Minnesota Real Estate Investors Association, Inc.

While working with one of my students this week on the FREE Weekly Training Webinar, I received an email with a discouraging attitude about using craigslist. You see, I gave everyone the assignment of creating and digital flyer and posting it on craigslist. The assignment wasn’t meant to generate an immediate lead, while that is what we all want from our craigslist ads, the assignment however was to get them doing something to start the marking process.

Here is her email to me:

Hi Mike, I posted this ad on Craigslist, I put a code where it made the picture fill up the whole page. I got a big fat 0 number of responses. I went with a gloomy appeal. Please let me know if it sucks, as a newbie, I need all the help I can receive.

Here is my response to her: 
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I do a live weekly webinar training for real estate investors from all over the country. The weekly training is designed to help you either get started or get back on track. We have a vast verity of investors on the weekly training call from beginners to seasoned investors and one thing that I have been trying to emphasis on the training calls is that there is no one magical technique for success.

There are common traits and behaviors of successful investors, but they all have their own (sometimes unique) business models and they stick to it. However, in today’s rapidly changing market and economy, even those seasoned investors have been forced to change their strategies recently, myself included. That is why we have been seeing so many seasoned investors looking for answers.

I have been working with everyone to help them understand that one key fundamental to long term success in real estate, or any other business for that matter is the ability to change with the market. The market has changed and so must we.

So I am reaching out to all my fellow investors, new and old to find out what is working for you in your market? In the comments section below, tell us what is working for you, or what you have been doing lately. Then join us on the weekly training calls to continue this discussion on a weekly basis.
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While the government wants us to believe that the recession is over and the economy is heading back in the right direction, all the indicators show something completely different. Housing prices in particular are heading back down in many areas, as I have predicted several times in the past on our weekly training calls.

CNBC even talked about it the other day on their Power Lunch news show.

Jobs are the biggest reason in my opinion. While the Unemployment rate has dropped below 10%, the number of people unemployed is still growing, currently over 17%. The unemployment rate only counts the number of people currently collecting unemployment benefits. It does not count the number of people whose benefits have expired and are still unemployed.
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Approaching your advertising can be a bit of a daunting task, but fortunately there is an old school approach that holds just as true now as it did 100 years ago. The formula for advertising success can be summed up into four little letters AICA (Attention, Interest, Conviction, and Action). It’s not just the 4 elements that are important, but also the order in which they lay.

• Before anything will peak someone’s interest it must first get attention.
• Before anything will convince someone it must be of interest to them first.
• Before anything will cause someone to take action, they must be convinced to do so.

The main point being that when you’re advertising you have 4 steps to walk your prospects through and between those 4 steps there are 3 bridges you must get them to cross once you have their attention.

There’s real beauty in the simplicity of this formula that gives you a great framework to analyze your current marketing as well as formulate new marketing:
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I’m sure by now that every real estate investor surfing the internet for information is well aware that the big 3 (Craigslist, Kijiji, and BackPage) are an essential tool in generating leads online. However, there is a disconnect between knowing and doing and what often stops people is ‘Where do I start?’ Well just starting and only having the idea in your head that you have to post doesn’t really leave much conviction for the poster if they don’t really understand the ‘why?’

Today we’re going to be covering the nuts and bolts of ‘The Big 3’ and laying out a game plan that answers the question ‘Why?’ Keep in mind this is to generate seller leads or to build your buyers list, if you’re posting properties then the recursion trick at the end isn’t going to be a factor since listing a property is time sensitive, as where lead generation is constant throughout your time as a business.
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Ok, ok, I know, flipping has never been illegal, but with recent changes in the mortgage industry, the lenders are coming back around and asking for our help again. Wells Fargo was actually the first major lender to change its stance on seasoning, but because FHA is a government program, this is huge. First, let me give you a little back ground so you understand what the hoopla is all about over FHA temporarily suspending its 90 day title seasoning rule.

