How Top Investors Source Real Estate Deals

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Hey everybody.

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Welcome to another episode of raising the flipping bar.

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I'm your host, Derek Marlin, and we're going to be jumping into finding deals this summer and what we're going to be using into this fall.

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We're right in the middle of 2024 when this episode comes out.

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And as everybody knows to me, what is the most important part of a successful business and it's generating leads.

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I think all these systems, all these operations, all this other stuff can be as, as dialed and as perfect as you want.

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But if you don't have the phones ringing or the email or the text or the DMS, um, you for business.

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But you can't put any of that into play.

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So we're going to talk a little bit about that, what we're doing this year and really what we're going to continue to get into next year and actually what we're going to get away from and what we just have recently gotten away from.

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So let's jump into today's episode.

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Welcome to raising the flipping bar, the go to podcast for aspiring and seasoned real estate investors.

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I'm your host, Derek Marlin, and I'm the CEO of Elevation.

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We're a real estate investment company based right here in Denver, Colorado.

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We'll dive into smart investment strategies, market insights, and essential tips for scaling your real estate ventures.

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Whether you're making your first investment or your hundredth investment, this podcast is your blueprint for success in the ever evolving world of real estate investing.

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Get ready to elevate your real estate game and begin your journey with me.

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So every time I teach the Elevation Academy, which again is on a quarterly basis, we have people started off and they introduce who they are and I ask them, Hey, what are one or two of the key things that you want to learn from today are really your biggest takeaways.

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And always, inevitably the top two is always lead generation.

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How do people find deals?

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So we're kind of making sure that we're testing and we're going over what people want to hear.

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And again, to me, it's the lifeblood of your business.

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So I think you need to ask yourself three big questions.

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One is what is your budget to what is your skillset?

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And then three, what is your level of commitment?

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So as you listen to today's episode or watch the episode today, really keep those questions in mind and honestly be willing to have kind of that tough conversation with yourself of.

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How much money are you comfortable spending or can you spend how much time commitment and really how consistent can you be?

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That's another kind of piece that fits into all of this different puzzle.

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We're going to talk about ways that we're sourcing deals right now, which this'll come out in late June, early July of 2024.

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So again, we want everything to be hyper, hyper current.

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But before we do that, I think it's important to look at inventory because that's going to help you pivot a little bit based on where you should be spending more of your energy versus less of your energy.

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So we're going to be just a titch behind where data is readily available.

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What I'm going to recite to you is some information from May of 2024, because all the national stats come out obviously the next month.

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And so we'll have some new stats here in the next couple of weeks.

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But I'm gonna tell you right now.

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There are nine thousand one hundred and fifty nine active listings on the market.

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And so that's every price point that's condos, that's town homes, that's single family homes.

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But what I want to kind of key into is what are the trends telling us?

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And so looking from April of this year to May of this year, that's a 31 percent increase in inventory, but more staggering.

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And we haven't seen this in a long, long time.

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If we think about May of last year to May of this year, which I would argue is maybe a little bit more pertinent and important to see where we're going.

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Cause you can have these weird monthly fluctuations from time to time, but on a yearly basis.

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This is what's important.

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Listen up we're up 75 percent in inventory.

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the good news is let's call it good.

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It's kind of sucks, but it's good for our business.

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And that is, we're still under the historical average of the last 25 years.

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I know that's a big time span, but we're still, if you look at 2019 kind of pre COVID, cause again, that COVID is truly in so many different ways.

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The outlier, if you think back to your statistics class, it was this huge drop in a super short amount of time.

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And then this huge rebound and spike in prices, and a huge drop in inventory.

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Again, I really think that's an outlier.

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So look at it, but it's almost like we need to throw that out.

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But we're still below inventory levels from 2019.

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So to me, it's kind of, it's normal ish.

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It's becoming a much more balanced and much more normal market.

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In the past, you would always have the same amount of typically, let's say 5, 000 homes would come on the market.

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You'd have roughly 5, 000 homes that would close that next month.

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And it kept things very tight from a supply and demand perspective.

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Here's where things are starting to creep up.

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Is that in may there were only 4, 198 properties that actually closed.

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So if you think about it, if we have this big chunk of inventory that keeps coming on the market, but we don't sell through or burn through those properties, you're going to start to stack that up.

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And what that's going to do is increase your days on market, which is how long is a property listed before it goes under contract to sell.

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To put a little bit more data to these closings, the good news is that From April to May of this year, the number of closings that we had was up 5.

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7%.

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So we were actually closing a little bit more properties than last month, which is good, but it's down if we look at it from a year to year basis.

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So may of last year to may of this year, We have closed 5.

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4 percent less number of properties than in the past.

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So again, I think the pendulum is just absolutely shifting back to a balance market.

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Again, days on market, or when you're looking at these statistics, it says D O M and, as I said, it stands for.

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listing the property, having it go under contract.

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It doesn't really track how long it takes to close.

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So something might be a cash transaction and it might close in, you know, 14 days or something might be, a super long transaction where you're extending, you're fixing stuff, there's issues with the buyer's loan, whatever, and it takes 60 days to close.

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So it doesn't track that.

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It's just an apples to apples comparison of Listing it, how fast does it go in a contract?

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So, this past month of May, properties were on the market an average of 27 days.

