All Forum Posts by: Ryan Webber

Sage, it seems like you've probably already received your answers for this question, but for anyone else here's two good places to start.

As for sellers, check http://www.biggerpockets.com/topics/42043-seller-profile-sheet-?forum_id=93&page=1#posts-217307

As for buyers, check http://www.biggerpockets.com/topics/41833-how-did-you-develop-your-wholesaling-business-?forum_id=93&page=1#posts-214860

I don't know if I have 10 questions to screen whether to pursue it or not. I ask other questions that give more information about the deal but don't necessarily dictate whether I pursue it or not. Whether to pursue it or not comes down to 2 factors - equity and motivation. Here's the questions I use to determine those 2 factors.

1. How long have you owned it? (equity)
2. What kind of condition is the property in? (equity)
3. When do you want to close? (motivation)
4. How much do you need to get for it? (motivation)

Depending on the situation sometimes I ask how much they owe against the property. Some people don't care about sharing that with you and some people are very cautious about it.

Yes, Amarillo, Texas.

The lender normally dictates the title company. Many times this is an out of town title company that utilizes a local "courtesy" title agent that actually does the title work and the actual closing. I still haven't figured out what exactly the lender's title company does other than collect a portion of the escrow and title insurance fee.

The key to wholesaling an REO is being able to pick the title company (i.e. one that will do double closings). Many times the lender will let you pick the title company if you pay for your own title insurance.

You also need to be aware of any deed restrictions that the lender may enforce. Some of the Fannie Mae REO's I've bought have a deed restriction on them that I can't resell or refinance it for over a certain amount of the purchase price for 90 days.

My first wholesale deal was me looking for a rehab to retail myself. I came across a wholesaler who had a 5 house package deal. I kind of spouted off and made the wholesaler a very low offer on all 5, and she took it. I remember thinking :badwords:

I freaked because I didn't have the money or the financing lined up to do all 5, so I started to frantically market them. I got the financing lined up for all 5 but I didn't need it. I ended up wholesaling 3 of them before I closed. I had another one sold within a couple weeks of closing and the last one I had to fix and resell myself. When it was all said and done I cleared about $30,000 on the deal.

Investors don't care as much about your experience as they do the price of the deal. The key to closing it was price. Price overcomes all objections. Sell your properties at a cheap enough price and you will always get the deal done.

Congratulations. That's a great first deal.

As Peter shared, now its babysitting time. Babysit the title work, babysit the buyer's financing, babysit the seller's needs or questions. You're not done yet, but you're close.

And again Peter is right on. Make that earnest money non-refundable.

To do a wholesale deal, let's say you will probably talk to about 30 pre-qualified people who want to sell their house. About 25 of those will be motivated but won't have enough equity to sell you the house at the discount you require. About 4 of them will have the equity but not be motivated enough to sell at such a discount. 1 will be motivated and have enough equity.

Now let's look at realtors. Realtors are looking for people who want to sell their house. You will roughly have 29 people who aren't going to sell to you that want to sell their house. Any good realtor should be able to pull at least a couple listings a month out of those warm leads. Even if you only refer the ones you know don't have the equity to take your offer, your realtor should be able to get several listings off of them.

i.e. a Win-Win situation

If I were you I would take the next week and read through every single post in the 44 pages of posts in the Wholesaling Forum, but that's just me.

As for what you should do with your particular question, a POF won't solve your problem but getting your buyer's buying criteria would. I could give you a POF for a million dollars but that doesn't mean I want million dollar houses. You should know what price range your buyers WANT to buy in. Then you won't be wasting your time and theirs.

Well let me propagate some more, investing CAN be SIMPLE and EASY.

The majority of the time it IS simple, and wholesaling isn't really even hard, but it does require work. Any strategy of investing is going to take work, and lots of it. And wholesaling is the epitome of a simple and easy real estate strategy that requires lots of work. Not even "HARD" work, just lots of work.

"Hard" work is reroofing a house or digging out peers with a 2 foot crawl space or dragging concrete for an addition. "Hard" work is installing sheetrock for an entire day only to come back the next day to tape and mud for hours on end day after day before you have to tape everything off to blow texture for four hours and then retape everything to paint the trim after you've spackled and sanded the trim 3 times and then you get to retape everything to actually paint the walls.

I know from my own personal experience and from helping other investors get started and ACTUALLY SUCCEED long term with a career in REI that my continual blowing of happy elevator music straight up their wannabe's kilt is REALITY. Its real. Its true. No matter what you or the gurus or the reality shows say or don't say.

Wholesaling is by far the SIMPLEST, the EASIEST, and the SAFEST strategy to learn in real estate investing. I say that from years of experience in not only the wholesaling field but from rehabbing and renting also. That along with years of experience in helping others get started and SUCCEED long term in not only wholesaling but rehabbing and landlording. Now rehabbing to retail (which is what the reality shows are about) or being a landlord are a whole different beast, BUT the discussion was about becoming a wholesale investor.

My words are NOT based on assumptions or guru's slick words or reality shows. My words are based on real world experience. My words are based on wholesaling over 250 properties over the last 5 years. My words are based on directly and personally mentoring other investors in wholesaling, in rehabbing, and in renting. My words are based on my own personal wholesaling experience with real deals, with real investors, in the real world.

Just curious Mark, what exactly are your words based on? You know coming from someone who is actually wholesaling like Douglas or Curt is one thing, but coming from someone who has no experience with wholesaling, how do you know? What exactly are you basing your assumptions on? How do you know that wholesaling is not simple and easy? How do you know that its not the absolute perfect investing strategy for a newbie investor with no credit and no capital just like all those evil guru's keep saying?

How do YOU know?

The benefits to a realtor to work with you as a wholesaler are that you would use them to make offers on any listed properties (HUD's, REO's, and other stuff on the MLS), and then unless you are planning on ONLY wholesaling for your entire career, to list the properties with them that you are trying to retail. Also if they work with any other investors you can use them to market your deals to their investors directly.

Curt is always a consistent naysayer for starting out with wholesaling. Not that I disagree that experience, connections, and capital are essential to being a successful wholesaler, but wholesaling can be started with little or no experience, initial connections, or much starting capital. Obviously the more experience, stronger network, and larger capital base you have the better.

Is it best to have all those things already set up? ABSOLUTELY

Is it REQUIRED to have all those things already set up to make money in wholesaling?
ABSOLUTELY NOT

As Peter shared, your marketing budget is the biggest and the most essential aspect to wholesaling. Finding deals and building your network of investor buyers is what wholesaling is all about, so make sure that you spend the majority of your money and time on those two aspects.