Last week my little diva came down with the cold and unfortunately we all caught the bug, so being the mama bear I had to put business, social media, etc on hold to tend to the kids and myself with lotsa chicken noodle soup, cuddling, movies and video games. One of the many reasons why I love being my own boss (reason #384755: I can take time off anytime without permission … love it)

Luckily, the houses that were scheduled to close took place a few days before, so it was easier to just relax. The property manager I was working with also has a title agent license, so he did all the closings and it turned out to be one of my smoothest and easiest closings ever. In previous closings, I did all the back and forth from seller to buyer to title agent, back to seller… you get the idea. I was in charge of everything, kept everyone in check, did all the follow ups and made sure everyone showed up at closing and papers were signed with little to no incidence. In this case, the PM/TA took care of everything. As soon as I sent the signed contracts to him, he did the title work, called and kept up with the seller, buyer and gave me daily updates. It was such a relief and I was very impressed with his hardwork and persistence. The best part ofcourse was a few hours after closing he sent me an email to let me know he has deposited the money in my account for all 3 closings. I’ll be honest, my heart skipped a beat when I checked my bank account because it was the most I’ve ever got in one day’s closing.

I’ll like to add some more things I learned from dealing with international buyers. You can check out Part 1 here.

10. When dealing with international buyers it’s very important to have the title company provide a closing statement/HUD. It explains how much the buyer is expected to pay at closing and what he is paying for. Necessary corrections could also be made before closing. Before one of my closings, there was a mistake on the buyer closing statement and the title company had to make the corrections, but it was nerve racking because the buyer was a little hesitant and skeptical afterward and needed some convincing to proceed. Next time I would ask the title agent to send a copy to me for review before sending it to the buyer.

11. It is quite challenging sending money to the US from another country. Very few American Banks actually accept money transfers from another country and the ones that do require some hassles with paperwork and fees. One of the banks I use for that purpose is Chase Bank. Other options are Western union and Xoom, but they could be quite expensive. The advantage Chase Bank has over the other options is they charge per number of transfers as opposed to amount to be transferred, so make sure to check the rates and fees.

12. I normally charge local buyers $1000 EMD, but for my international clients I charged $2000 EMD. The reason is simply commitment. It’s easier for someone you don’t know and have never met to back out of a deal and remain anonymous if they don’t have much to lose. A large EMD makes it less likely for that to happen and give them a reason to follow through.

13. Follow up!!! I follow up with all my buyers right after every closing to ask them how they felt about the process and also find out more about what they are looking for so I can go out and house shop for them. From experience I can guarantee that once you close a deal with a buyer with little to no hiccups, they will keep coming back for more and that my friends is trust you can’t buy.

P.S: I will be celebrating my birthday this weekend and I can’t wait to have a blast with family and friends. I feel very blessed and fulfilled to have accomplished a lot more than I could dream before turning the BIG 3-0. I’ll back to work next week and ready to take over the world. So watch out world … here I come

I like to think I’m very good at problem solving and rolling with the punches, but 2 closings I had recently tested me in ways I’ve never been tested before, but I’m going to focus on one since, I’ve blogged about it extensively, here, here , here , here and here.

A deal that I had been working on for 3 months finally got a clear title. As a summary, there were 3 people on title; one was deceased, one was disabled and the third (Sarah and her husband) was trying to sell the house. In order to have a clear title, a probate case had to be opened for the deceased which typically takes 3 months or more and the person that is disabled needed a conservator ordered by the court to make his decisions and sign title documents and in order to do that every family member had to give up their rights including one of the siblings in jail. After setting up the closing date which was a challenge in itself, everything was expected to go smoothly. As soon as the phone rang on the closing day, I had a big ol’ smile on my face because I thought it was my title guy calling to tell me the money was in my bank account, but it was far from it. It was Sarah calling to ask me to pay the closing cost. What the @#$%&.

I took a deep breath and told her according to the contract, “seller and buyer pays their respective closing cost and fees” which means they get to pay their own closing cost. The back story is during the negotiation, Seller told me the least they would accept will be $11K and I said if they accept $10K, I’ll be willing to pay their closing costs. After a lot of back and forth, they refused and insisted on 11K which is a great price, so I agreed. They claimed that it was a misunderstanding, but I wasn’t buying it because I made it clear to them that they were going to pay their closing cost and when I drafted the contract, it clearly stated that they were going to pay their closing cost. I felt like the seller was trying to pull a fast one on me so I decided to play hardball. I said according to the contract they will have to pay their closing cost and their response was well they are not going to sign the papers and were prepared to walk away. My immediate response would have been, “go pound sand”, but I had to keep it professional, so I said “okay well I honor my contracts and I have worked hard with you to help you sell your house and if you feel good about walking away then so be it” and that was the end of the conversation.