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So just keep that into your holding time and pattern that out so that if you're doing a deal analysis, you know that you're probably going to hold that property 30 days.

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If you do a really good job, if you price it right, if you have a beautiful product, we have found that we're able to cut that number in half typically.

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So when the market was super hot and stuff was going under contract in a week or two, we would go under contract in a weekend.

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Right now, if it's taking a month, on average stuff is going under contract in two or three weeks.

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We'll tell you in another episode, we just listed our property in wash park.

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And we went under contract in a day.

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So it is, it does vary, but again, factor in 30 days of holding time.

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And so why I want you guys to key in on this is that depending upon whether there's a lot of supply or a lot of properties on the market, or whether there's a little bit, I personally think you should shift your lead generation strategy.

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So we're going to take a quick break and tell you about the next elevation Academy.

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If you're looking to dive deep into real estate investing, this is definitely the event for you.

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Our Academy features over a hundred step process to help you navigate every single thing from market analysis all the way down to every aspect of project management.

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So this is tailored for both beginners and seasoned investors.

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And our one day intensive training will equip you with the strategies and insights needed to elevate your real estate investing game.

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Spots are definitely limited.

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So click on the link below in the show notes to sign up and transform your approach to real estate investment.

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Okay.

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Let's get back to the episode.

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So for the rest of the episode, we're going to break it up into two categories.

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First we're going to talk about sourcing deals on market because that's actually still very lucrative and can be very successful.

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And then we're going to talk about sourcing deals off market.

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So again, when we're doing on market searches, now is the time to actually do those and try to source on the MLS because you just have so many more properties to choose from.

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We always want to tell people what we're seeing in the trenches.

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And that is when properties are, even though they're super beat up, if they're priced well, they are still getting scooped up.

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Prices are getting bid up a little bit.

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Those houses are typically not selling, in 30 days or 45 days or whatever else.

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But there are definitely some properties that are sitting because they're funky layouts.

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Another big factor is people are overpricing because they've only sold two or three homes in the last two years.

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And so they're looking at pricing from a year ago and they're not in tune with the market today.

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So just a quick little flip tip for you guys that, that stuff is still selling.

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And then to help frame out how we're going to have the rest of the conversation.

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is we as a company are getting back to our bread and butter and our sweet spot, which is purchasing properties between 300 and 600, 000 and then selling them on the backend with a maximum ARV or after repair value of 800, 000.

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We're just in the process of getting out of two really expensive multimillion dollar flips, which for us didn't go as well as we wanted.

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And they obviously took forever.

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So we're kind of getting back to basics.

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When you're searching in the MLS, whether it's you or whether you're working with an agent or call our team and we'll help you out, you want to search for key terms like as is investor special, handyman special, bring your tool belt, there's about 15 different terms that you can search for.

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That's automatically going to generate those properties so that they're in your inbox every morning to take a look at.

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So that's a big one.

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Then you're also going to want to set up automatic searches, which means that you put in these specific parameters and each morning they spit out properties for you to look for once they hit those guidelines.

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And so for us, we're normally looking at, zip codes and certain neighborhoods.

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I know some people say, Oh, well, the minimum size house that I want to do is a two bedroom, one bathroom or larger or a three bed, one bath.

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The thing that I would caution you on that is there are people that are inexperienced and they list properties.

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And I've seen it before.

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We've gotten a couple of them and been lucky enough to get them where the property is like 1200 square feet, but it's listed as a one bedroom, one bathroom, and it's just lazy on the part of the listing agent.

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So I want to grab that property and you would never see that if you said, Oh, I want to look at only properties that are two bedrooms and bigger.

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So just again, another little flip tip for you guys to key it on or to pass along to your agents.

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Our goal as a company is to write at least 10 offers a week for on market properties.

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So sometimes it's a little more, sometimes it's a little less, but that's absolutely our goal.

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And we're able to do that now coming into the season of mid to late summer, going into the fall where there's going to continue to be more inventory is what we're seeing.

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The other thing I'd kind of really have you guys do is go back Dive it back into season one and listen to the episode on deal analysis.

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It's one of the first four or five episodes that we recorded.

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And the reason is, is because if you're sourcing on the MLS, I don't want you to get sucked into analysis paralysis because you get spent all day analyzing like three properties.

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Half the time.

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I don't even want you to go see them.

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So what I would do is I would definitely double check your numbers.

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Don't get stuck into analysis paralysis and go back and listen to that episode on deal analysis, because you don't want to spend all this extra time looking at deals that really don't make sense because as of right now, there's over 9, 000 things to choose from.

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So quick things to remind yourself of.

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We are currently seeing a rehab budget of 40 per square foot for more cosmetic remodels.

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And that doesn't mean that you're still not doing a lot of work.

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It just means that all your major systems are probably in good shape.

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When you then start to get those really trashed houses where the roof is shot, the sewer line shot, the windows are old, maybe you've got some asbestos on the duct work.

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You're spending on average, about 70 per square foot is what we're seeing.

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And our numbers are typically calculated based on a general contractor running those jobs.

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So if you're doing the work yourself, you're going to be able to save some money.

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If you've got a buddy or a business partner, that's doing some work for you.

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Again, those numbers can come down, but we like to kind of be super realistic.