Several years ago, when all was right with the world, some investors were taking advantage of a unique situation in the mortgage industry. The federal government wanted everyone to be able to take advantage of the America dream. So they lowered interest rates and loosened up the required mortgage qualification guidelines for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac backed mortgages, including down payments. This actually made it cheaper and easier for people who normally would never have been able to qualify for a mortgage, get one with little or no money down.

These changes actually made it cheaper for a tenant to get a mortgage than it was to rent a property, because they could finance the entire purchase price, including their closing costs. If they were to rent a property, they would at least need the first month’s rent and a security deposit. But if they bought a house, they didn’t need any of their own money up front and their first payment wasn’t due until after they had lived in the property for one month. Plus, with a mortgage, the lender only pulled their credit report, and since most of these tenants never established credit, they didn’t have bad credit. Note that a credit report doesn’t show eviction notices or criminal history, which is where many of these tenants had records.
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May 1, 2003 HUD imposed a 90 Day Title Seasoning requirement for all new FHA loans. This was their big idea to help protect the consumers from the Big Bad Flippers. It only took 6 years and a housing market crash to show the elitists the errors of their ways. Now they need our help to fix their mess.

They finally came to their senses and temporarily suspended title 24 CFR §203.37a(b)(2), which is the 90 Day Title Seasoning Requirement. This is only a temporary suspension. Starting February 1, 2010 and expiring on 1/31/2011, First time Home Buyers who apply for an FHA loan will not have the 90 Day Title Seasoning Requirement. However, we as investors will still need to follow a few guidelines in order to Resell (Flip) our Short Sales / REO’s and Flips to First Time Home Buyers who are applying for an FHA loan.
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Before we get into talking about the role of wholesaling in the world of real estate investing it would be fruitful to look at the real estate investor’s role in the bigger picture. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to say that real estate investors act as a floor for real estate prices, and in a way a recycling center for run down houses. On an economic scale we provide a demand where others aren’t with a particular specialty in renewing property and people. The first natural need a human has is shelter and with so many people in the population the numbers alone will inevitably lead to complications. Where those complications arise, an investor is equipped to step in and create a win-win-win situation to liquefy an otherwise viscous asset.

Real estate investors come in many, many forms, essential a form for each complication and a combination of the sort. Investors work together to create efficiencies to allow investors who have a comparative advantage to focus on those advantages and succeed in flushing out new leads to bring to the real estate investor community. The real battle that investors face is turning sellers and buyers onto the idea of creative financing and alternatives to foreclosure.
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It’s hard to imagine a world where there is no wholesaling. To picture a world where wholesaling doesn’t exist almost seems unfathomable because it is such an essential part of business where the focus is on goods. Though it is nearly impossible to imagine a world without wholesaling, it is still something that is hard to give the appreciation it deserves.

Sure it is easy to refer back to the old common understanding that wholesaling is the matter of buying something and one price and turning around and selling it for more. We can all think of numerous examples of wholesaling outside of real estate and we understand what it is in terms of real estate. However, what lies beneath the surface of this seductively simple definition can provide you with your own set of understandings that will allow you to grow your business in ways others can’t… because they’re not you.

One key to success that I tend to trumpet whenever I get the chance is to apply differentiation to your business and the best way to differentiate is to understand the surrounding roles and factors of your field and where you fit in. Recognizing what you can do and where that fits in to the bigger picture is key!
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In the first two installments of this series we covered how the internet can help supplement your core real estate tasks. However, for real estate investors the internet provides two incredibly helpful roles that every investor should take part in… networking and education! These are essentially two things that the inspired investor can’t ever get enough of.

If you’ve found your way to this blog post you probably have an idea of what the internet can provide as far as education goes, but for those of you who aren’t, this part is for you!

Now one of the most abundant sources of real estate education can be had at your local REIA’s home page which may feature audio of past meetings, replays of past webinars, and archived newsletters with articles galore. This is the information that you want to access first because not only will it be information geared towards real estate, but it’s also geared towards your market as every market is different. This will also expose you to the rest of the resources that are made available by your local REIA (always a good practice).
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