As soon as I got off the phone, I couldn’t believe what just happened. I thought about all the hard work that had been put into this deal. Get this, this was a JV deal. I was selling this house through another wholesaler who has this new buyer she is trying to impress and the buyer has been patient for 3 months while trying to get a clear title. What was I going to tell this wholesaler and her buyer? There was no way i was going to tell the buyer to pay the closing cost now since it’s not part of the contract, and oh my title guy has been through hell dealing with title issues, will I just let them walk away with an egg on his face? And oh I had invested about $750 in this deal to help them pay some of their legal fees and since they’ve just shown me they have very little integrity I might have to sue them to get the $750 “EMD” I loaned them. Afterall, when I asked her how I was going to get the $750 after she threatened to walk away she said I don’t know, I don’t have a job right now. @#$%&@$%! After analyzing the situation, it was important I keep a good relationship with all involved and I realized the only way I could get my money back was to close the deal. So I swallowing my pride and called back to ask my title guy what the closing cost was and he said $820. After giving me the breakdown, I asked to speak to the seller who were still in the office by the way. I told them, I normally won’t do this, but there are too many people involved to back out now and I was willing to pay only part of the closing cost and they agreed. So I faxed a contract stating that my company was going to send them a check after closing.

So yes, I blinked and although I sent them the check, I struggled with my decision at first but I realised I did the right thing. I make business decisions everyday and based on the present circumstances I try to create a win, win, win for all. My consolation is even though I was $670 short, I still kept my integrity and my relationships and it’s up to the seller to live with her decision. Needless to say, I got an email from Sarah afterwards offering to write a testimonial.

Today, I got a call from the buyer saying he doesn’t have the keys to the house 2 weeks later even though the seller claims she mailed the keys. Here we go again, this house just won’t quit me. Seller told me several times that the house was cursed and even though I dismissed those charges I’m beginning to feel that way.

How was your labor day weekend people? I’ve been trying to juggle so many things from making sure my daughter has a great day on her birthday, to prepping for her first day at school, spending quality time with family to wheelin’ and dealin’ and trying to create relationships with international buyers. Today, I’ll focus on some of the lessons I’ve learned dealing with international buyers which has been an eye opener to say the least.

1. Ask to speak with your buyer. After sending out letters to potential buyers and they call and leave a message, it’s very important that you return their call. I’ve noticed that buyers tend to feel more comfortable with whom they are dealing with when they can talk to you mano-a-mano or in this case mano-a-womano. They can sense your personality, get to know what you are about, if you really know your stuff and most importantly if they can trust you.

2. Get to know the team they’ve already created and let them know you are comfortable using their services. More than likely, you won’t be the first person your buyer is dealing with, he might already have his crew in place and they include; title company, property manager, contractor, etc. Do not insist on using your title company if they ask to use theirs. Just ask to speak with their contact title agent, get to know them and ask questions like “do you  accept assignment contracts, double closings etc”. They are the link between you and your buyer and therefore it is just as important to create trust and rapport with them. If they don’t have a good vibe with you, they won’t hesitate to tell the buyer and that could end the relationship.

3. Always respond to their emails and/or calls. I don’t know anyone that is not excited to get a quick response to their emails or text and that’s why twitter and the likes are very popular because people can get immediate responses without waiting for hours or days and the same goes for international clients. Respond to the emails as soon as possible and if you don’t know the answer to their question, don’t wait for days to find out before replying. Reply to their emails letting them know you will get back with them soon and as soon as you have an answer be sure to respond. If you don’t plan on taking any calls from anyone within a certain period of time, you might want to make an exception for these groups of buyers. Though the downside is if they are used to receiving a response within a few hours, they will expect it everytime and when they don’t get it, they might start to panic.

4. Be upfront and honest. Trust is very important when dealing with any buyer, but even more apparent when working with international buyers who don’t get a chance to see the house before buying it. Your word is all the can hang on to before doing their due diligence. Do not hide anything and/or make them aware of it later. Be honest about the exact yearly taxes, which utilities tenants are paying if any, condition of property, neighborhood, show pictures of both good and not so flattering areas of the house. Remember you want to build trust for a potential first deal and many more after that. When you hide information whether it’s intentional or not you start to sound shady. It might not end the relationship, but it could be a red flag. Some situations are beyond your control so when you make a genuine mistake which you would, own up to it, don’t make excuses, don’t be too apologetic and make neccessary correction(s).

5. Do your due diligence. You may have to do more due diligence than you would normally do with a local buyer. You might have to get an inspection report, take a lot more pictures, video etc. All these might not be necessary if they already have people in place to inspect properties, but be prepared to do it. You could charge a fee for it, it’s up to you. I still don’t understand why I get listings from other wholesalers to JV on and all they send is a picture of the front of the house and an address. In order to stand out from the rest, you have to be willing to provide more services and do more for your buyers. It does go a long way and they will appreciate it.

