The Ultimate Guide to Buying Off-Market Properties (As a Complete Beginner)

Ashley:Janelle Carlson is walking us through the exact deal finding playbook that any rookie can start running this week.

Tony:Off market is the rookie’s edge in a tight inventory market and it works for every exit strategy. So today’s guest, she flips wholesales, rents, she has some Airbnbs, but they source the deals themselves for all of them.

Ashley:This is The Real Estate Rookie Podcast. I’m Ashley Kehr.

Tony:And I’m Tony J. Robinson. With that, let’s give it a big born welcome to Janelle. Janelle, thanks for joining us today.

Janelle:Thanks for having me. Excited to be on today, guys.

Ashley:Well, Janelle, we have to start with you lost 35,000 on your first flip and you are still in the business of flipping today. So you have now closed over 30 off-market deals a year across California, Indiana, and Ohio. In one minute, what did the MLS teach you that really pushed you into finding off-market sourcing?

Janelle:Yeah, the MLS basically taught me that it’s very difficult to find deals that work on market. There’s just not a lot of margin on a lot of them. And I was also doing this and buying in 2020, 2021 when prices were crazy interest rates were low so the competition was absolutely wild. So I felt like my only option was to find properties that nobody else had access to, which was going off market.

Ashley:Now with that first deal, tell us what happened with that and what was kind of the lesson that you learned?

Janelle:Yeah. So that first deal I partnered with somebody because I didn’t have any mentorship. I didn’t have any guidance or anything like that. And so I wanted a running mate basically to figure out how to do this. They were a well established flipper in my area and so I though I could trust them, gave them money to partner on a flip and then they just completely ghosted me. Never heard from them again. They just completely took my money and ran away. Oh

Ashley:My God. Yeah.

Tony:I had no idea. Wait, so Janelle, so for the rookies that are listening, because I do think that there’s some truth to the fact that there are gurus out there who do exactly what happened to you where they charge these or partner with you, take your money and run. But then there are also educators who actually solve a need that people have of getting into the space, getting the right education. So what’s your advice to someone who’s just getting started that is looking for that mentorship and they’re willing to maybe even invest and pay for it? How do they tell the difference between someone who’s going to disappear in the middle of the night and the person who’s actually going to help get them across the finish line?

Janelle:Are they currently doing deals? Are they making their money by selling the course or are they making their money by actually doing the thing that they’re teaching you? I think that’s a really big thing to ask and just see how many deals they’re actually doing currently in this market because it does vary. If they were investing three, four years ago, the market that we have now is very different. Sometimes our strategies change depending on the market cycle. So I think it’s really important to really understand that your teacher, mentor, whatever is actively investing now to teach you the right strategies. And the person I invested with, they weren’t a guru, they weren’t a mentor or anything like that. They were someone in my real estate office because I was an agent at the time. So there was someone in my office that was flipping houses and I wanted to partner with them.

Tony:So what happened after they ran off with your money? Did you see them in the office on Monday morning? Did they just leave the office altogether?

Janelle:Yeah, basically. They never really were in the office to begin with. I saw them here and there at different events and stuff like that and they were active per se. I just heard their name a lot because they sounded like a big deal. He drove a Rolls-Royce. He was like that guy. And so I thought he was successful and he wasn’t. And the biggest mistake that I made in that though was that I didn’t have my paperwork aligned well enough to go after him after the fact. I tried to put liens on his house and do all that. When I started to dig into that, I realized that he was in a lot of trouble with a lot of people. He had a lot of houses foreclosing, so I missed the ability to put liens on the house. I was last in line to be paid back.I’ll just say that. But because I didn’t have the right paperwork in place really, I couldn’t necessarily sue him or take legal action. So big bummer, learning lesson, but is what it is.

Ashley:Did you ever have the full circle moment where you ended up buying one of his houses that were foreclosed on?

Janelle:Not yet, but this was in the beginning of my real estate career in general. And I did tell myself one day in every real estate room he goes in, he’s going to know who I am and hear my name. So one day he’s going to know who he screwed over.

Tony:Jenna, I think for most people they would maybe be too scarred from that experience to jump back in, but not only did you jump back in, but you jumped back in in a way that’s maybe even more complicated than the traditional form of real estate investing, which is going off market. So I want to talk a little bit more about that transition. But when we say off market, what does that actually mean? If you break that down for Ricky, what does it mean to go off market and how is that transaction different than buying on the MLS?

Janelle:Yeah. So off market basically means buying a house that is not listed on Zillow, that’s it, listed on the MLS because you could still buy technically an off market deal from a real estate agent. I do that all the time. They just don’t have it blasted on the MLS. So it’s any type of deal that you can buy just not listed on Zillow.

