All Forum Posts by: Kyle B.

Carolina - thanks for the welcome. Agreed, BP has a wealth of knowledge for people like us starting out. Where in Chicago are you from/investing in?

Eddie - it's encouraging to here a fellow "newbie" getting some deals done. I've heard of the driving for dollars approach. Glad to see that it can be a success strategy. A few questions for you: how many houses did you need to identify and market to before getting calls from these owners; and also how motivated did you find the sellers that contacted you? Trying to gauge if this is a more effective approach for finding motivated sellers than just purchasing an absentee owner list. Sounds like it is, but then it probably is also much more labor intensive since you are required to spend time finding the homes.

Thanks,

Kyle

Ryan, thanks for the response. See below to answers for your questions:

1) No, my end goal for real estate investing would be to rehab homes (to generate higher profits per deal) as well as purchase rental units (to generate passive income). As I gain more experience about investing, I suspect I'll learn about additional strategies where I can develope a niche as well.

2) I want to begin in wholesaling because from what I've read, it is a great way to gain expereince going through the deal process without putting much capital at risk. I think it would be very risky to "dive in" so to speak and purchase a property without any prior expereince - seems like an easy way to lose money. After wholesaling a number of deals, I would hopefully gain enough experience about the market and deal process to be confident enough to purchase a property and rehab or rent it out. Furthermore, with a fulltime job, I think it would be very diffcult to manage a rehab process with such little experience

3) No specific GURU mentioned this term, but I've read that it is a good way to get started in real estate by various people from this website along with several others (for the very reasons I mentioned). I've also read posts about successful investors who only wholesale.

Also out of curiosity, what area of Chicagoland do you live/invest in? I currently live in the city on the near north side but am originally from the south suburbs.

Thanks,

Kyle

John - thanks for the response. I agree with all the points you make. Did you begin with rehabs when you first got started as well? This is the route I eventually want to go down, but I would like to gain some experience in wholesaling before actually purchasing properties. Also out of curiousity, do you acquire a fair amount of properties from wholesalers or do you mainly acquire properties from your own marketing?

I plan on starting out in real estate investing by wholesaling to cash buyers. I want to start by wholesaling because it will allow me to gain practical experience and knowledge (of which I currently have little) without risking much in the way of capital. After reading a lot of posts on BP though, I have notcied a fair amount negative sentiment towards traditional wholesaling, as it is not as profitable as rehabbing and does not create passive income like owning rental units.

My ultimate goal would be to move from wholesalilng to rehabbing and also building up a rental asset base to create consistent cash flow. But I think it would be crazy to start actually purchasing properties without have real world experience dealing with real estate (not just from reading books/forums or purchasing study programs, but actually going through the deal process from start to finish). To me, that sounds like a quick way to loss money and not the best strategy for someone without any real experience.

I would be interested in hearing more seasoned people's opinion on this topic. Is traditional wholesaling a feasible business model? I've read forums from what seemed to be successful wholesalers (which leads me to think it is feasible), but as I mentioned earlier, I've sensed a somewhat negative sentiment towards this business strategy. Also, for those who are landlords and/or rehabbers, did you start out wholesaling before actually investing your own money in properties or did you "dive right in" so to speak?

Thanks and merry Xmas/happy holidays to everyone.

Kyle

Thanks Brandon, appreciate the response. I will have to look into this source a bit more.

Brandon - I am also looking to purchase a direct mailing list to generate wholesale leads. You are well ahead of where I am in the process though. How much is Listsource charging you for their list (on a cost per address basis)?

Thanks,

Kyle

Hello everyone. I'm new to real estate investing and am in the process of putting together a business strategy to begin wholesaling in Chicago/Chicagoland area. I want to put most of my efforts into marketing to motivated sellers and am interested in hearing what marketing methods other investors used when first getting into the business.

Many of us planning to take the first step into RE investing would really benefit from hearing what marketing methods were successful for investors when they first began and other methods that ended up not panning out. I would really be interested in hearing about people's experiences regarding this aspect of investing. As of now, I'm somewhat at a loss in determing how to get started. The only thing I could really do at this point would be to drive around looking for homes that seem in disrepair/with an absent owner - not the most well thought out strategy to get started.

Also, I have a full time job as I'm sure many other investors do as well. I would also be interested in learning how investors have successfully balanced their current jobs with starting a RE investing business.

Thanks in advance and Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays to the BP community.

Kyle

Brandon - thanks for the welcome. I look forward to connecting with others on the site. I plan on getting a pic up shortly... just waiting for a good hair day.

Thanks Jon, I'll take a look at CoreLogic. Would you happen to know the cost per contact investors typically pay for these lists?

Hello everyone. My name is Kyle and I live in Chicago. I currently work in the finance industry, but for a number of reasons have become very interested in real estate investing. I would love to connect with anyone also located in the Chicago area looking to expand their network. I don't have any experience so far, but am anxious to learn as much as I can about investing, and in particular wholesaling, which is how I would like to start out. I have a lot of questions, but there is one specific quesiton I will start out by asking below:

- How do you obtain marketing lists (such as probate, absentee owners) for potentially motivated sellers? I've read this is a good marketing strategy to use, but do not know how to purchase these.

Thanks in advance, and I look forward to connecting with everyone.

Kyle