6. Be professional but also be laid back and find something in their culture that both of you can relate to. I have a Japanese buyer who is buying 4 properties from me in the next 2 weeks and he calls me everyday, yes everyday to get updates or give me information and we still email several times a day. One day I got this brilliant idea to say hello to him in his language the next time he called, so I asked my husband who took 2 years of Japanese in college to teach me what to say and how to pronounce it. All I had to say was “moshi moshi” and we hardly talked real estate the entire conversation. We started talking about family, vacation, children, food etc and it was the longest conversation we’ve had so far. That really did make him feel more relaxed dealing with me and we felt we could relate on some level.

7. Be aware of the time difference. If your London buyer is fine with receiving phone calls before 10pm her time, be sure to call before 4pm your time (assuming you are EST) and if your buyer is in Japan, based on current daylight savings, he is 13 hours ahead of your time which means you only have a short window of time to speak on the phone. Your 8am is his 8pm and if he only accept calls before 10pm you have just 2 hours to speak with him except if you are fine calling after midnight your time.

8. Don’t pretend you know it all, but always sound confident. Nobody likes a “know it all”, be humble and honest about what you are selling and don’t be afraid to say “I’m not sure, I’ll have to find out more information and get back with you as soon as possible”. At the same time, sound confident and be sure of yourself. The only information they know at first is what you tell them and since the only sense is the sense of hearing, they hang on to every word, so be sure not to come off as arrogant.

9. Make it known that you are not only interested in one deal but in several deals in future, you value their opinion of you and you will be committed to making sure they have a pleasant experience. If they know that you are business oriented and not just interested in closing one deal and moving on, they will be more trusting of what you do throughout the process.

Just as a side note: I am doing a JV with a local wholesaler and he called me yesterday to let me know that the seller initially told him he did not owe any back taxes but he just found out he actually owes about $3000. I sent an email to my buyer to let him know immediately what the situation was, but I let him know I was going to take care of the issue. He called me right way wondering what was going on and what he could do about it because he already closed with his buyer in his country. I called the seller directly and it turns out seller wanted buyer to pay the back taxes, but was not willing to come down on the price. Under normal circumstances, I would have told the seller to go pound sand, but since i had already accepted a price from the buyer and I want to maintain the trust, I gave up my share of the assignment fee. It doesn’t feel good, but it doesn’t feel quite as bad since he is buying 3 properties from me in the next 2 weeks and I’ll be making almost 6X that amount. I’m not interested in just one deal because I know if the trust is established, he will keep coming back for more, which means more money in my pocket.

P.S: Most of thess lessons also apply to local buyers, so even if you have no interest in dealing with international buyers, i’m sure you can learn a few things that would help in your business deals. And yes JP, I’m happy to be your guinea pig

P.S: Part 2 will include how to handle money transfers, getting earnest money deposits, setting expectations, laying the ground rules, how to close even if buyer can’t buy a ticket to the closing table etc. Stay tuned.

Everytime I had a buyer campaign which in this case was sending out letters to absentee buyers, I only included local and out of state buyers, but for some reason I excluded international buyers. This time I decided to include them and I’m pleasantly surprised with the result.

A few weeks ago, I got a call from a seller whose house I sold in March. He had a great experience and called to sell his brother in law’s house to me. After speaking with him, I was curious what happened to his house since I sold it and decided to check public record to see if my buyer resold the house or kept it and what I found was very revealing. I sold the house and made $2,000 assignment fee. My buyer resold the house the same day to a London buyer for get this $8,000 more than what he got it for. I’m honestly not upset he made more than me, but it opened my eyes to see that the chatter I’ve been hearing and ignoring for months that international buyers is where the money is at, is absolutely true.

I decided to get on the international buyer bandwagon, so I set up aweber recently to keep track of subscribers that sign up for my VIP buyers list before sending out the letters. Most people called and left a message, and some went to the website and subscribed, which is great, but this time I was more interested in international buyers.

Of the 19 letter I mailed to international buyers, 7 of them from 4 different countries subscribed to my website. After sending them a welcome email, a few days later I sent a form which includes questions asking them what exactly they are looking for so we can meet their investment needs. Only 3 buyers filled out the form and they also included their phone number and the best time to call. I called and spoke to all 3 of them and it turns out 2 of them are big time buyers in this market looking for turn key properties and one of them is a wholesaler in his country with a waiting list of buyers.

Within a few days, the wholesaler was able to find 2 buyers for 2 of my turn key properties, sent me an email and told me he has buyers with a deposit ready to close on Thursday. Holy Smokes! After lots of emails, I spoke to his property Manager today and we hit it off and had a great conversation. They have had many successful transactions and he manages properties for international buyers. As much as love fast closings, we won’t be able to close this Thursday because I want to make sure all the necessary due diligence is done before closing. I’ve learned so much and I can’t wait to share with you guys.  I’ll keep you updated with my progress and lesson learned through this process.

Do any of you guys have any experience selling to out of state or international buyers? My first encounter with an out of state buyer was not a pleasant experience. I wasted a whole day driving him around while he was acting like a big shot and he turned out to be a tire kicker. This new experience has renewed my faith in out of state buyers. We’ll see how it goes.