Tony:And after that first deal that wins sideways, what was it that pushed you into sourcing off market deals? Because I think the benefit of on market is that it’s easy. Anyone can download Zillow or Redfin, open it up on their phone and within minutes have access to every single potential piece of real estate that’s for sale across the country, or a lot of it at least. So there’s an ease function there. Off market is much harder because you have to drum up those leads yourself. So what was it that made you say off market is the right strategy for me?

Janelle:I felt like I didn’t really have a choice. Because of the market cycle we were in, it was a seller’s market. There was a lot of competition on market and I just couldn’t compete. So I felt like my only option to find deals was to go off market things that I sourced that nobody else had access to that I could buy. So I kind of just felt backed in a corner and had to make it work. And even what’s really cool about real estate is that, yes, I lost 35K on my first deal, but I knew that, or maybe I just didn’t know what I didn’t know, but I felt like real estate was very forgiving and I knew I could make that up eventually if I just kept going and I didn’t feel like any other investing strategy allows you that option, but I’m like, okay, I learn my lesson here.If I take what I learned and move on to the next one, I think I can slowly build up and make what I lost in even 10X, 100 exit, which I feel like I’ve done now. So it takes a litle bit, but it’s possible.

Ashley:Now, Janale, when we talk about off a market deal, what does that actually mean? How is this transaction different? How is it listed different? How do you buy it different and walk us kind of through the difference between off market and on market deal.

Janelle:Yeah. So I think there’s a couple different ways to buy off market. I think there’s like three main ways, I guess you could say. One is buying with a pharma a real estate agent that has the deal, just hasn’t listed it off the market. In that case, it usually happens the exact same way as it would on market. You just have direct access to it, but you’re still working with an agent. You can still ask for inspection repairs and all that kinds of stuff, just like a normal transaction would. Then there’s also a way of working with a wholesaler and a wholesaler is someone who finds deals off market, negotiates them, puts them under contract, kind of basically wraps them up in a pretty bow to present to an investor to buy. And those are not listed at all. They’re direct to the seller usually so they have direct access and they present that deal to an end buyer.In that instance, it does work a little bit different because you’re not working with like the normal real estate contracts usually. It’s usually just like a simple purchase and sale agreement, but you’re not having the same contingencies as you would on market.You usually don’t have an appraisal contingency, you usually don’t have a loan contingency. And if you’re working with a wholesaler, you usually don’t have an inspection contingency either. If you’re going to commit to that deal, you commit to it and hopefully you close on it. And then there’s you going directly to the seller and sourcing the deal on your own. In that instance, this is when you are working on terms with the seller on purchase price, you’re negotiating everything. And usually in that instance, you do have an inspection period. You can negotiate that into the deal and you may be able to ask for loan and appraisal as well, but it’s just not as standard.Usually the standard is anywhere from a two to three week close, sometimes four weeks, or depending on the seller timeline, and then asking for about anywhere from like a seven to 10 day inspection period so that you can get your contractor in or you can assign the contract to an end buyer through wholesaling or whatever it is that you want to accomplish during that inspection period. And that’s usually how it works.

Tony:So part of the benefit of going off mark is that you’re getting deals below value. If you think about all the deals you’ve transacted on, can you think about the one that was like your quote unquote best deal? If you look at the spread between what you bought it for and what it was worth at the end, which one kind of comes to mind as the biggest or the best deal?

Janelle:Yeah. So I actually have one right now that should be listed next month that I’m really excited about because I actually bought this deal, it was off market and I bought it for $110,000. They were actually pitching it to me for, I think it was 125 or 130, but it was a very risky deal because it had a lot of foundation damage and it had 45K worth of foundation damage. So it was a lot and it scared a lot of people, but the spread was amazing. So I put it under contract for 110. My rehab was $250,000, so double the purchase price. But when I was in escrow, my hard money lender wanted to get an appraisal, which some of them do and it appraised for 550 and I knew that. I knew my numbers were going to be between 550 and 600 for ARV because it was in an epic area, but the house was just really dilapidated and just needed a lot of rehab.So people were afraid of it, but that’s where you find the most opportunity when people are afraid, right? So that’s exactly what I did.

Tony:One last thing, Janell, on that point, because I think for a lot of Ricky’s, they hear foundation issues or they hear mold or they hear name kind of like the big thing that kind of scares a lot of other investors away. Do you think you could have taken that deal down as a rookie investor?

Janelle:I could have. And I think this is where a big misconception is, is that yes, these terms sound scary, but they’re all fixable really. They might just take a little bit more time to fix or more money to fix. So as long as you’re accounting for that in your budget, these deals can work. And especially if you become the expert at that thing at remediating mold, fire damage, foundations, all the scary things, even roofs. Some people are afraid of the roof because they think it’s expensive. So different things like that, you can make a lot of money because a lot of people avoid those deals, so you’ll have more deals to choose from than others.

