All Forum Posts by: Sharon Vornholt

White always. It looks good, buyers love it and it is classy no matter what type of property you have.

Sherry - I agree with Ed.

If you don't belong to your local REIA, run - don't walk to the next meeting. Join the group and start to market your properties there. You don't typically need to use a Realtor to sell wholesale properties. I know I don't.

Build a buyers list beginning with your REIA. Also, get some blank bandit signs and put out signs in the areas of your properties. Just get a marker and put something like "Cheap House 10K CASH" and your phone number. Investors that work in the area will see your signs.

Keep posting on Craigs list, but use a Postlets (free flier). Make your house stand out. You can send that flier straight to Craigs list from Postlets.com. It also puts it out on a lot of other sites.

Have you posted it on Bigger Pockets? I sold a house from this site and found some great local buyers for my list.

You need to try some different things when what you are doing isn't working. Everyone makes mistakes. Just get free of this one and move on.

You need a different attorney.

Go to your local REIA and find out who everyone is using. In my group, we have several closing attorneys that also are investors. They will know the ins and outs of how things work in your state. I have never heard anyone say that is was illegal to do assignments in their state.

Hey Michael G -

6 months is way too soon to quit. Some of these folks don't even begin to work on selling the property for a year or more. Some of my best deals have come from folks that have waited and waited, then suddenly want the house gone this week.

I try to go back and look at these outstanding houses quarterly, but as I said in my article it is more like 3 times a year that it actually gets done. I look up the property on the tax assessor's website. It will show if they have been sold. It is definitely a pain in the neck, but you have to do it.

From the very beginning, I entered my probates by month and year. That makes it much easier to check them. I can take one month at a time. I use an Act database for my contacts. I am entering new folks in the database every month, so the list will grow too big if you don't edit them.

I have definitely seen a trend that mirrors the local market whereby a high percentage of these houses still aren't sold from 2010. I take this as "good luck" for local investors.

It's great Bp was represented at such a big conference Josh.

@ Chris - Chris I work with absentee owners all the time. They never come to closing. They sign the documents in front of a notary and send them back overnight. Their money is also sent to them in the same way.

In my area, we use closing attorneys rather than title companies. The way you find an investor friendly attorney, is at your local REIA meeting. My attorney is also an investor. I have flawless closings!

I am working on a deal like this now. The short answer is that everything can be done by overnight mail. How's this for a "situation":

The owners of record are elderly, are divorced and never did a property settlement, so they own property together. They live in 2 different states. One is in a nursing home in KY (the mom), the other just left rehabilitiaon after a stroke in Virginia (the dad). He is now staying in Florida with his daughter.

The mom's POA is her son, and he lives in Georgia. The daughter is the POA for her dad and she lives in Florida. They each have an attorney in Virgina. You will note that no one is in Virginia at this time. Getting these 6 people to do ANYTHING in a timely manner has been almost impossible. One last thing, the two POA's don't speak to each other.

This has been difficult becuase there are so many folks in the deal in so many different states. My closing for today has been rescheduled for next week because one of the POA's was admitted to the hospital a couple days ago.

I am still confident that this deal will close before I completely lose my mind.

Justin - A good REIA club has a value that you just can't put a price on. Our club brings in national speakers, has panels of local successful investors and so much more. You can buy properties, sell propertis and it is there that you will find a mentor. Our group even has a formal mentoring group. Go to the meetings, meet folks and network with them.

Dominic -

I am also a wholesaler and have been doing direct mail for 20 years in two different businesses. First of all, have you narrowed down your list by houses you actually want to buy?

If I get an absentee owner list in my area, I will get well over 10,000 names. First of all, I don't want all of those people that live in my city, but happen to live a county or two away from me. They are not your target market. In most cases, your money would be better spent to get a list of out of STATE owners. That will narrow your list considerably.

Next I would filter out bad areas and war zones unless you intend to buy there. I personally think they are a waste of time, because they are really difficult if not impossible to sell. I also filter out houses that cost above a certain dollar amount, because most rehabbers want houses that are more bread and butter type. I don't send mailings to folks that have more expensive houses. Once again, they are just too hard to wholesale.

Once you have put in some filters you will have a much more manageable list. As Michael said, it would be impossible to follow up with the calls you got from 20K letters. When you didn't call those folks back after the first mailing, they would most likely throw your mail in the garbage the next time around.

I would put some filters in your list, and then send out no more than 1000-2000 per month until you have some systems in place to handle the calls. You will find success more quickly and it will cost you less money to do it this way. The secret is to mail consistenly every month, not to send out one huge mailing and quit.