This week I bet I answered and made over 50 calls and guess what? Most of those calls were for one closing. The best part is, it was all for a great assignment fee… ready for this? $1500. The irony of it all is the other closing I have tomorrow is for a $4000 assignment fee and I only spent a few hours on it. It’s funny how the lower the assignment fee, the more the work required.

My seller is anxious to sell especially after my runaway buyer backed out on the day of closing when he found out the seller was not totally honest about taxes. I could have easily backed out of the deal, but I felt obligated to help the seller sell his house, so I tried to market to other buyers. The problem with the house is the taxes are high and a lot of my investor buyers love the house, but the numbers don’t work. I had to reduce the asking price so I could attract a buyer who is willing to overlook the high taxes and I finally found one through another new wholesaler. I took this wholesaler under my wings because he is new to the game and wants to close his first deal so bad.

Initially he added his $2K assignment fee and showed the house to a buyer who was excited about the house, but after the run around and several back and forth calls, he called 3 days later to say that the numbers are $5K more than he wants to pay for it. The wholesaler was disappointed and called me to tell me the “bad” new and in his own words “the deal has been crushed”. As far as I’m concerned a deal is not crushed until you exhaust all your options, so I told him if he says the asking price is $5K more than he wants to pay it means he wants to negotiate. So I told him to ask his buyer to meet us half way. His buyer agreed right away and sent a copy of the EMD within hours. I decided to share the assignment fee with him 50/50 for 2 reasons and that is he has been doing working hard trying to sell the house and also I really want him to get his first  wholesale check because he reminds me too much of me when I got started.

This leads me to a question that was asked on facebook a few days ago:

“need help FB FAM! How do you deal with investors that have cold feet when making a decision or take FOREVER doing their due diligence? any tips on how to make them come up with a offer or answer faster?? need help! The poster’s frustration was that he has a buyer who showed interest in the house, but is yet to call him back to make an offer.”

First of all always try to get good deals and by good deals, I mean deals that at least 80% of your buyers are looking for and avoid marginal, ok or soso deals that are harder to sell. It’s not really worth the time or the effort you put into it. It’s better to get one great house under contract that you know your buyers will compete for than 5 ok houses that might sell. Since it’s a buyer’s market right now, buyers are very picky and are only going for the slam dunks. If it’s a good deal and the price is right, you will know if a buyer is interested within hours of showing them the house.

Also you should deal mostly with “real” buyers or “quick feet” buyer. A lot of wholesalers pride themselves in having a huge buyer’s list of hundreds or even thousands of buyers, but only a handful are the “real” investors buying several houses every month. These “Real” buyers don’t have cold feet. They know exactly what they want and will jump at it as soon as they see it and it usually takes anywhere from a few minutes of seeing the house to a few hours. But they will usually call you to tell you yes or no and why because they are hoping to do more business from you in future.

Create competition. Everyone wants to be a winner and the competition spirit kicks in if we feel there is someone else that could potentially take the price. Let your buyer know that there are other buyers that are interested in the deal and as much as you would love to do business with him, you would like a response within a timeline (say 24 hours or 48 hours) or you would assume he is no more interested and sell to someone else.

Offer incentives and give him a reason to call you back.  We tend to keep in touch with people we know we can profit from now or in future. You could say something like, “if you are not interested in the house, that’s okay, just let me know what you think either way because I have other houses for sale you might be interested in”. Another reason for this statement is so that you have an opportunity to ask why he wasn’t interested in the house and you can get a hint of what to look for next time before getting a house under contract.

Don’t tie your house up with wanna be wholesalers. Give them an opportunity to market your house, but don’t sign a contract with them until they find a buyer with EMD. A good number of the houses I have sold have been through other wholesalers and it’s a great way to sell houses especially if you are new in the game, but don’t be too certain as to put all your eggs in one basket because chances are it might fall apart if they don’t know what they are doing. The time wasters/tire kickers are those that act like they are the buyers while trying to market your house to their buyers. Beware of those and ask as many questions as you can to avoid dealing with them.

In the mean time, always remember that, the deal is not tied up yet till you get an EMD. Even if a buyer shows great interest in the property still market to other buyers and first to give you the EMD, gets the price.

If you have any other suggestions or tips be sure to add it in the comments.

P.S: It’s our 5^th wedding anniversary today Wow! How time flies. I have the best life ever and I couldn’t be more grateful to my husband for putting up with me all these 8 years. Can’t wait to enjoy some R&R this weekend away from all of it all…just the two of us

Today is one of those days where you get somewhat of a good news and then a bad news and it feels like things are not just working the way you want it to ….grrrrrr. I’m having one of those days right now and it doesn’t feel good to say the least. My daughter caught the bug and her doctor said she might have the stomach flu….my poor baby. I decided to take most of the day off to take care of her without all the distractions. I’ve offered her over 10 meals, fruits and snacks and ended up with a table full of untouched food because she does not have any appetite for food and it’s obvious she is not her usual very active, entertaining and vibrant little girl. I pray she feel better in the morning.