Ashley:I have to 100% agree with that. A roof is actually one of the easiest things to get done You know what you need to do. They come in, they send a day or two, they get it done and it’s done and it’s taken care of. Another thing that I’ve gotten kind of used to doing unfortunately is mold removal. Sometimes it’s not as bad as you see people post on Instagram, “I have to move out of my house for so many days and blah, blah, blah.” If you take care of it and get rid of it and it’s not as expensive as I would’ve thought that it would be to actually take care of it too.

Janelle:Right, exactly. And same thing with like when you see a roof leak, I feel like people get really afraid when they see the stains in the ceiling and stuff. And I’m like, honestly, it’s probably not as bad as you think, but you can kind of play it off for it to be bad so you get a better deal if you want, but it’s probably not as bad as you think it will be.

Ashley:Well, we have to take short break, but now that rookies know what off market means when we come back, I want to find out what the actual channels are that you use to find these deals and which is actually the best one that a brand new rookie should use. So we’ll be right back. Okay. Welcome back. So now that we understand why off market is such a rookie edge, let’s slow this down now and walk through the actual channels you use. So Janelle, take us through the tech stack, take us through one real off market deal from maybe the last 12 months and take us end to end. So how did you source the deal to how did you get it under contract and close on it?

Janelle:Yeah. So I’ll take you through another one that I have in escrow right now should be closing next week. This is actually a wholesale deal and technically this one was a referral actually. So I originally got this deal from sending direct mail and it was an absentee with equity list, sent them mail, followed up. We were able to buy a deal from the seller about a year or two ago and we just usually kind of try to keep in touch with some of our sellers that have multiple properties or we know that could have something else coming up down the line and she was one of those. So about a month or two ago, she hit us up saying that she had another house that she wanted to sell off. She really enjoyed working with us. So we sent one of our boots on the ground guys out there to take a look at it and to see what we could put it under contract for.We were able to negotiate the deal and we got it under contract, wholesaled it like a day or two later to an end buyer and we close next week.

Tony:You make it sound so simple, right? You’re like, “Yeah, we did this and this. ”

Janelle:It’s not. I know.

Tony:For our rookies that are listening, Janelle, you said absentee list. What does that mean for folks who aren’t familiar with that phrase?

Janelle:Yeah. So absentee basically means that it is non-owner occupied. So the person who owns the property just doesn’t live there.

Tony:Well, I guess let’s go down then to kind of the next phase, but I guess before we move on from this deal, since you’re wholesaling this, what is your spread going to be for this deal?

Janelle:We have it under contract for 72 and we’re selling it for 95K.

Tony:Wow, that’s a pretty solid spread, right? For not having to swing a hammer or deal with any contractors, right? There’s a lot of spread there.

Janelle:Yes. And I know that may seem like a lot and sometimes we get the question of like, “Oh my gosh, well, isn’t that what you can give the seller all that kind of stuff, blah, blah, blah.” Well, with this specific deal, there is a decent amount of problems with it that we’ve been able to solve. So that’s kind of why we’re able to also charge, I guess you could say, a little bit more for our fee. Like for example, this deal specifically had 27 liens against the property that we are clearing up. Yeah. So a lot of liens. So this seller would not have been able to sell it because other people probably wouldn’t be able to get that remediated like my team can. And so we’re kind of able to work that and be able to help the seller move on from this property while also providing the buyer a good property without any liens against it.Hold

Tony:On, just really quick. 27 liens, what were they doing? What were all the liens?

Janelle:Honestly, this is where title comes into play and is very important. So a lot of these liens were actually not even against the seller. For some reason, there were a lot of liens on this property that had nothing to do with the seller. So we had to work with the city to get them removed and justify why they aren’t attached to the seller. For some reason, they were just thrown on this property. Some of them were valid that were taken care of, but the other ones were not. So there was some child support ones on there that didn’t have any validation to our seller or this property. So different things like that. But again, that’s important why you want to have title. You want to have the title search and title insurance, all that kind of stuff because of that type of situation.

Ashley:My God, can you imagine finding out you have liens against you that you had nothing to know about?

Tony:Not even liens, but 27. It’s like, oh my goodness.

Ashley:So Janelle, when you talk about you take care of the liens, so is this calling the contact person and negotiating or are you paying the full balance on each of them? What does it actually entail when you take care of the liens?

