All Forum Posts by: Harvie Arington

It seems to be the consensus around here that using comps is the best way to determine the value of a property. Texas is a non-disclosure state, so the MLS is the only way I can think of to get the comps. So here's the question, if you're not an agent, how do you get the comps from the MLS? I don't imagine there are many agents who will do this for free and their 3% commission would take a huge bite out of an assignment fee. What arrangements do you fellow investors use to get comps from agents? How do you agents here want to be paid?

Pros
1) The owner doesn't live there, so they are probably less attached to the house.
2) There's a good chance they are landlording/ it's vacant because they couldn't sell it.
3) If it's empty they're usually motivated and possibly desperate to sell.
4) This is also a good way to meet other investors, especially if you are a wholesaler.

Cons
1) There's a good chance today there's no equity in it if they only owned a couple of years.
2)If you want to but subject 2 there are still a lot of bad loans.
3) If you're marketing to other investors there's a good chance they know more than you do and you should be prepared before you talk to them. Some people might want to take advantage of you while others might not want to deal with a novice.

Just a few off the top of my head. I love marketing to absentee owners who have owned their homes at least 5 years. Another list to consider is Free and Clear, or people who have little or no mortgage on their house.

Lots of great ideas so far. I found a book on Amazon.com called Real Estate Investing Systems by James Orr. It has about 100 checklists for all aspects of real estate investing. Some are daily checklists and others are task specific. I think it's about $20

Sorry it took so long to reply. Out of 768 postcards I got 4 calls. Three didn't return my call and one is an elderly man who wants to unload at least one of his properties. Still hopeful we can come to an agreement. About 50 postcards were sent back undeliverable. I don't know if that is normal. If I learned anything it's that the more personal the communication is the better your response will be. Therefore my next mailing will be yellow letters. I'm also going to try to answer the phone every time it rings even though I have a full time job. I think I will try another service for my list to see if I get fewer returned cards.

Sorry, i don't know who Chris Chico is. I just read a lot, talked to people and tried something. Going to see how it goes.

Quick update,

The postcards hit on Saturday, May 29 and I've had 3 calls so far. I'll let you know what becomes of them.

Josh,
I didn't realize that you didn't have an editorial team. Now I'm even MORE impressed. My wish list would include an interview with an industry mover and shaker. I'm not talking about a pitch from a "guru", but a discussion from someone who actually works in real estate and can give their perspective/story.

Thanks again,

Harvie

Any recommendations on a company? Yellow letters complete? Sales Team Live/Richard Roop? Any others?

I plan to use some of the proceeds from any deals on a yellow letter campaign.

I agree that yellow letters would work better. But, I'm on a budget so I didn't want to farm it out and I'm lazy so I didn't want to write 767 letters. I tried to do it on the computer, but I couldn't make it work the way I wanted to. That's why I sent the postcards. As for the cost:
MelissaData $145.92
Click2Mail $278.20
Total $424.12