As if that was not enough for me to deal with, it seem like all my deals are in limbo. I have 7 houses under contract right now and I have buyers for all of them and some of them seem to have one issue or the other for different reasons that are threatening to hinder closing. One of them even almost fell apart because buyer tried to go around me to buy directly from seller after he found out how much I was making and it’s become a big mess. I’m too exhausted from wheelin’ and dealin’ all evening to make sure the deals don’t fall apart, I can’t even get into all the crap i had to deal with today at the risk of ranting and venting. I will just sleep it off and I know I will feel better in the morning. Though what comforts me from experience is that when I feel down and it seem like i’m at my wits end but I keep being persistent anyway, things always turn out better than I expect, so I’m just going to hang in there to see what surprise life has for me.

On a lighter note, last week I was interview by Kendall Matthews of KJAM Radio and he just posted it on his website. I’m very excited to share it with my blog readers HERE, it’s a 20 minute interview with lots of goodies and I did not hold back. You will also get to know more about me and how you can succeed in Real Estate Investing. I really enjoyed it and i’m sure you would too so grab a cup of coffee or your favorite snack and enjoy.

P.S: Speaking of coffee, my pal Shae Bynes of goodfaithinvesting.com also has an Enriched coffee and tea business and her and her husband have a contest going on right now with lots of give aways. If you have any good coffee recipes you would like to share head over to her page HERE and be a part of the contest and you might just win some of her delicious, healthy coffee and tea. She sent me some samples and it’s to die for…..yum! Hurry, contest ends on Monday.

Have a great weekend everyone.

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Michigan Wholesaling Property Investing with Esi Benedict

I really enjoyed this interview with Esi Benedict who made a u-turn from pre-med biology to become a stay at home mom, then recently turned into www.FlippingMom.com

You have to listen to her story of how she found her niche in wholesale real estate investing in Michigan. She has a very inspiring story, especially how she found her life’s goal while waiting in a hospital waiting room.

Conversation with Esi Benedict – KJAM Radio Show Notes:

• Background of how did you get into the Real Estate Marketing Industry.
• What do you do when your not working so hard?
• What Are the Biggest Mistakes Challenges and Frustrations
• Is Having Goals Really Important?
• 3 Important Questions To Ask Before Getting Into Real Estate Investing
• If You Could Go Back and Give Career Advice To Your Younger Self What Would You Say

listen to the Esi Benedict interview HERE. Enjoy!

Moving Forward,

www.InvestmentRealEstateCorner.com

It’s been a fun, busy, challenging last few weeks. I feel like I have an endless checklist of things to do and just when I think I’m almost done, I add 10 more. I have accomplished a lot I set out to do, but still have lots to do, so I would like to update you guys on what I’ve been up to.

My 2 year old daughter is finally potty trained after lots of cupcakes and fruit candies … Yeaaa! We’ve been shopping for a pre-school for about a year now and finally decided on one that she loved and was almost dragged out of because she enjoyed the visit so much. The Principal was going to have her start at the 2.5-3yr old class but after some tests, they realized she was smarter than the kids in that class, so they suggested she starts at the 3-4 year old class. I was very proud of how well she did on the questions. She knew her shapes, colors, numbers, letters and counting. As part of the exercise, she was told to draw a head with eyes, nose, mouth and hair and she did all that and added arms, body and legs. I was of course grinning from ear to ear the whole time, but I’ll give most of the credit to her dad, Shhh! I’m not looking forward to her going to school, and still struggling with the decision. I’ve never left her in the care of anyone but my husband and I, but she is going to start with the bare minimum of 2 half days a week and we will see how that goes.

As if I didn’t already have too much on my plate, I doubled down on my marketing to both sellers and buyers. On Thursday last week, we sent out another set of letters to buyers in our market, and I decided to do a facelift/makeover to our buyer’s website. Part of what we did was add aweber as an autoresponder tool for sending email notifications of new houses for sale and newletters to subscribed buyers. I got it for $1 for the first month, so I’ll try it out and see how I like it. So far, it’s cool and I’ve had people subscribe and a few unsubscribe. If I can get at least 10 solid buyers and not tire kickers that will make all the work worth it. I am still keeping up with the momentum of sending out postcards to sellers every 2 weeks (not the same groups of course). I have got some quality calls and some hang ups, and I’ll have to follow up on a good number of them.

The (4 houses) package deal I blogged about here, got a lot of interest and I finally found a buyer who gave me $2000 EMD, but she won’t be ready to close for another 2 weeks, so if all goes well with funding and inspection, it should be my largest wholesale check so far. I need all the positive energy I can get on this one. The other house the buyer backed out of the day of closing (runaway buyer) is also getting some interest, but no EMD yet. Right now I’m working on a JV with another wholesaler who has a very interested buyer, but until I get an EMD it’s still up for sale. Ya know how that works.