Janelle:Yeah, so it does depend on the lien and who has put the lien on there. So sometimes we can negotiate them down and then pay off a smaller balance. Sometimes we can just get them forgiven. Other times we have to pay off the full balance. So it does take quite a bit of work to be able to work through. And the reason why my team has been able to kind of master this strategy of figuring out liens is because for some reason in Cincinnati, the liens list when I send direct mail or do marketing, liens as a niche list do very well for me. I get a lot of callbacks and different things like that, lots of leads from that. So that is why I have been able to figure out this lien situation because it does take a little bit of time to master, like I mentioned, and having the right people in place to be able to get these things taken off or help the seller get them forgiven, paid off, whatever.And usually when you’re paying them off too, sometimes you’re using seller proceeds to do that, or I have to build up my assignment fee to pay off some of these loans or these liens, which is what I’m doing a little bit, but not really. I think we’re only paying like a thousand bucks or 2,000 bucks for one or two liens to get them removed for the sale. But yeah, so that’s usually what you got to do.

Tony:Now, Janelle, you mentioned direct mails. One of the ways that you’re sourcing these off market opportunities, I guess let’s zoom out. You guys are doing, I think you said about 30 deals per year, right? So that’s like a couple deals every single month. If you look at all the deals that you do on a monthly basis, what’s the breakdown of the different channels that you’re going through to actually get those deals done?

Janelle:Yeah. So now it’s actually changed a lot. I think because we’ve been in the business for a little while now, so we’ve been investing, my husband and I have been investing now for about seven years, I think it is. So in the beginning we were very, very direct mail heavy. That’s almost all we did. And then we did some partnerships with wholesalers like JV partnerships with wholesalers, joint venturing. And now we’re honestly a lot more referral based. So wholesalers bring us deals that they can’t close or we partner with realtors that have deals that are fixers, they don’t want to list or the seller doesn’t want to list or even past clients that have done deals with us and want to do more. So that’s basically what we do. I’m starting to get into the auction side of things, but maybe that’s another topic for another day.

Ashley:We just had someone on recently who was talking about auctions and it once again rings that shiny object bell for us. I feel like, “Oh, this is something we should revisit.”

Janelle:Yes, I know. Oh, and I’m doing paperlead now too, but I don’t have solid numbers just yet to really see how well it works for me.

Ashley:Okay. Yeah. Tell us about that and how does that actually compare to direct mail?

Janelle:The way I do paperlead is a little bit different because usually for paper lead, when you’re working with a paper lead company, pay per lead by the way stands for you actually paying per lead. So some people think it’s paper like a sheet of paper, but it’s not. It’s paying per lead that you buy.

Ashley:Like pay per view

Janelle:Yeah, like paperwork.

Ashley:Is that even still around anywhere?

Janelle:Exactly, exactly. So same concept, but so with the companies that offer the pay per lead strategy, you are investing a certain amount of money into these companies and then from that monthly budget that you give them, they will funnel you leads. And it’s usually like a round robin process. So you will let the company know how much you’re willing to pay for each lead that they send you. It could be 200 bucks, 250 bucks, whatever. And the person that will pay the most for the leads will get the leads first until their budget runs out and then they’ll go to the next person, the next person, the next person. So if you’re going to pay the lease and you’re probably going to wait usually towards the end of the month to really start to receive these leads as the other people’s budgets run out. I didn’t necessarily love that strategy because you don’t really have any control of the leads that you get.So I found another company that will allow you to manually pay for leads instead. Well, they allow for both. You can go ahead and issue money to your account and they’ll give you leads as they come in, but you can also manually pay for leads as they come in. So you are able to kind of screen them a little bit and see if they’re worth taking on because my buy box is pretty specific, I’d say. So I only want certain leads and so that’s why I liked this strategy of manually paying for them instead of having to like buy in bulk almost.

Tony:What’s typical costs on these leads that you’re paying for?

Janelle:Yeah. So right now I am at max paying for like a hundred bucks a lead. It’s

Tony:Actually not too bad. And then do you know like out of 100 leads, how many of those actually convert into closed, whether it’s assignment fees or you end up keeping the deal, how many of those actually close for you?