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To me, it's always frustrating when we get on these wholesaler lists and they say that, rehab budget is, like 9 a square foot or something ridiculous, because they just don't have the experience and know what's going on.

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Again, use that deal analysis spreadsheet.

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We'll have it in the notes or contact us.

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We will give away our deal analysis spreadsheet for free.

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Happy to get that to you guys and then do what we call five minute math, which is look at a property for five minutes.

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Run it through the deal analyzer and make sure it makes sense.

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Don't get stuck, because again, you have 9,000 properties right now to the theoretically look for.

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So let's also bookend this with, again, the shift in inventory.

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So the way that we focus is right now, we're typically focusing in third and fourth quarter and actually leaning a little bit more on market.

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Okay.

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Then we are still keeping the off market machine going, which we'll talk about here in a second, but we're leaning into that more in first and second quarter.

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So again, all things being equal.

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And I look back our highest volume and our most balanced year was actually 2019.

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And we did roughly 50 percent of our deals on market.

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And we did 50 percent of our deals off market.

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So the other thing that I really want you guys to focus on, and I'm putting this in the on market category.

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I mean, you could kind of debate where this falls.

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It seems so simple, but so many investors do not do this.

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Build relationships with freaking real estate agents and realtors.

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Those are people that are seeing properties.

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They have access to properties.

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And if you build those good relationships, you're going to get business.

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You're going to get what they call pocket listings, which means somebody has a house.

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It's probably a little bit more beat up.

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They know it's going to be a pain in the ass to list it on the MLS.

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It might not sell right away.

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And so they'll give you a shot at making a cash offer on that property.

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And so what we do is we absolutely pay referral fees to agents that send us deals.

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So they still earn their by side commission.

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Two, they do far less work because there's just not everything that goes with listing a property.

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They can save costs because ideally they've done it before, or they've called us before.

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They've done photos before they've done three tours before people have invested in staging.

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So like the numbers start to get good.

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And then on top of that, we'll pay somebody referral fee.

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We don't even need to charge commissions going in on the front end, because again, that's why I'm the investor who, who will never knock on wood.

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Who knows, shouldn't say never most likely not get my license.

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Again, we don't have to pay commissions.

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Or they don't have to pay us commissions, I should say.

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And so for us, the other thing you can do is if you have to have a good relationship with an agent and they are very experienced is they could list the flip on the backend.

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So again, you want people bringing you deals, I know it's probably a little tough for our team to hear it, but, Our folks are not going to list every single property.

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They're going to list the vast majority of them.

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But if I've got some bad ass agent, who's bringing me good deals once in a while and think about it, if you just reach out and develop five phenomenal relationships, and they just call you once a year with a pocket listing, those are five deals that you would never have a shot at getting.

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So I would really, really lean into that.

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Again, agents are around buyers and sellers all day, every day.

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So build your sphere, build your database, deliver great value to people.

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The other thing is, is sometimes we will honestly help them justify a lower price in their clients minds.

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If their client is still thinking it's 2021 and they're going to get some stupid price for the house, we'll give them a cash offer that's reality.

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And even if they don't go with it from time to time, It helps them price it more appropriately when they go on the market.

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And again, hopefully you've done them a solid and they'll think of you next time.

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So let's jump into off market deal sourcing strategies.

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As I mentioned before, we really lean into this a little bit more in first and second quarter.

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And the reason being is that historically there's less inventory on the MLS.

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There's a lot more competition.

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And so you're just sitting there getting into bidding wars and you either end up overpaying or you get wrapped up in the hysteria.

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Off market deals are typically the ones where you've got better margins anyways, but it takes a longer lead time to get them.

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And it takes a lot more money in marketing and ad spend to get them, but let's talk about what we're doing right now.

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As a company, we have a third party.

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Cole calling company.

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What they're doing is we use them for about two years.

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There's probably five or six good ones out there.

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So you can get with me and I can help give you guys some guidance, but it is a company that we've done probably almost two years of good deals.

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Then I had a bit of a staff turnover.

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And so I just didn't want to pay for this pretty expensive lead generation.

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Where I didn't have the internal staff to like immediately execute on these deals.

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So we've taken a one year break.

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We literally just signed another contract and we're firing back up with our third party cold calling company.

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And what I like that these guys have done is they've done, more training.

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So I'll be able to train out my agents faster and a more consistent basis.

00:16:39.466 --> 00:16:41.936
They are just doing significantly more calling.

00:16:42.166 --> 00:17:00.145
So what it is is they pull a bunch of data that we help guide them of certain price points, certain parts of town, certain zip codes, and then typically people that have been in their home at least 10 years so that they've got some equity and that cold calling company will dial the hell out of a three to probably 10 line dialer.

00:17:00.525 --> 00:17:01.535
Get a hold of people.

00:17:01.576 --> 00:17:05.726
And then once they've had an initial conversation, they've done some qualifying questions.

00:17:05.976 --> 00:17:11.185
They then dump that lead into our CRM system so that our team can immediately call them.

00:17:11.496 --> 00:17:16.175
So they really are delivering warm, if not hot leads right to our doorstep.

00:17:17.090 --> 00:17:21.240
But we are paying thousands of dollars per month, for that service and for that opportunity.