My husband took the girls out for a few hours today, so I spent the whole time making phone calls. I had so many calls to make, but ended up spending a whole hour talking to just 2 people who had a lot to say. I like to think I have mastered the act of getting off the phone when I have a time crunch, but I just got caught up with the deals and all the story telling, I didn’t even realize the time. I did finish making all the calls I planned to make and feel a weight lifted off my shoulders. I will never market to sellers and buyers on the same week again, I feel my eyes are rolling backwards from dealing with all kinds of people including a buyer who threathened me because she thought I was trying to sell her house back to her. How she came to that conclusion after reading my letter is a mystery to me. It’s quite funny, listen here and here. I called her back and explained the letter to her and she kinda felt embarrassed and asked me where my houses for sale were…well after that conversation, what do you think I told her? … Not a chance.

For months I’ve been flirting with the idea of expanding my business by partnering up with other companies that could add value to my business, so I decided it was time to start working on that. I’m partnering up with a Property Management Company as a service to my buyers looking for a company to manage their rental properties for them after buying from me. I’ll also be partnering up with a local contractor for estimates and repairs, etc. So far I’m getting recommendations and interviewing different companies. This should be interesting.

What have you guys been up to?

“The most important thing you can do to achieve your goals is to make sure that as soon as you set them, you immediately begin to create momentum. The most important rules that I ever adopted to help me in achieving my goals were those I learned from a very successful man who taught me to first write down the goal, and then to never leave the site of setting a goal without first taking some form of positive action toward its attainment.” ~ Anthony Robbins

“One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.” ~ Michael Korda

Last week, I spoke to 2 very motivated sellers ready to accept a lower price than I offered because of changing circumstances.

Seller (Laura) was just recently divorced and as part of the divorce settlement, she was given some of her ex husband’s rental properties. Listening to her story was quite fascinating because I know in most states the couples get to share the assets and this case she became an accidental landlord. The worst part was the tenants stopped paying rent and started avoiding her calls when it was time for them to pay up. It got so bad that she became scared of the tenants since they refused her entry into the houses, by coming up with all sorts of excuses and refusing to come to the door when she went there. Right now she is going through the process of evicting one tenant and wants to evict the other next. The house I am interested in is a 2 family house with one tenant in the lower flat. While my assistant was taking pictures of the outside someone walked out of the house and invited him to come in to take pictures after finding out we were interested in buying the house. Laura was surprised that the tenant let him in the house since they won’t even return her calls. After accessing the house, I made her an offer and she refused and told me she was just going to rent it out to another tenant, so I told her that might just be a better idea, but if she was still interested in selling she should give me a call. 2 days later, I got a call from her and she sounded quite upset and told me she was done dealing with tenants. She’s been trying to contact him…he is still refusing her calls and she was done! done!! done!!!. She suggested that since he was good to my assistant I could keep him in the house as my tenant if I wanted. I was like “No way, he’ll treat my buyer the same way he is treating her, he did us a favor by showing himself to be a problem tenant. I told her after I made the last offer, I noticed I had offered more than I should have on the house and I made a lower offer and to my surprise, she accepted. The problem is that she won’t be ready to sell till later this month after she evicts her tenant. I sent her the contract and my buyer will just have to wait it out

Two weeks ago, I got a lead through webuyhouses.com. Seller (Sasha) got the house through a quit claim deed and was ready to sell. Based on the information I was given after about one hour of conversation, I made an offer and she said she was going to discuss it with her husband. 30 mins later, she called and said her husband thinks the price was too low. After talking for a little while, she informed me that they were going on a camping trip and asked me to call her in 2 weeks. On Saturday I gave her a call and she told me they went by the house and saw the house needed more work than she thought but that her husband was willing to accept $2K less than what I offered 2 weeks before. It turned out that they were much more motivated to sell because of a little leak in the basement. My buyer is going to have his inspector take a look at the house tomorrow, so finger crossed.

Follow up! Follow UP!! FOLOW UP!!! I can’t say that loud enough. I’m still working on being organized and making more follow up calls, but I’ve noticed that when I do follow up with sellers and buyers, I have a better chance of getting a deal.

After reading Rachael’s guest blog post on Julie’s blog titled “A Week in the Life of a Full Time Real Estate Investor”, I decided to give it a try and like Racheal, take Mondays off for admin day. It was a very fulfilling day, I got so much accomplish and felt like I closed last week’s chapter and I’m prepared for this week. I was lucky to have my husband home all day Monday so I spent the day in my home office getting stuff done. And at 9pm I had checked out all the 15 tasks I set out to do. So it’s official every Monday will be admin day for me.
P.S: All the names used in this blog post are not actual names

P.S.S: I was interviewed today by Kendall Matthews for KJAM radio show which will be posted soon. I gave a lot of good content,and did not hold back. As soon as it’s posted, I’ll let you guys know.