Janelle:Yeah. So right now I’ve only boughten … How many have I bought? I bought in like 60 to 70 leads and we have a handful of them under appointment status right now, none to conversion and I started this two or three months ago. So it’s been a little bit, but I’ve also note … I mean, I’m used to the delays like this because with off market strategies or even just when you’re sourcing deals, you have that delay because of the follow-up sequence that you have to have. On average, it takes five to seven touches to convert a person to a lead. That’s usually what it falls down to. And then from that, it usually takes three to five touches to convert them from a lead to a deal. So it takes a little while to nurture these people and nurture these leads to get them to close and that’s why that followup is so important, but that’s also why there’s just that slight delay for me right now, just because it takes a little bit to nurture.And with paper lead leads, I’ve noticed they kind of fall in between cold calling and direct mail. So with direct mail, I feel like those leads are just a little bit warmer because they’re reaching out to you saying that they want to sell. They received your letter and they’re interested or else they wouldn’t have called you. So they’re just a little bit more motivated. With cold calling, it’s just a complete cold lead, right? You’re reaching out and sometimes they say, “Yeah, I’m interested. Give me the price or whatever.” And people consider that a lead and they want a million dollars for like a 100K house or something. But with the paper lead, they’re slightly screened already because the company has screened them for you and they’re doing their due diligence on their end to make sure that they’re a lead that is worth giving out to their clients and for people to pay.So I feel like they’re falling right in between cold calling and direct mail in a sense of motivation because they’re like pretty motivated, more motivated to cold calling, but less in direct mail, if that makes sense.

Ashley:Now with all of this, this whole process of the first touchpoint to setting the appointment, how are you managing all of this? How are you using software? Is it a spreadsheet to actually track all those touch points and what status someone is in?

Janelle:So I am using a software. I’m using a CRM called ReadSimply to help me keep track of all of this stuff and I also have all of my leads on a drip sequence or a drip campaign. So whenever they come in, once a lead comes into my CRM and my database, they are automatically getting a text message saying that I’m going to reach out to them and I’ll reach out to them and then if they answer the phone, then they go into a different follow-up campaign. If they don’t answer the phone, then they’re put back on the drip as a no contact made and then that drip sequence is just going to be constantly following up with them until they tell me to stop or until they answer the phone.

Tony:Now, Janelle, you talked about paper lead, but you also said direct mail was where you really started. Direct mail, I think to your point, it’s great because you get warmer leads and I’ve shared on previous podcast episodes where I’ve gotten certain calls back from people who I was cold calling who weren’t very happy to get a cold call, but on the direct mail, they’re reaching out to you. So it is warmer leads, but I think it’s also, maybe there’s a litle bit more risk associated with direct mail than there is just like cold calling homeowners because you got to kind of spend a litle bit more money upfront to get that going. So what have you found is maybe A, some of the mistakes that Ricky’s typically make when it comes to direct mail and B, what are some of your, I don’t know, I guess your best ways to improve your conversion rate and getting people to actually call you off of those mailers?

Janelle:Yeah. So going to the first question first with that, honestly, I feel like people fail with direct mail because one, they either don’t send enough mail or they don’t stay consistent with that mailing. So like I mentioned already, it takes a little while to actually convert a person to a lead, like three to five touches, five to seven sometimes. So you have to constantly be sending mail to reap your reward. Then I talk to some people like, “Oh, I sent a hundred letters and didn’t get one single call back.” It’s like, “Well, because you sent a hundred.” Usually it takes a little bit more than that. Unfortunately, I wish it only took a hundred letters and sometimes it does. I’m not saying that doesn’t work, but if you’re trying to really build up a pipeline, then you’re most likely going to have to send more than that.For example, for me in Cincinnati, it takes me on average about 3,800 letters to convert or to get a deal. So it takes quite a few letters to actually get a deal in. And if you’re in a more expensive market like Southern California, Seattle, the East Coast, something like that, it’s going to usually take more. Your marketing is going to cost you more before you land a deal. So it just takes a litle while.

Tony:Janelle, what are you saying in your letters? Because you said five to seven touch points. Is it the same mailer every single time? What are you saying in each one of these mailers and what’s your cadence for sending them out?

Janelle:Yeah. So I use a company to help me send out these letters. I use a company called Ballpoint Marketing. There’s a couple others that I have heard good things from like open letter marketing and yellow letter marketing, but I use Ballpoint and honestly, whatever Ballpoint says to say on the letter, I just say it. I don’t change the copy of it because I know those companies, or I feel like actually I know the owner of Ballpoint, so I know he does it. I don’t know about the other guys, but they do a lot of market research to figure out what copy or what text on the letter actually performs and gets sellers to call you back. And I’m not a wizard at that. I have no idea. So I just trust in them and don’t change it. And usually what my letters say is, “Dear seller, what are your plans for 123 Main Street?I’m prepared to make a cash offer. Please call my office at whatever if you’re interested in selling.” It’s sincerely my name. That’s it. It’s pretty basic, pretty generic. Sometimes the copy changes depending on the letter that I’m sending, just because whatever they have, I’ll just change it. But it’s very, very slight changes. They’re not huge. And then my sequence for it is usually I’ll send two normal letters, like actually actual letters to the same list. So one month I’ll send a letter, the next month I’ll send another letter and then I’ll switch over to postcards and I’ll send a post, usually three rounds of postcards to that same list until the list kind of dies out basically. But if I’m not getting a great response from a list, like if I just am not getting anywhere with it, then I’ll usually just send that one letter, look at my response rate and then switch to postcards if it’s not awesome just because postcards are a little cheaper than actual letters.So I just want to save some money if that list is not performing well.

