm running Facebook ads right now trying to get leads. We will see how it works.

Mark Benevento The more properties I own, the easier it seems to make money.

David Gritz You can easily create a thread that will get a lot of replies, I have seen it time and again on here. 1. Anything about a real estate bubble/crash 2. Any thread arguing property management vs. self managing 3. A thread asking how to invest $100K, $200K, or some large sum of money 4. Any discussion of appreciation vs. cash flow markets