00:17:21.530 --> 00:17:22.911
So we're 100 percent doubling down.

00:17:22.911 --> 00:17:24.020
We're going back to that.

00:17:24.050 --> 00:17:26.451
And I'm excited to report results here.

00:17:26.641 --> 00:17:28.040
Well, that'll start in July.

00:17:28.441 --> 00:17:31.290
And then we'll give you guys kind of our report card of how things are going.

00:17:31.740 --> 00:17:35.310
Adding on top of that an internal dialing campaign.

00:17:35.381 --> 00:17:39.901
So there are four or five different data sourcing companies out there that you can use.

00:17:39.901 --> 00:17:42.111
The one that we've selected is called Red X.

00:17:42.530 --> 00:17:50.951
And so what you do with Red X is you pull all this data and it will then also give you the ability to jump on a three way dialer, which means.

00:17:50.951 --> 00:17:50.990
Yeah.

00:17:51.161 --> 00:18:00.421
This system is calling three numbers at once and then getting you to, a heck of a lot more people and we're doing internal cold calling as well.

00:18:00.661 --> 00:18:07.060
So right now our team is eight agent strong and we've got three or four rock stars that really are stepping up to the plate.

00:18:07.310 --> 00:18:12.040
And doing this cold calling, this is a little bit more cold in nature, but, come to some of our events.

00:18:12.040 --> 00:18:14.411
We'll give you guys some more kind of insider tips.

00:18:14.851 --> 00:18:22.971
Two of them really quickly are calling the area where you have your flip, and you can actually tell people, Hey, we actually just flipped the property.

00:18:23.270 --> 00:18:24.310
We had more demand.

00:18:24.310 --> 00:18:25.901
Obviously we only had one house to sell.

00:18:26.205 --> 00:18:28.195
We knew a bunch of people that wanted to buy in here.

00:18:28.226 --> 00:18:29.596
Are you looking to sell your property?

00:18:29.596 --> 00:18:31.006
Because I might actually have a buyer for you.

00:18:31.576 --> 00:18:35.175
And then obviously the other thing is you can just say, Hey, we've done flips in this area.

00:18:35.465 --> 00:18:37.006
We've really had great success.

00:18:37.006 --> 00:18:39.175
We're trying to buy more in your neighborhood.

00:18:39.570 --> 00:18:41.030
Are you interested in a cash offer?

00:18:41.371 --> 00:18:43.240
So those are things that you really want to get into.

00:18:43.451 --> 00:18:46.141
And just cranking out as many calls as possible.

00:18:46.391 --> 00:18:52.951
The next thing that we're doing for off market is we're continuing to do digital marketing and website marketing.

00:18:53.310 --> 00:19:09.260
Kind of a nuance of where we're changing thing is we I'm not going to say rebranded, but we've rebranded the website because we had our kind of just weird, janky ass website that, had been three different iterations of where it was in my business and where it was in my budget.

00:19:09.661 --> 00:19:18.830
And we finally just ripped the bandaid off and, shout out to Damon and nomadic who redesigned our website and, and it's amazing.

00:19:18.861 --> 00:19:24.740
And the thing that I was kind of screwed myself on, honestly, is I was talking to too many audiences.

00:19:25.000 --> 00:19:29.171
I was trying to talk to people who wanted to sell and wanted cash offers.

00:19:29.201 --> 00:19:32.401
I was talking to people who wanted to take the Academy.

00:19:32.451 --> 00:19:36.590
I was recruiting real estate agents and I was talking to institutions and hedge funds.

00:19:36.681 --> 00:19:39.980
And so it was just, it was too convoluted.

00:19:40.070 --> 00:19:43.191
And so we've made this break, which we're actually just starting this month.

00:19:43.806 --> 00:19:54.195
And we have two websites now, so we have kind of what we're calling the corporate website, that the pretty elevation, just super awesome website that I think is, is again, all things being equal.

00:19:54.195 --> 00:19:58.506
We're helping win institutional business from that, but it was only mediocre for Legion.

00:19:58.746 --> 00:20:02.925
And so I've started up a separate site that does not look nearly as pretty.

00:20:03.296 --> 00:20:04.276
It kind of looks like.

00:20:04.556 --> 00:20:08.236
Like hell quite frankly, but it works and it's all about lead gen.

00:20:08.266 --> 00:20:20.746
So when somebody is searching, sell my house fast, sell my house for cash, cash offer on real estate, we are now, optimizing and ranking much, much higher literally in just the first month.

00:20:21.066 --> 00:20:24.086
We're at the end of June when I'm recording this and we've already gotten two leads.

00:20:24.445 --> 00:20:33.675
For legit seller leads, but the key for that is you have to do, I call it speed to lead, you have to call people back immediately, or you have to text people back immediately.

00:20:34.046 --> 00:20:37.155
So again, we'll have more data on our beta test of shifting.

00:20:37.455 --> 00:20:41.605
And then if we want to, we can put SEO money behind that and pay per click money behind that.

00:20:41.625 --> 00:20:46.016
And all it is, is just immediately solving their one problem, talking to their avatar.

00:20:46.605 --> 00:20:48.526
Saying, give us your information or contact us.

00:20:48.526 --> 00:20:50.026
And we immediately get back in touch with them.

