In previous articles I talked about all the different ways to build your real estate investing dream team. I talked about how to use two amazing shortcuts for finding the absolute best dream team members and why you should consider using those instead of the traditional ways of finding dream team members. For those that missed the last article, the shortcuts were to tap into the dream teams of other real estate investors that you know and to tap into real estate agent and broker’s dream teams.
Today, I will be sharing with you some strategies for using CraigsList or other classified ad websites for finding and building your dream team.
First, if you are looking to network with other real estate investors to ask them for recommendations to key dream team members, you will also want to review the material I have on how to build a buyers list of real estate investors. Those strategies are great ways to find real estate investors that you can ask if they know a good (fill in the blank with a dream team member you are trying to find) that works with investors.
You can also post ads directly seeking key dream team members. What category do you post these ads in? I post them in the jobs section. Why the jobs section? Aren’t you looking to hire that dream team member to do work for you? Yes, you are.
While you can do this with every type of dream team member, let’s take a quick look at how this might work to find a real estate agent so that we can tap into their existing network for other dream team members (which is one of our shortcuts).
You post an ad in the real estate jobs section of CraigsList saying something like this:
Local Real Estate Investor Seeking Real Estate Agent/Broker
I am a local real estate investor looking to hire the best real estate agent or broker to help find me great investor deals in the MLS. I can tell you exactly what I am looking for, so that you can find them and help me buy them. You will be paid your normal commission with your existing broker. You can continue to work with your other clients as well. Call me at (and give your phone number).
Will you get calls from this ad? Yes. Will they all be great real estate agents? No. Will you get the occasional great agent calling? Yes. In fact, from similar ads that I have run, I’ve been told that it was not the great agent that found it, but a friend that shared the ad with him or her, which prompted the agent to call me.
Another method of using CraigsList or other classified ad websites for building your dream team is to actually call on ads that people are posting. I prefer to post ads and have people contact me, but you absolutely can build your dream team by calling dream team members that are advertising their products and services on CraigsList.
Until my next post,
James
P.S. Upgrade today to Real Estate Investor Bronze Membership and get instant access to over 100 real estate courses plus much, much more.
If you plan to wholesale real estate, I hope you know by now that you absolutely MUST be building your buyers list. In fact, I am so adamant about this, that clients and investors who I work with often ask me which comes first: the buyers list or an actual deal.
I strongly recommend that you start building your buyers list immediately – even before you have your first deal. What?! How do you build a list of buyers even before you have a deal to market?
Well, without going into all of the details of how to build a buyers list, here are a few ideas:
First, you can market generically that you are looking for investors that are interested in deals. Put out some ads on some free classified sites seeking investors who want to be notified when you find a great deal. Ask them if you can add them to your buyers list. Most serious investors will want you to call them if you have a great deal.
Second, you can contact investors that have investment property and ask them if they are looking for more deals. If they say yes, then ask them if you can add them to your buyers list. How do you find these guys? Three very quick ways: people advertising that they want to buy houses, people with houses for rent (they’re investors aren’t they) and absentee owner mailing lists.
Third, you can borrow deals from other investors and offer to help them market their deals. While you are contacting investors using the first two methods, you can also ask them if they have any deals. The odds are that they will have a deal or two. Ask them if you can do some marketing for them to help them sell it. If they agree, you now have a deal that you can use to meet people interested in deals, which both helps you build up your own buyers list and helps your new investor friend get their deal sold.
Fourth, give away real estate courses and a list of distressed properties. I use this method with my wholesaling clients. I allow them to give away one real estate course on CD that I have, to attract people who are interested in investing, in order to build their list of potential investor buyers.
So, while some people believe that you need to have found a deal to start building a buyers list, I strongly disagree. You should be building your buyers list from your first day as a real estate wholesaler and keep building and replenishing it every single day that you are in business as a wholesaler. It is one-half of the life-blood of your business (the other half is finding deals) and it is critically important to do it everyday.
Until my next post,
James
P.S. For access to our complete training system on how to run a profitable real estate wholesaling business which includes on-going training and free consulting sessions sign up as a Real Estate Investor Bronze Member today.
