2015 is shaping up to be a sweet year for real estate wholesalers. New inventory, more buyers, and new loan programs are all aligning to make flipping houses a highly profitable endeavor for those that know where to look.

Finding Wholesale Deals

There’s no shortage of wholesale deals out there. If you are coming up short handed check out these four options…

Zombie Foreclosures

It’s no secret that foreclosure activity has been spiking. However, there are still tens of thousands of distressed properties that remain in limbo. In many cases owner – borrowers left years ago believing they had already been foreclosed on. Many are finding out that the bank still hasn’t followed through on repossessing them. That costs money and adds liability. That means a massive pool of properties which aren’t even being marketed for sale. They shouldn’t be too hard to spot. And by tracking down the owner or lender holding the non-performing mortgage debt great win-wins could be struck. And with no competition.

HUD Homes

HUD auctions are still churning out deals. Many have already had some rehab work done to them, and the earnest money requirements are minimal. They can be a great choice for those working with minimal capital.

Foreclosure Hot Spots

While national real estate statistics may mask the reality on the street, there are many counties battling foreclosure as if it was 2008 again. RealtyTrac reports foreclosure particularly high in MD and NV. In some counties around 1 in every 80 units is in some stage of foreclosure. That’s a lot of potential wholesale deals.

Areas Receiving Deferred Investment

There’s a 600 home community on the Delaware shore that is the perfect example of this. According to local custom home builder and renovation firm Turnstone Builders; this 3 mile stretch of beach is now receiving the benefits of a new $63M federal investment. The beach widening project is reportedly doubling local home asking prices from around $500k to $1M. And the project is just beginning.

Why Should Real Estate Wholesalers Care about End Loans?

CT Homes’ JD Esajian of the Flip This House TV show just launched a new two part report on The Number One Financial Threat in America. The report highlights how renting is becoming unsustainable, and how much cheaper it is to buy homes. WA real estate expert Joe Tafolla highlights how thousands of individuals can qualify for no down payment financing, and tens of thousands in down payment grants. Even if they are recently out of foreclosure, bankruptcy, short sale, or have credit scores as low as 640. Many others could find a combination of hard money loans and seller financing the way to get back into homeownership.

This can help wholesalers boost direct sales to retail home buyers for maximum profit, quick flips, while helping to provide affordable housing and reduce the hardship of skyrocketing rents.

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

Real estate wholesalers have become essential to creating more sustainable housing in America. So how have property wholesalers become the key to solving US housing crises. And how can they help make more of a difference?

The Real Definition of Sustainable Housing

In his new book R.J. Martin of Green Homes Hawaii argues that ‘Sustainable’ housing is about more than just LEED certifications. In order to be truly sustainable housing not only needs to be eco-friendly but affordable too.

America is facing a growing affordable housing crisis. The McKinsey Global Institute says that the world is on its way to over 1,600,000,000 individuals that can barely afford housing, or have to live in unsafe housing. That’s on top of all of those already forced out of housing. Affordability is about more than low rents or mortgage payments. Utilities are a big part of overall housing costs too. The new mandatory water restrictions in California show that recent building methods haven’t just been costly, but can no longer be sustained.

Building Better Solutions

Fast Company, 100% Sustainable Home Builder Mesocore, and The McKinsey Institute believe America’s affordable housing crisis can be solved via…

Unlocking property to be redeveloped

Finding more affordable ways to create housing

Improving energy efficiency

Better financing

It is also undeniable that one of the most important components of fixing the current landscape is to recycle the billions of dollars in distressed properties and REOs out there right now. Millions more homes remain vacant than there are homeless people in America. In Charlotte 1 in 4 foreclosures in the first quarter of 2015 were classified as abandoned ‘Zombie Foreclosures’. Wholesalers are key to recycling these homes and putting them to good use. There is a massive amount of this housing stock, and it is more sustainable to use this than develop raw land (in most cases).

DistressedPro just released a new Definitive Guide to Bank Owned Property that breaks down how to find, negotiate, and buy REOs, and reveals the top 10 US banks with REOs right now.

How Important Real Estate Wholesalers Are

Wholesalers are vital to taking this housing and getting it into the hands of homeowners and renters. Most importantly; wholesalers control the flow of this housing.