00:20:50.195 --> 00:20:52.185
So again, separating with two different websites.

00:20:52.236 --> 00:20:54.316
The other thing we're doing for off market is it's old school.

00:20:54.316 --> 00:21:05.375
And I think this is what goes back to that original comment, which is how committed are you and how determined are you, but we knock doors and a strategy that we use is when we're doing a flip.

00:21:05.726 --> 00:21:11.105
In an area, we knock all the doors in about a three or four block radius and it accomplishes two things.

00:21:11.455 --> 00:21:20.746
One is, especially if we're pulling permits or maybe not pulling permits with more of our cosmetic stuff, it tells people, and we actually leave a flyer on the door, or it's a great conversation starter.

00:21:20.756 --> 00:21:21.556
If somebody's home.

00:21:22.135 --> 00:21:24.605
And we say, Hey, we're doing a project in your neighborhood.

00:21:24.965 --> 00:21:25.596
Great news.

00:21:25.596 --> 00:21:27.215
It's typically the crappiest house.

00:21:27.215 --> 00:21:30.125
And we'll say, Hey, you know, that house down there that looked like it was world war three.

00:21:30.125 --> 00:21:30.756
Well, great news.

00:21:30.756 --> 00:21:32.125
We bought it and we're fixing it up.

00:21:32.205 --> 00:21:33.766
So we're going to help your property values.

00:21:34.385 --> 00:21:39.185
If there's, workers that are there at six in the morning, if you've got trash blown down the street, just call us.

00:21:39.185 --> 00:21:42.846
We want to be a great neighbor, even for the short period of time that we are in your neighborhood.

00:21:43.135 --> 00:21:49.165
Oh, by the way, We love doing multiple projects in the same area because of course our crews are there.

00:21:49.385 --> 00:21:50.435
It saves us money.

00:21:50.685 --> 00:21:51.685
We set our own comps.

00:21:51.796 --> 00:21:53.086
Are you interested in selling?

00:21:53.355 --> 00:21:55.125
Do you know anybody that wants to sell?

00:21:55.175 --> 00:21:56.256
If not, okay.

00:21:56.286 --> 00:21:59.076
If you know of anybody, we'll even pay you a referral fee.

00:21:59.395 --> 00:21:59.746
Mr.

00:21:59.746 --> 00:22:00.175
And Mrs.

00:22:00.175 --> 00:22:02.056
Random neighbor that I'm leaving a flyer with.

00:22:02.375 --> 00:22:06.465
So it's old school, but we've absolutely gotten deals and we're going to keep ramping that up.

00:22:06.526 --> 00:22:07.905
So don't discard it.

00:22:08.125 --> 00:22:12.905
It shows me, you know, how committed are you, but that is still a key piece of our off market sourcing.

00:22:13.826 --> 00:22:15.556
Building out your internal sales team.

00:22:15.715 --> 00:22:17.846
So we've had a ton of success.

00:22:18.365 --> 00:22:28.806
We actually interviewed the CEO of Riva global, which is the virtual assistant company that specializes just in working with folks in the real estate space, Bob LaChance, great interview.

00:22:28.806 --> 00:22:30.266
Please go listen and watch that one.

00:22:30.526 --> 00:22:31.306
But we.

00:22:31.486 --> 00:22:45.256
Promoted my executive assistant to a sales assistant, and she is helping us really, really increase our speed to lead, getting back to people, following up with people, just making sure that our sales team is more efficient.

00:22:45.596 --> 00:22:47.445
And so I would highly look at that.

00:22:47.445 --> 00:22:50.605
We'll have a link in the show notes to get you guys a discount.

00:22:50.895 --> 00:22:56.695
But we're literally paying 11 bucks an hour for a super qualified, super smart, super hungry person.

00:22:56.695 --> 00:22:56.996
Yeah.

00:22:57.201 --> 00:22:59.590
The folks are typically working over in the Philippines.

00:22:59.621 --> 00:23:05.820
And so she's working, whatever time period you want, and you can get tons of stuff done and then walk in the next day and have it sitting in your inbox.

00:23:06.221 --> 00:23:07.310
So it's super cool.

00:23:07.840 --> 00:23:12.740
The last thing I'll hit on a really two different things, still in the off market bucket is content media.

00:23:12.760 --> 00:23:16.090
So obviously you're hopefully either listening or you're watching this podcast.

00:23:16.510 --> 00:23:20.661
And so that is, is lead gen that normally leads into a little bit more.

00:23:20.945 --> 00:23:48.286
On the partnership opportunities, the agent opportunities, but what's really helped us a ton is when we're competing side by side with another investor and we're sending that seller, our information and our credibility literally where the people that have either written the book or have the podcast on what we're doing and they can watch episodes and we've won business because they're like, I'm a real person rather than just, some random man or woman or person who doesn't have that digital presence.

00:23:48.365 --> 00:23:50.425
So produce as much content as you can.

00:23:50.826 --> 00:23:53.115
We've even started a LinkedIn newsletter.

00:23:53.326 --> 00:23:57.346
I'm a huge proponent of building out LinkedIn and so you guys can actually subscribe to the newsletter.

00:23:57.355 --> 00:23:59.155
It's called the fix and flip insider.

