How To Steal Houses!

Imagine hypnotizing your juiciest prospects into handing over their deed without so much as asking!

Of course this is ridiculous. However, consider the guy in this video and what he does to the cashier at a supermarket.

The reason I post this is because making an offer using a scripted presentation is the next best thing to putting your prospects into a mental headlock and getting their deed without ever asking for it. This is a chapter in my new course coming out soon.

Guerilla Online Marketing!

Matt Bacak is one of the most successful internet marketers I've come across. Many of the folks that visit my blog are also interested in learning how to market online. So I'm posting this for their benefit.

Old MacDonald Had A Farm, Too!

If you stare at this picture long enough, you'll discover a smile on this couple's face. Look closer! See them smile?

Yes, this couple is out front of their house letting everyone know they're making a killing in real estate. He's got a pitchfork in hand ready to poke any trespassers that try to send any postcards to his farm prospects.

She's ready to back him up with that "ol' school marm warning" expression, which barely hides her exuberance over the $40,000 they pocketed as a down payment yesterday from the house they just seller-financed.

Yup! This couple flips houses bought from desperate, anxious sellers, and then turns around and seller-finances new credit-challenged buyers. More specifically, they take over loans and resell those loan terms to those that couldn't borrow a rake (or a pitch fork) at this point.

Two years ago, this couple found out what kinds of houses were selling the fastest and in what area over the previous 90 days. They discovered that the three and four bedroom houses in the 37237 zip code were the most common, and fastest selling properties. So they staked a claim in that zip code and mailed postcards to all the three and four bedroom home owners letting them know they buy houses. This stake, or claim is referred to as a "farm". Not to be confused with raising crops of course, but cultivating a profit nonetheless.

Farms are important to investors for several reasons. First, they focus the investor on an area that he can become intimately familiar with. This is important, because familiarity with values/comps trumps about anything else, even cash, when it comes to finding, funding, and flipping houses.

Others may have cash, too, but the professional investor that is cultivating a well-defined geographical farm area (defined here as something one can drive to and back from in 45 minutes) can and will beat any potential competitor to the punch because he can first instantly recognize the deal for what it is --- and land the deal like a seasoned airline pilot, before anyone else knows there's a deal.

Meanwhile, the amateurs are still compiling comps, addresses, computer print-outs, and pouring over last-minute CMA's (comparative market analysis), biting their nails, second-guessing themselves, if not simply flying blind. That's no good.

The best way to start and maintain an investing career is to first choose, and cultivate a farm area. It doesn't really make difference where the farm is, as long as the investor has enough prospects to pick over in a given geographical area, and become more intimately familiar with it than practically anyone else is/can/will.

The fastest way to fail in real estate investing then is to fail to have a farm defined. "Southern California" is a "region", and for our purposes of discussion would be considered a lousy farm. Any one zip code in "Southern California" would be superior to the entire region.

I'll just say, nobody can be an expert in a region, but few can be more of an expert than the investor who cultivates a familiarity around a one mile square. Of course the uniqueness of a property may dictate the size of the farm. For instance, say we're looking to buy a slightly used nuclear power plant, we might have to resort to a farm the size of a "region" just to get enough prospects on our mailing list!

Short of this, however, we need to focus on a specific territory, or farm area, so that we can be the fastest, most reliable buyer around.

After all, there's no such thing as "stealing in slow motion".

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Agents work for themselves, not us!

There's just something about relying on agents as a professional investor that goes against my grain.

I suppose it's just the fact that the agent has a different objective than I do. They want a "closing". I want a "deal".

Agents "have" to have a closing to pay their bills and overhead.

I don't "have" to have squat.

Frankly, to put our opposing objectives into relief, if I don't insist on only buying "deals", I'll only have "squat" in the end.

Recently I interviewed a professional (full time) real estate agent that I'll call Pedro, that was listing a short sale property. The acreage had a stick built home on it, and at roughly $80k an acre, it seems like a great price --- not wholesale, but a good price for an end-user.

After talking to Pedro for a bit, I realized that even though this agent was open and frank about his feelings regarding the market, I had to pause and remember I was not only talking to Pedro ---- I was talking to a Pedro. Yes and this Pedro was quite persuasive informing me that I shouldn't wait until the market bottomed out before I bought, but should realize that a bargain now, held on for many years, would prove a decent investment --- especially if I had "staying power".

Well yes, this might be true enough, but my objectives are not to rely on my staying power, just so that I can survive until the next rebound. I want only juicy deals that I can profit from today (regardless of my staying power thank you).

So, what's the Pedro thing anyway, one asks. Here's the story...

Once upon a time there was a feisty US Marshall chasing two stage coach Banditos that had robbed the stage of it's gold.

While capturing and handcuffing the robbers, the Marshal realized the thieves spoke no English. The Marshall was helpless to find out where they hid the gold without a translator. So he dragged the scoundrels into town and found a man called Pedro to translate. When Pedro found out why the Marshall needed his help, Pedro smiled and happily obliged.

Meanwhile, the Marshall was waving his six-shooter at the thieves heads demanding to know where they hid the gold, and threatening to blow their heads off if they didn't tell him what he wanted to know.

Pedro translated exactly what the Marshall requested to the two thieves saying, "If you don't tell the Marshall where you hid the gold, the Marshall says he'll shoot both of you in the head!" They looked at the Marshal waving the pistol back and forth just waiting to shoot them. Fearful the Marshal had a trigger-finger they gave in and explained to Pedro that they had buried the chest of gold under the Oak tree at the Three Forks river bend.

Desperate, the Marshall demanded to know what the bandits said. Pedro turned to the Marshall and replied, "They said, 'Go ahead and shoot!'"

Credential Books - What are they good for?

I'm working up a post to explain how extremely valuable, helpful, and most of all, profitable a "Credential Book" can be for any investor, regardless of their investing strategy. This is a misunderstood, and undervalued sales tool. I used my first credential book to make me $125,000 in paper equity within six weeks of first using it.

It's that powerful.