Wholesalers choose who gets the inventory.

You get to choose who gets to buy it. And in turn what happens to it. Will you just cash out to the first bidder? Or will you build a list of ethical buyers? Buyers that will make green and sustainable improvements and renovations. And if they’ll be tearing down to rebuild; buyers that will build affordable green homes.

Some real estate investors are simply in to make big money. You can make big money, and make a big difference. When you look back on your life’s work wouldn’t it be great to have had a part in helping families, ensuring safe housing for kids, and creating healthy housing? You’ll be responsible for one or the other. You choose. Though handing our children millions of dollars in inheritances may be of little use if the environment is a wreck and housing hasn’t been fixed.

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

How can you consistently make $96k per week wholesaling houses?

How can investors scale to this level of income faster, and without having to work on their wholesaling businesses more than a few hours a week? How can they do it sustainably?

Automating Your Real Estate Wholesaling Business

A new video blog episode from San Diego based Todd Toback reveals his secret to banking $96,000 in a week, from just 4 real estate deals.

Some wholesaler might already be making 10x this amount per month. But no matter what you are now, and where you want to go with your wholesaling business, keeping up this type of deal flow requires doing things differently to the average Joe.

While Todd may certainly have plenty of talent, and experience in wholesaling. The wisdom he is most keen to share is that his greatest success has come when empowering his team to do their best work. “Hire great, get out of their way.”

This is more than simply delegating. And far different than micro-managing.

Empower, trust, and let them go to work. The results might surprise you.

Todd says that his team brought together almost $100k in profit from wholesale deals in a week. Just by letting them do their thing. Do automate. Do create systems. But then get out of the way, and let it work.

4 Tips for Building Your Wholesaling Dream Team

Hire the Best

Those real estate businesses with the best talent will come out on top. Period.

Invest in Building Team Relationships

If you want loyalty, hyper-productivity, and awesome results for your team – invest in the relationship. The real estate industry is booming and good talent has plenty of options. Internal relations are as critical as external ones. Probably more so. These are the people that will generate the most leads for you, and turn those leads into dollars.

Not everyone wants to have regular meetings, or team cheer parties. Especially in this remote working era. However, empowering them to their best work, showing appreciation, being a reliable client-employer that pays promptly and provides consistent work, and enabling them to be a part of something bigger can all go a long way.

Leverage Your Team’s Word of Mouth Power

Bestselling author and revered marketer Seth Godin says most brands and independent professionals completely miss the boat when it comes to word of mouth. He says that referrals don’t happen because the individuals and organizations we hope to share just don’t have the motivation. And that those hoping for referrals aren’t putting enough thought into providing the right motivation and environment to foster more personal referrals.

Word of mouth marketing is some of the best. Yet, too many wholesalers fail to enroll even those closest to them, and those that have the most to benefit – their own teams. They should be sharing, and they should be motivated to make it a success - if they are proud of the work you are empowering them to do, and they are confident in your intentions and ability to serve their referrals well.

Never Let Them Go

Once you have found great talent, never let them go!

Summing it Up…

Refuse to give up. Wholesaling houses isn’t hard. Especially with the current market; inventory availability, appreciation, and best transactional funding. But, it can be lonely. It can be easy to be distracted, when you try to do it alone.

If you want to go fast at the beginning, it’s okay to go alone. But if you want to go far - go together. “Teamwork makes the dream work.”

 

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

The real estate landscape is changing fast. Beyond the mechanics of wholesaling houses for high profits investors need to know how emerging trends and some of the finer quirks of the industry can impact profitability.

Throwing out offers in mass with confidence is relatively easy for property wholesalers with the best transactional funding lined up to fund all of their deals. On the flip side, while there are still some properties rotting on the market, many areas are seeing homes being snapped up in minutes, often before they can even be put online. However, there are some emerging quirks of the market which it is wise for serious wholesalers to be tuned into.

Some of these have the potential to stick wholesalers with properties they can’t turn over as quickly as they thought. Others can help investors stay away from snags and take the lead in the boom ahead…

New Construction Isn’t Perfect

As some find publicly marketed inventory tightening or more competitive, more investors are considering the lure of new construction properties. As Delaware custom home builder Turnstone Builders recently blew wide open in an ultra-transparent blog post – new construction can be far from perfect. It can be riddled with contaminated land, faulty structures, and more. Don’t fall for looks or the promise of new always being better without a warranty and some due diligence.