00:23:59.536 --> 00:23:59.986
It's been fun.

00:23:59.986 --> 00:24:06.510
We've just launched it a handful of months ago, and we've already got 425 subscribers that get weekly newsletters.

00:24:06.560 --> 00:24:09.861
So it's all just the machine and you have to just stay consistent.

00:24:10.131 --> 00:24:11.881
Obviously social media is key as well.

00:24:11.881 --> 00:24:16.411
So having a presence on Facebook, on Instagram, we haven't jumped into Tik TOK.

00:24:16.411 --> 00:24:17.580
I know I need to do it.

00:24:17.820 --> 00:24:23.560
I'm barely okay at doing Facebook and Instagram, but, I still think it's something that people need to look at, but again, lean into your skillset.

00:24:23.931 --> 00:24:26.441
If it's something that you're super uncomfortable with and you'll never do it.

00:24:26.500 --> 00:24:26.980
Okay, fine.

00:24:26.990 --> 00:24:28.961
Don't do it, but it is a piece of the puzzle.

00:24:29.421 --> 00:24:31.740
And then the last, content piece is YouTube.

00:24:32.111 --> 00:24:38.851
So obviously we then rebroadcast these podcasts and post them on YouTube, but that's where you can find our flip tip series.

00:24:38.851 --> 00:24:40.651
That's where you can find lots of information.

00:24:40.681 --> 00:24:43.810
So just keep the media machine and the content machine going.

00:24:44.621 --> 00:24:48.631
It's really playing the long game, but that's going to help you win regardless.

00:24:48.800 --> 00:24:54.391
For off market, here's a couple other strategies again, just because we're not doing it doesn't mean that you should evaluate it.

00:24:54.391 --> 00:24:58.480
So I'm going to hit these top other handful of areas, because it's areas you probably want to consider.

00:24:58.480 --> 00:25:02.931
Think about your budget, think about your skill set, and then think about your own level of commitment.

00:25:03.625 --> 00:25:09.715
So you can do PPC, which stands for pay per click or SEO search engine optimization.

00:25:09.996 --> 00:25:22.546
We haven't done that in the way that we've leaned into it is I feel like if we're putting out a ton of content and we've got good search terms, we are ranking typically on the first page and very high for keyword searches without being sponsored.

00:25:22.905 --> 00:25:32.405
I've done some super informal polling and ask people, do they click on the first sponsor link or do they actually skip the sponsor and then go to the first, traditional or organic.

00:25:32.715 --> 00:25:34.596
We get about a 50 percent response rate.

00:25:35.205 --> 00:25:45.260
So my other big thing is I feel like we have to spend so much money on to rank highly, there's four or five other players in the Denver market that are just pouring way more money into it.

00:25:45.270 --> 00:25:48.260
So I feel like I'm a much littler fish in a bigger pond.

00:25:48.320 --> 00:25:52.381
And so we haven't gotten there yet, but I know other people that are crushing it on that.

00:25:52.381 --> 00:25:53.641
So great option.

00:25:53.661 --> 00:25:57.951
It just depends upon where you're at in your budget and how much you want to pour into that.

00:25:58.351 --> 00:25:59.431
But totally an option.

00:25:59.711 --> 00:26:00.310
Direct mail.

00:26:00.961 --> 00:26:02.721
That's something that people are actually getting back to.

00:26:02.750 --> 00:26:07.550
It was really, really kind of hot when I first started investing in, in 2014, 15, 16.

00:26:08.060 --> 00:26:11.270
We are doing very strategic and select direct mail.

00:26:11.681 --> 00:26:19.711
So what we'll do is when we pull this campaign on Red X and we're doing tons of calls, we're getting Actual people.

00:26:20.060 --> 00:26:21.480
And then we put them in our database.

00:26:21.530 --> 00:26:24.780
I want to then be able to hit them and retarget them on Facebook.

00:26:25.151 --> 00:26:28.611
I want to send them a letter or a postcard every once in a while.

00:26:28.921 --> 00:26:32.161
And then we'll obviously continue to call or we'll continue to text them.

00:26:32.211 --> 00:26:41.540
So we're doing select direct mail, but a lot of people build their business on sending out, tens of thousands of pieces of direct mail and getting good responses and feedback.

00:26:41.641 --> 00:26:44.371
I did it early on and it didn't work for me as well.

00:26:44.371 --> 00:26:48.385
Cause I think you have to have, again, Bigger budget and you got to be ultra consistent.

00:26:48.776 --> 00:26:50.205
And then the messaging is key.

00:26:50.516 --> 00:26:58.625
The thing that I would actually avoid in Denver is we have so few properties in pre foreclosure or even foreclosure.

00:26:58.915 --> 00:27:03.215
I wouldn't waste your time paying to mail that list because it is such a small list.

00:27:03.615 --> 00:27:07.615
And there are so many other data service providers that have sold that to other investors.

00:27:08.006 --> 00:27:15.246
Those poor folks that, you know, like last time I looked at the list, it was like less than 50 people in a month in all of metropolitan Denver.

00:27:15.605 --> 00:27:19.175
Of 3 million people for our MSA, they're probably getting a hundred letters.

00:27:19.185 --> 00:27:20.655
It's like, how are they going to choose yours?