Tony:Janelle, where are you pulling your lists from? Are you going to like a prop stream? Are you pulling these yourself from like county records? Where are you pulling all these lists?

Janelle:Yeah, I was using PropStream quite a bit. I absolutely love PropStream. I think their interface is awesome. I’ve recently switched over to ReSimply because they have list pulled link capabilities now too. So I switched over to them basically because I had like five or six different softwares trying to manage all of these different things and it was just easier to keep everything in one. So I switched over to Recently, recently.

Tony:Now you also mentioned being able to track like response rates to specific campaigns. Is that managed inside of ReSimply as well or are you using some other sort of tracking to know, “Hey, these mailers went out to this list and here’s a response rate for that specific mailing.”

Janelle:I track that in ReSimply now, but I was just using an Excel spreadsheet when I first got started, but now in Read Simply, I just track it through there. So every letter that I send out, I will have a specific phone number dedicated to that. So I’ll have like a direct mail phone number for Cincinnati specific. I’ll have a postcard phone number. So I’m able to track which leads are coming in from what marketing source and then when I upload the list into ReSimply, because there’s this thing called list stacking in ReSimply where you can upload all of your lead lists and then tag it in a certain way. So I will add tags to these lists for like when I send out, if they’re being mailed to what type of marketing source I’m doing for that list, when I’ve marketed to them, usually I’ll do the month and the year and then anything else that is specific to that list, like maybe it’s, I don’t know, like owners of two to four properties or more or something like that.And so that’s how I keep track of it. So in Then every month I can go in and look at my different tags and see which ones are performing. Same thing with the list. I’m able to see which leads came from which list source so that I’m able to then market to that list. Okay, the leans list is hitting really well this month, but the probate one isn’t doing that great. I’m going to change out my marketing to adjust for those changes. So different things like that.

Ashley:Now Janelle, those are all things that you can do remotely, especially with using the software that you’re using, but what about the boots on the ground? How have you structured your team with you being remote and buying properties in Indiana and Ohio? What team members do you have there?

Janelle:Yeah, so that took me a while. Lots of trial and error to figure out which people I even like to work with because that’s also a big part of it is figuring out who you gel well with because the main thing with managing a remote team is communication. And if you do not have good communication with a team member, then unfortunately you got to let them go. No matter how much you like them, you got to let them go because it relies solely on communication and just making sure things are being done on time because they are your eyes and ears. They are your boots on the ground. They’re supposed to be you when you’re not there. And if they’re not getting back to you in a timely manner on things, then it’s going to be hard for you to do business. And so my main team members are my real estate agent, my contractor and my property walker/other wholesaler that I like to partner with.I had my own property walker, but they transitioned into another job. So he kind of transitioned out. And so when I have this void, I just use other wholesaler friends in my area to help me take pictures and I just give them a little bit of the fee if I need to. And they help me with like buyer walkthroughs and stuff like that. But we still handle all the negotiations with the seller.

Tony:On that note, the folks who are walking the properties for you, I know you said you maybe split in the assignment fee with them, but what happens if the deal doesn’t close and that’s the risk that they’re willing to take or are you paying them like, “Hey, I’ll pay you per hour.” How does that actually work?

Janelle:If they’re a wholesaler, then they understand the deal. They know exactly what’s going to happen. It might fall through, it might not, is what it is. If it’s somebody that I’m just hiring off of a Facebook group or like TaskRabbit or something, I don’t know. If I’m just hiring a random person to take pictures for me, then I’ll usually pay them a fee. And it’s usually like 75 bucks for just some pictures because it doesn’t take that long. It’s like an hour’s worth of their time. So it shouldn’t be that big of a problem.

Tony:Now, Janelle, I think one of the biggest challenges is when you try and invest remotely for a lot of people, they want to have the warm and fuzzies about these properties before they buy them and they just want to see it. What’s your response to someone who’s in California but you’re investing in the Midwest? Do you not feel the need to see these properties in person beforehand? Or how do you get over that hump of doing that virtually?

