All Forum Posts by: Luis Toledo

Originally posted by @Michael Jobe:

Hey @Luis Toledo property #2 was in a very good neighborhood. I'd bet the crime rate is almost nonexistent. But property #1 was a completely different story!

You'll need to tell me more at the next TREIA meeting :)

The fact the cops showed up at all tells me the neighborhood isn't all that bad.

You signed up for BP just to post this? Okay. Are you looking for help or just looking to complain? My tip is get off the MLS and build a real system for buying properties by marketing directly to sellers. South Florida has been hypercompetitive for decades. What are you doing that's not working?

The only people that think PPC and online strategies are cheaper than direct mail are the ones who've done neither. PPC can be very expensive to do effectively. Mainly because it's tough to target with the efficiency of a mailing list and thus tire kickers will likely drain your allocated budget faster than qualified leads. If you just focus on organic growth, you can equal the successes of PPC for much less, but it will take much longer. Especially in a very online savvy market like SD. PPC is best used to jump start online efforts until organic ranking comes up to speed.

The nice thing about PPC is that once your organic ranking efforts get you to the top spot for your focused searches, you can lay off the PPC or refocus to cover other searches. In your market, SoCal, you're facing massive competition both online and offline. There are established firms with deep pockets and lots of experts already doing what you're talking about. Your best bet is going to be to do something they aren't willing to do. Those activities are typically going to be either totally original, in which case don't share it here ;) or it's going to be something that doesn't scale well and thus doesn't appeal to large concerns. Door knocking, for instance, is one such marketing activity that large firms don't generally bother with, but can be highly effective when you do actually find a motivated seller.

I'm sorry for the equity stuff before. I just realized that you posted in the agents forum and not the wholesaler forum. Web savvy first time home buyers sounds like a good "bread and butter" niche to go after at first. The other stuff still applies though, you've got some stiff competition in your area. Your best bet is likely to go online and act like you're a new home buyer, then see which agencies are always in your face online. Those are the firms you want to be a part of, rather than competing against as they likely have the most to teach you. Good luck.

You might try not to think of it as "traditional vs. online," because honestly, that doesn't matter. Instead, try "what works vs. what doesn't" and by "work," I mean methods that make you much more money than they cost you. Last time I checked, PPC wasn't free. Neither are websites, hosting (the good type that you can run analytical on." Also, people your age don't usually have equity in their homes. So, as far as the near future is concerned, you're probably going to need to target baby boomers. Direct mail works because everyone checks their mailbox with a certain frequency. PPC and SEO strategies work if you know how to capture leads and convert them into clients.

What I'm trying to say is that I know traditional marketing techniques work because their effects can be proven and tracked. Social media and online efforts are just another medium and the same campaign tracking that one would use for direct mail or telemarketing can also work for online campaigns with the right techniques. Marketing isn't rocket science, it's mostly common sense... benchmarked, tracked and ruthlessly evolved. Be careful of "new marketing" that emphasizes branding and intangible benefits over ROI. It's not that the benefits can't be measured, it's that the metrics never look good when translated into dollars. Small businesses can't afford that and would likely do better focusing on proven techniques that pay for themselves and folding branding themselves through those same efforts as a secondary benefit.

Checkout books by Seth Godin, Dan S. Kennedy and Zig Ziglar if you want a good background on marketing and sales.

maybe have an inspector out to the property ASAP so you can identify any major issues. Very few issues will have wildly variable costs associated with them. Foundation issues are one... plumbing is another.

@Dante Nava

Yep, I'll be there Monday night.

Welcome to BP Chuck! It's great to see another member from the Bull City here. Make sure you checkout our local TREIA organization. There's a big monthly meeting in Raleigh and a smaller monthly sub-group meeting for Durham and Chapel Hill that meets at the Golden Corral near 54 and 55 next week (I think). You can PM me or check out TREIA.org for specifics.

You should speak with a good accountant to decide what to do. The IRS could care less about your LLC, it's not relevant for tax purposes. As far as they're concerned you're either a C-corp or basically everyone else. That is, either a pass through entity or not.

Maybe the agency will lease the other unit too and it will be a non issue. Maybe offer that up next time you speak with them.