“Success comes from taking the initiative and following up… persisting… eloquently expressing the depth of your love. What simple action could you take today to produce a new momentum toward success in your life?” ~Anthony Robbins

Yes, I was left at the altar. Just imagine a few hours to the wedding of your dreams with beautiful white flowing gown, bridal train, bouquets, 7 tier cakes, wine bar, best DJ in town, a wedding planner for the stars to boot…you get the idea, and the music come on, “here comes the bride…” walking down the aisle with no groom waiting in anticipation for you at the altar. Well, ladies and gentlemen….after all the preparation for the wedding of the year, I’m sorry the grown had cold feet and the wedding is cancelled.

Yeah, I know it sounds a little dramatic, but it did happen to me. After all the preparation and looking forward to a few thousands of mullah in my bank account my buyer backed out on the day of closing. I knew it was a possibility and always dreaded a phone call from my title company on the day of closing, but it’s never happened to me before and my worst fear finally became a reality.

The day after I got this house under contract, I sent pictures and all the information to only one of my buyers because I he is pretty fast and I knew he would love this house. He called me an hour latter and wanted his contracted to go see the house in an hour, so I called the homeowner and arrange for him to meet “my contractor” , but my seller was out of town for the weekend so we set up a time for them to meet on Monday at 10am. At 11am I got a call from my buyer and he wanted me to send him an assignment contract and set up a time to meet to get my EMD. I sent him the contract and within hours I got a signed contract and we planned to meet the following day.

I had closed 2 deals with this buyer in the past and had never met him so this meeting was very special for me. I posted on facebook asking my fb friends if I should pay or have him pay for dinner and they suggested I pay since he is a good buyer. As a female, I’ve never had to pay for a meal when my company is a male, because he always insist on paying, but this time I was determined to take the tab. First of all getting to dinner was a merry go round, I was supposed to meet him at his office, then we will both go to a restaurant 1 mile away and it turned out there was a miscommunication because he thought we were just going to meet at the restaurant. Anyway, I got to his office on time, but didn’t make it to the restaurant till 30 mins later because I got lost 3 times. I know, I’m very bad with directions, and my husband always comes to my rescue as my human GPS but let’s leave that for another blog post.

We had a great dinner and there was hardly a pulse during our conversation but I insisted on paying and 2 hours later, he left and the waitress was upset that he left without paying because he is a man and needs to pay. I told her I didn’t mind and that it was my treat and she kinda snapped and said “it doesn’t matter, the man should always pay” anyway, I gave her a nice tip and left.

The title for this house came out clean and clear 2 days later and we were set to close Monday. On Monday morning I got an email from my title guy telling me he doesn’t think my buyer will close. I called him right away and wanted to get to the bottom of it and it turned out the yearly taxes were higher than was anticipated. Okay let’s backtrack, Initially we thought the yearly taxes was $3500, but my seller said his yearly taxes was reduced to $2600 and after several tries to have him send me his last tax bill, he finally sent it on Sunday, day before closing, and even though it was $2600, it happened to be his summer tax bill. When I asked him what his winter bill was he said he didn’t have that and that all he had was the summer bill, so I faxed it to my buyer right away. After the taxes were verified, the total tax bill was about $3000.

If you’ve been reading my blog, you know I don’t take no for an answer, so I called my buyer and tried different tactics from reducing the price of the house to helping to pay part of the tax bill and he said the numbers just don’t work for him and his partner. But of course, I’m a fighter and didn’t let it get me down. Luckily I had another closing scheduled for that day. I immediately called the homeowner to apologize, I was very honest about the situation and told him to give me more time to find another buyer, but if he found one first, I would shred the contract. This time I sent the house information to my other buyers and on Friday I found a buyer and we are set to close this week.

… and we lived (hopefully) happily ever after.

The last 2 weeks have been very busy. When I first started wholesaling, I mapped out a farm area of about 8 zipcodes that most of my buyers are interested in purchasing houses, and have been marketing exclusively to those areas. In my last marketing effort, I sent out postcards to Absentee owners and after 2 days my phone started ringing off the hook. On Tuesday  7/6, I sent out 1040 Postcards and got the first phone call on Friday 7/9.
Men tend to have a more authoritative voice and from experiments, people tend to respond to a guy’s voice and follow the instructions given. Since real estate investing is a male dominated business, I thought using my husband’s voice in the recording would be a good idea. So on Tuesday night after sending the postcards, my husband was up till 1am recording the voice messages. We just switched to using Google Voice for our voicemails and since Google Voice only allows 3 minutes of record time, we decided to experiment with a shorter version of our voice message and after several editing, we were happy with what we ended up with. Luckily, he didn’t sound too sleepy.