Janelle:Yeah, no, I’ve never seen a property I bought remotely first before I bought it. They’ve all been signed unseen and then I may have seen them when I’m just in town. And so that can be kind of scary. My first property that I bought out of state, I was terrified. I’m like, “Did I buy a burn down barn? What did I do? Why did I do this? ” So it’s pretty scary. But now I guess I kind of see them because whenever I have either my realtor or my contractor walk through a property, even a partner wholesaler that we’re working a deal with, they’ll usually FaceTime me in and they’ll point out the problems that they see or that they’re facing or that we have to address or whatever it may be. So they’ll just walk me through it virtually and that’s usually how I see the property.So I’m still able to physically see like, okay, the property that I saw in pictures is the one that my team is walking or whatever to confirm it that way. And then I’ll also just have my team members send me pictures as well, pictures and video after they’re done walking through it, just to make sure that I’m looking at the exact same property they walked through.

Tony:All right. Now a Ricky has the channels, but finding a lead isn’t the same as actually closing a deal. So next up, Janelle’s going to walk us through the actual seller conversation itself. What do you say? How do you anchor on price and what a rookie should do this week with $0 maybe to spend right after this quick ad break? All right guys, welcome back. So we’ve covered what off market means, why it matters and the exact channels that Janelle’s using to find these deals, but now let’s talk about the part that everyone’s really wondering about. How do you actually turn a lead into a locked up deal and what should a brand new Ricky do this week? So Janelle, I want to start with the seller conversation. So walk us through the actual approach. Let’s say I send out a mailer, the phone actually rings, someone’s actually finally calling me back.What the heck do I say? Because I think that’s where most people get nervous is like, okay, they’re calling, but what do I do now to actually capitalize on this deal? So what does your opening line look like?

Janelle:For sure. So when they call in, I usually answer the phone like, “Hello, this is Janelle Purpley Properties.” Or I have somebody on my team do that, really, to be honest with you. I have somebody on my team do that, but then they say, “How can I help you or whatever.” And then they say, “I got a letter from you and it says you’re willing to give me an offer and I want to know what that is. ” That’s usually how it goes or something. They’re usually pretty strong on the phone. They’re like, “Okay, great.” And then they’ll either transfer over to me or my husband, we take that call or book an appointment to call them back. So then when we call them back or get on the phone with them, we let them know like, “Hi, Mr. Seller. I’m Janelle with Purple Lily Properties.We got your phone call and yes, we’d love to make an offer on your property. Can you tell me a little bit more about your property though before I give you an offer?” And then that’s when we dive a little bit deeper into it because when I’m on the phone with a seller before I actually book an appointment and that’s the whole goal of that first conversation is to book an in- person appointment. I’m not the person to do the one call close. I just don’t do that on the phone because I mean, I kind of have in the past once or twice and I didn’t love it because I just personally didn’t feel like I was being truthful because my offer would always change after I walked through the property and I’m like, “I just can’t do that. ” So I always try to get … I look for four things when I’m on the phone with the sellers.They’re called the four pillars. The first thing is their motivation. So why are they being interested in selling? What’s the point? Why are they trying to get this? And you’re usually wanting that motivation so that you can use that also to help you with negotiation. Whether they have a time crunch, they need money for something or they inherited a property that they don’t want, whatever it is, trying to figure that out. Then you’re trying to figure out the condition of the property, like what does it look like? And to try and gauge that because people have just like a different view on what their property looks like. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad. So I usually try to figure it out by asking like, “Have you done any renovations within the last five years? Has the roof been redone? Has the bathrooms, kitchens been redone within the last five years?” Different things like that.And if they tell me no, then I know it probably needs to be at least updated at the very least. So after that, I’m looking at their price. I want to know what price that they have in mind. If they’ve thought about price, I’m just trying to figure that out. Then I’m moving on to timeline. So I want to know how quickly they want to close. How quickly do they want this sale? Do they have time? Are they looking at two to three months to get it sold? Do they need it sold within a week because they’re hitting a foreclosure deadline or whatever it may be? That’s what I’m looking for. So those are the four main things, condition or motivation, condition, price, timeline. And I want to have usually at least two solid answers to those things before I book an appointment because I’ve noticed that if I don’t have at least two of those pillars, then usually they tend to be a little bit more of like tire kickers and don’t really go anywhere and I don’t want to waste my team’s time.So I like to have at least two of those. And then I will constantly build rapport, try to book an in- person appointment and so thank you for this information. I’d love to just take a look at the property and just make sure that the offer I give you is fair. So based on what you’ve told me, it sounds great, but again, I’d just love for my contractor to walk through, my partner to walk through just to make sure I’m not wasting your time with my offer. So when is a good time to meet? Does Thursday morning at 10 work or Friday afternoon at this time work? Always give them options. You don’t want to just say, “What works best for you? ” because then they’ll be like, “Oh, I’ll get back to you, ” and then they never do. So you always want to give them a time.

Ashley:Have you used any of the AI features to actually take some of these calls? I know Recimply has AI call agents. Do you use any of that? I’m sure a lot of other platforms have them too.