00:27:20.976 --> 00:27:22.586
So that's just kind of my personal take.

00:27:22.596 --> 00:27:24.756
You know, if you guys have different results, please call me.

00:27:24.756 --> 00:27:27.846
I'd love to hear about them, but I think that's a waste of time and a waste of money.

00:27:28.346 --> 00:27:30.976
Then there's a lot of people that are doing pay per lead.

00:27:31.306 --> 00:27:34.155
So if you search this, on your phone.

00:27:34.885 --> 00:27:42.536
They will stock you, like any good digital marketer and people are paying on average between 20 and as high as 500 per lead.

00:27:42.786 --> 00:27:49.165
So that's them doing outbound sales and marketing, supposedly qualifying somebody and then delivering a lead to you.

00:27:49.445 --> 00:27:51.306
Again, I haven't used those services.

00:27:51.355 --> 00:27:53.806
I might try them in the future, but haven't just seen the value.

00:27:53.806 --> 00:27:54.040
But.

00:27:54.171 --> 00:27:56.401
Again, people can see, some good ROI on that.

00:27:56.901 --> 00:28:00.681
We kind of get back to my original bread and butter, which is traditional advertising.

00:28:00.780 --> 00:28:09.270
So I cut my teeth in sports marketing and then I went into television advertising, and so people are still advertising on television.

00:28:09.560 --> 00:28:20.020
The one caveat that I would say as we're heading into an election season is you better either have an insane amount of money, or my opinion is just pause it because the political ads.

00:28:20.270 --> 00:28:24.101
They spent so much money and rates can be literally triple what it is.

00:28:24.201 --> 00:28:31.391
And again, me knowing behind the curtain, from my days at CBS television is that is the time when media stations make their money.

00:28:31.601 --> 00:28:39.300
So they will bump traditional advertisers and replace you with some politician who will pay four times the amount than your traditional advertiser.

00:28:39.300 --> 00:28:42.090
So just be careful of that when it's political season.

00:28:42.520 --> 00:28:43.721
Definitely radio is an option.

00:28:43.730 --> 00:28:49.161
I've heard a couple of either traditional agents or investors do radio and depends upon your budget.

00:28:49.601 --> 00:29:00.050
And then, even outdoor, it's not as big as our market, but I was in Las Vegas and I was in Texas recently, and people are doing billboards or outdoor advertising or bus side advertising.

00:29:00.300 --> 00:29:01.911
Again, I don't see the ROI in Denver.

00:29:02.161 --> 00:29:03.111
But totally an option.

00:29:03.490 --> 00:29:12.651
So as we wrap up this episode, I want to talk about where are we focusing our efforts for the second half of 2024 and really going into 2025.

00:29:12.901 --> 00:29:21.550
So we are doubling down on overall off market lead gen, because theoretically you have less competition than something on the MLS.

00:29:21.580 --> 00:29:25.421
And there might be a hundred investors trying to offer on the same beat up property.

00:29:25.760 --> 00:29:27.510
To put some, some numbers behind it.

00:29:27.800 --> 00:29:35.836
If we Total up our spend on cold calling on the two or three other kind of cold, lead gen sources.

00:29:35.836 --> 00:29:45.905
The calling sources are marketing our podcast, our follow up, our CRMs, kind of everything that you need for Legion machine right now, I'm spending about 10, 000 a month.

00:29:46.441 --> 00:29:50.631
So for some people that might sound like a lot, some people that probably sounds like a drop in the bucket.

00:29:51.010 --> 00:29:54.661
We're really trying to get to, if we spend X, it will generate Y.

00:29:54.730 --> 00:29:56.240
So I'm really dialing into that.

00:29:56.240 --> 00:30:05.361
I feel like we've been doing a decent job, but kind of inconsistent in being able to tailor our overall total investment to deal quantities.

00:30:05.550 --> 00:30:07.921
From there you need to really focus on squeezing out the best margins.

00:30:08.010 --> 00:30:10.290
So again, we always give you guys the real deal.

00:30:10.290 --> 00:30:13.671
We'll tell you whether we're doing a good job in our opinion or we're, Performing like hell.

00:30:14.020 --> 00:30:15.270
But that's what we're spending per month.

00:30:15.310 --> 00:30:18.201
So it's all about your commitment, your budget, and your consistency.

00:30:19.080 --> 00:30:30.131
The other thing is we're really looking at training up our agents to have a top level understanding of all the different ways to source deals, but then we're really helping them dive into their one or two areas of genius.

00:30:30.621 --> 00:30:39.421
Like some people obviously it would be their worst nightmare to go knocking on doors or, or even cold calling sometimes, but you put them in a living room.

00:30:39.701 --> 00:30:47.211
With the person who's in the older adult space and they're talking to, an estate sale company, that's like their area of genius.

00:30:47.250 --> 00:30:52.691
It's really trying to find your skillset and we really match our team up with giving them again, broad knowledge.

00:30:53.070 --> 00:30:56.891
But then getting them super, super dialed in their one or two areas of genius.

00:30:56.901 --> 00:30:57.340
That's it.

00:30:57.520 --> 00:31:03.990
The other thing that we're going to do is really focus on using AI and technology to just help cover more ground.