Here is a breakdown of the call we got within 2 weeks of sending the postcards;
Friday 7/9 – 19 calls
Saturday 7/10 – 48 calls
Sunday 7/11 – 6 calls
Monday 7/12 – 66 calls
Tuesday 7/13 – 32 calls
Wednesday 7/14 – 10 calls
Thursday 7/15 – 13 calls
Friday 7/16 – 10 calls
Saturday 7/17 – 3 calls
Sunday 7/18 – 2 calls
Monday 7/19 – 7 calls
Tuesday 7/20 – 4 calls
Wednesday 7/21 – 6 calls
Thursday 7/22 – 5 calls
Total number of calls – 231 (22%). By the way this percentage is way more than average. Google Voice records all the calls even if the hangup was within a second of placing the call, so that might be why it’s so high. Or, I guess the competition is very low. Either way, I’m not complaining Thanks Shae for pointing it out in the comments
Number of people who left voice messages – 112 (11%)
Number of people I called back after listening to voice messages – 58 (6%)
Number of Motivated callers – 29 (3%)
Number of Very good Leads that were close to my asking price – 12 (1%)
Number of houses under contract – 6
Number of houses to follow up every week till they tell me to piss off – 6
Number of angry calls – 1: Yeaaa, I finally got an angry call, If you want a good laugh, listen to it here. I almost fell out of my chair laughing.

Breakdown of the houses I got under contract and need to sell in 45 days.
First House
Seller: Realtor/Investor.
Reason for selling: Seller purchased an REO last year and have been renovating the house, but unfortunately ran out of money towards the end of renovating, he is disillusioned, no more interested in pouring money into the house and needs to sell ASAP. Seller refused my offer at first, but called 2 days later and was willing to negotiate. After several back and forth calls, we finally agreed on a price.
Got a signed contract: 07/16
Found Buyer: 07/19.
Will Close: 07/26 (today)
Assignment Fee: $2500
Pros: House is in top shape. Needs only kitchen sink, some cabinet doors, new garage doors and a tenant
Cons: None
Challenge: Making sure seller puts up a furnace and hot water tank per our agreement before closing today.

Second House
Seller: Out of State investor.
Reason for selling: I actually got this call at about 1:05am. I decided to listen to the voice message and it sounded like a very motivated seller, so I called him right back and it turned out to be a deal. Seller has several other houses with tenant, but one of his vacant houses got broken into and everything was stolen (copper plumbing, furnace, Hot water tank, kitchen Cabinets, toilet, sink….you get the picture) Only thing left is the brick structure, excellent roof, walls and floors. Did a walk through with his property manager and my contractor, who estimated the repairs as $5K- $7K.
Got a signed contract: 7/24
Still gathering information before marketing to my buyers this week.
Projected Assignment fee: $4K
Pros: Very cheap. Great neighborhood. Buyer will have a chance to decorate a clean canvas however he wants to.
Cons: 2 bedrooms, with lots of rehab work to be done.
Challenge: Finding a buyer willing to take on that much rehab work

Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth House
Seller: Retired long time Landlord
Reason for Seller: Retired and wants to move to Florida with wife. Landlord owns 4 properties with mostly good long time paying tenants. We drove around his properties and it was obvious he takes very good care of them and gets along with his tenants. We stopped by a Coney Island to sign the contracts and get some lunch together after the hour long walkthrough of all 4 houses. The husband insisted on paying, but I told him it was going to be a tax write off and he handed me the receipt, lol.
Got signed contracts – 7/24
Sent property information to my buyers – Sunday 7/25
Already gaining interest, 2 of my buyers called to get more information and will drive by the houses tomorrow.
Projected Assignment Fee for all 4 houses: $30K (as a package deal)
Pros: Turn Key properties with good long time paying tenants. About $9600/year cashflow per house = $38,400/year for all 4 houses.
Cons: Can’t think of any major cons.
Challenge: Selling all four (2 family units) as a package deal.

I sent out my second set of postcards for the month last week Tuesday and already have over 50 calls. I’m still getting calls from the previous marketing, but it’s slowed down quite a bit. I was scheduled to have 3 closings last week, but for one reason or the other (which I’ll be blogging about next time) they were postponed to this week, so I’ll be having 2 closings today and another later this week. Two from previous marketing efforts and another from the above marketing.

One thing I will change from this marketing will be sending out the postcards on Thursdays as opposed to Tuesdays, So I get my first call on Monday and spend the whole week returning calls. Also, I’ve learned how to filter through the calls, so as not to waste time with sellers looking for top dollar for their houses and only focus more on motivated callers. Other interesting things that happened from phone conversations was finding 2 cash buyers in the process, a property manager to partner with and meeting with someone I had a good conversation with, who is excited about being a birddog and a private investor if I decide i want one…go figure.

P.S: In my previous posting, I mentioned that I was going to record a video to show you some of the things I look for when I do a walkthrough of a property. Unfortunately, the recording didn’t turn out well so I’ll have to redo it. My buyer actually closed on the property last week Thursday, but since the seller is out of state, we had to email the documents to her and have her overnight it. So, we will be getting the closing documents back today. However, my buyer will not be working on the house this mid August and is perfectly fine with me recording another video in the house. I’ll find time out of my busy week to retape or choose another house. So stay tuned.

Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant. ~Robert Louis Stevenson

Effort only fully releases its reward after a person refuses to quit. ~ Napoleon Hill