Janelle:So I am slowly starting to transition into that. So recently literally just launched this maybe a week ago, like more of an AI type of follow up and so I am slowly transitioning into that. I’ve noticed, and this is like no hate on resimply whatsoever. They’re awesome. I absolutely love them. I’ve used them for years, but whenever a software rolls out something new, there’s usually some bugs and kinks. So I’m just kind of waiting for them to figure that out and just like make sure everything’s good and then slowly transition my entire business model into that. But I am going to start using them specifically for drip campaigns and follow up sequences like that.

Ashley:That was your excuse for waiting on a new MacBook Pro too, right? Sony, you wanted it to roll out for 10 years before

Tony:You. Great. That’s exactly right. Let them work out the kings. But for rookies who are sitting at home and they’re maybe sold now on the idea of going off market to get their first or their next deal, but maybe they’ve got very limited budget, right? Let’s just even say zero. Someone’s sitting at home right now, they love the idea of investing in real estate, but they’ve got zero capital. They want to go lock up a deal, maybe wholesale to generate some capital. What’s the first thing that they should focus on to find an off-market deal?

Janelle:Man, there are honestly a lot of ways to find off-market deals without any marketing budget. So one of those ways is obviously contracting with the wholesaler and working and partnering with the wholesaler. I mean, they’re already doing all the heavy lifting, right? So you can definitely go that route. You can even contact some realtors that have … I usually contact realtors that have fixers currently listed and if they don’t fit my buy box, that’s totally fine and I’ll just let them know like, “Hey, I’m looking for a property similar to this, but this one doesn’t exactly fit my buy box because of X, Y, Z. So could you have anything that would work for me or anything that’s coming up that you know of? ” And just constantly following up with them to see if that lead source hits. And if not, then you can also look on Zillow for the for sale by owners because those are technically off market too.And you know those sellers are interested in selling, right? They have it listed, they just haven’t listed with an agent, but that is still considered an off market deal because it’s just a for sale by owner. And then another easy quick way is still by using Zillow, but you are actually going to look for the properties that are listed for rent instead. So you look for properties that are listed for rent that need some work, need some love. Some of them do, right? They’re not super great and you know that owner has a pain point, right? They have a vacancy and who knows what it took to actually get that property vacant. Maybe they had to go through a terrible eviction, terrible remodel, terrible whatever to get it list ready and they might be a tired landlord. So might as well shoot your shot and ask them if they’d be interested in selling instead of renting out the property.

Tony:I like that aproach of going after the ones that are listed for rent. I’ve actually, I’ve never thought about that. I have folks who are in the short-term rental space who do that where they’ll go after these kind of larger properties that are for rent and then pitch them to, “Hey, if you rent this as a short-term rental, you’ll get X amount.” But I like the idea of going back to those folks because they’re renting because they tried to sell and it couldn’t sell, right? So I like that approach. But I think the last question, Janelle, and this is more so just to level set expectations for folks who want to get into this, how much time … Someone starts today and they say, “I want to get my first off market deal.” How much time should they realistically budget for that to actually happen?If I start today, can I have a deal by next week or is it going to take five years? How much time does it take to get to that first off market deal?

Janelle:Yeah. I mean, you definitely could have it within next week, but you have to be working your tail off to do that. You can’t just be like, “Oh, I’m going to do this for an hour this week and then have a deal by next week.”That’s not how it works. It depends on how much time on a daily or weekly basis that you have to dedicate to this, especially if you’re wanting a wholesale or do something like that. It is very time intensive and that’s why you don’t necessarily need as much money to get started with that. It’s usually a trade off of time or money for stuff like this and investing in real estate. And so I would say if you can have like at least, I would say minimum 10 to 15 hours a week dedicated to this if you can, maybe five, but just know that if you have less time invested, it’s going to take you a little bit longer to find a deal.You will find one if you stay consistent and do these steps, but it’s just going to take a little bit more time. So just keep that in mind.

Ashley:Well, Janelle, thank you so much for joining us today on Real Estate Rookie. Can you let everyone know where they can reach out to you and find out more information about what you are doing in real estate?

Janelle:Yes. So my best platform to reach me is Janelle Invest on Instagram. That’s where I’m most active, I’d say. I’m also on TikTok. Janelle invests the exact same, but I usually answer my Instagram DMs faster than my TikTok DMs. So sorry about that if you are DMing me on TikTok.

Ashley:Well, Janelle, I remember even like years ago watching your TikToks and how creative they were. I love them. Well, thank you so much again for joining us. We really enjoyed having you on the show.

Janelle:Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate it.

Ashley:Thank you guys for listening to Real Estate Rookie. I’m Ashley. He’s Tony and we’ll see you guys on the next episode.