00:31:04.340 --> 00:31:10.020
I know a lot of people say like, Oh, AI is going to replace people and it's going to replace a lot of our industry.

00:31:10.520 --> 00:31:17.540
I think real estate investing and the people aspect of it gives us such a unique way to avoid being completely phased out.

00:31:17.931 --> 00:31:25.550
But absolutely there are such ways that you can level up your business and make things more efficient, cover more ground with AI.

00:31:25.550 --> 00:31:32.580
We'll put it in the show notes, but even though we're filming this podcast from the Broadway collective, our real estate centric co workspace.

00:31:33.010 --> 00:31:41.371
I'm really pumped because we've got an event on July 17th where we've got a really keen renowned speaker, in the AI space.

00:31:41.540 --> 00:31:42.730
He's actually one of our members.

00:31:42.730 --> 00:31:46.161
So he's going to do a free, business meetup.

00:31:46.340 --> 00:31:51.250
Talking about how you can use AI to leverage your business and leaning it towards real estate investing.

00:31:51.290 --> 00:31:52.250
So sign up for that.

00:31:52.280 --> 00:31:52.891
It's free.

00:31:53.201 --> 00:31:55.500
This is going to be really, really, really amazing.

00:31:55.520 --> 00:31:56.471
So check that out.

00:31:56.691 --> 00:32:00.901
We're going to talk about thinking of ways that, Hey, how can we potentially have AI run comps?

00:32:01.131 --> 00:32:03.111
How can we help it create content?

00:32:03.471 --> 00:32:07.671
How can we help put, you know, chat bots on our website to get back to people faster?

00:32:07.671 --> 00:32:11.161
So I just think we're at the tip of the iceberg as far as.

00:32:11.651 --> 00:32:15.191
integrating technology into growing our real estate business.

00:32:15.817 --> 00:32:22.188
I think the key takeaways for today's episode is, really figuring out how much money do you have to spend?

00:32:22.198 --> 00:32:24.907
How much commitment do you have and where's your area of expertise?

00:32:25.218 --> 00:32:28.167
I think it's balancing both on and off market strategies.

00:32:28.538 --> 00:32:29.647
I think it's being consistent.

00:32:29.958 --> 00:32:33.667
I know personally, when I first started, I was way too shiny object.

00:32:33.742 --> 00:32:36.303
I would do this for three months and then I would do that for three months.

00:32:36.303 --> 00:32:38.113
And I would say this sucks and this doesn't work.

00:32:38.462 --> 00:32:42.133
I think it's all about consistency and that's going to be the key.

00:32:42.732 --> 00:32:44.502
And then you match that up with your skillset.

00:32:44.782 --> 00:32:51.442
So again, if you want to learn a lot more about that, we've got the elevation academy coming up here on September 27th.

00:32:51.762 --> 00:32:54.742
DM me and you'll get a discount to sign up for that.

00:32:54.772 --> 00:32:58.403
And then we really do again, go over and way more in depth on these strategies.

00:32:58.432 --> 00:32:59.932
And then we help you pick two.

00:33:00.468 --> 00:33:02.048
And hopefully you can crush that for the year.

00:33:02.278 --> 00:33:08.117
So as always connect with us, engage with us, send us DMS, call us, stop by the Broadway collective.

00:33:08.147 --> 00:33:11.067
We really want to, learn more from you guys and build our community.

00:33:11.367 --> 00:33:13.397
Thanks for tuning in and we'll catch you guys on the flip side.

00:33:13.738 --> 00:33:16.768
Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of raising the flipping bar.

00:33:17.147 --> 00:33:30.458
If you found value in our insights and stories, let's keep the conversation going, connect with me on social media, and be sure to share this episode with friends or colleagues who might benefit your feedback and reviews, help us grow and reach more listeners like you.

00:33:30.837 --> 00:33:33.988
So please, if you enjoyed this episode, leave us a review.

00:33:34.817 --> 00:33:37.748
Thanks again to the elevation Academy for sponsoring today's show.

00:33:38.347 --> 00:33:41.657
If you're interested in learning more, click the link in the show notes below.

00:33:42.167 --> 00:33:43.607
And remember every property.

00:33:43.667 --> 00:33:44.387
Tells a story.

00:33:44.738 --> 00:33:46.028
Every deal brings a lesson.

00:33:46.597 --> 00:33:49.387
Keep reaching for those goals and we'll catch you on the flip side.

00:33:52.153 --> 00:33:52.732
Hey everybody.

00:33:52.752 --> 00:33:55.952
Thank you so much for listening and watching raising a flipping bar.

00:33:56.262 --> 00:34:01.603
Just a basic overall disclaimer is that a, this is not legal advice.

00:34:01.803 --> 00:34:03.212
B, this is not tax advice.

00:34:03.212 --> 00:34:04.952
See, this is not financial advice.

00:34:05.323 --> 00:34:09.003
I hope you get the gist, but I'm obviously not a lawyer, not a CPA.

00:34:09.143 --> 00:34:13.682
Hell I'm not even a real estate agent actually, but in general, we hope you get a ton of value out of this, but there is a bit of a disclaimer.

00:34:13.682 --> 00:34:17.242
Please consult a professional if you have any questions whatsoever.

00:34:17.293 --> 00:34:17.943
Thanks for tuning in.