It’s Cheap for a Reason

The incredibly low prices real estate has traded for since the crisis has helped thousands of new investors get into the market. With properties going for under $10k a pop, they became accessible for everyone, while those with good credit can put houses on their cards as easy as buying lunch. However, as with most things in life; cheaper isn’t always better. There’s a reason properties have sold for $100, $5,000, and $10,000 in areas like Detroit. Some also might question the math of purchasing properties and then putting double the purchase price into them in rehab money. Deals mean undervalued properties, or at least fair priced homes that may be worth more to others; it has nothing to do with the dollar price tag.

Responsible Products

Unfortunately the real estate industry seems to foster the temptation to throw ethics to the wind in exchange for more deal flow and more cash. It often starts slow, with one toe into the grey area, and then bam! In the real estate industry this has often turned into rationalizing selling bad product. This might be poisoned land, homes with mold, old meth labs, or even homes with Chinese drywall. You wouldn’t appreciate someone selling you a dangerous car that you plan to drive your kids around in, or faulty toys that can be lethal. So why sell on homes that can be even more dangerous? If in doubt throw the file out. If you don’t, at least know that investors and home buyers are better educated than ever, and sooner or later it will comeback, even if you resell these homes.

Property Rights Wars

Property rights is the new frontier of real estate. The highest paid lawyers in the country are moving into this niche to help affluent property owners and the public preserve views and space. Eminent domain activity is also heating up. This is perhaps most noticeable in South Florida, along the planned route for the Keystone XL pipeline, and California’s new rail line. For some investors property in the path of eminent domain can turn out to be incredibly profitable. In other cases it can mean big losses. It all depends when you buy it, and for how much.

Forward Thinking Buyers

Home buyers, including end investors are thinking further forward than they used too. They may not verbalize these considerations, but there are factors they are looking at, and which unless addressed could become barriers to resale. On the other hand those wholesalers than pay attention and get ahead of the objections could find a new sweet spot. The most intelligent and serious buyers today are taking into consideration factors like rising sea levels, length of functional use, and long term performance. If your end buyers are long term hold income property investors or high net worth home buyers you might want to keep this in mind when searching out new areas and making offers.

Privacy

Mark Zuckerberg’s real estate woes in California have highlighted the desire for privacy many luxury buyers are seeking today. They don’t just want large lots and homes, they want a nice cushion to keep the paparazzi away too. How can you help serve up more of what they want than the competition can?

Sustainability

Although industry organizations like the CCIM Institute have proclaimed that green building has now become mainstream, and buyers want it, the online real estate landscape still appears to be very thin when it comes to searching for and finding green homes and lodging. How can you incorporate this into your strategy?

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

Where are the best cities and neighborhoods for real estate wholesalers to live in 2015?

A recent thread on popular online real estate forum Bigger Pockets raised the question of why investors choose to live where they do (if they do), and why?

Top Cities, Myths, and the New Economic Landscape

There are a variety of indicators to follow for property wholesalers that are considering relocating. This might include where the cheapest homes in the US are, following the claims that the massive pool of today’s millennial buyers are flocking to dense urban living, or tracking the markets that check all the boxes of what home buyers say they really want in a home today. Then there is the question of whether real estate investors should relocate to destinations that appear to promise more growth. For example; RealtyTrac’s nod to Jacksonville, FL or San Francisco, CA for the largest house flipping profits and spreads. Or to NJ where RealtyTrac reported the highest percentage of foreclosures at the beginning of 2015.

We have lists like this from RIS Media laying out the ‘Best US Markets for Buying Residential Rental Property’, and Forbes’ list of ‘America’s Fastest Growing Cities 2015’. There are also lists of cities for hot jobs, though as we’ve seen with the recent oil price crisis; trenches of the country relying on a single industry can boom and bust fast.

So where should wholesalers live?

What Wholesalers Do & Don’t Need in a New Home

Do real estate wholesalers need to be in the midst of high distress cities and neighborhoods, or in the pockets that are favorite with VC money, and where mortgage lenders prefer lending?

Being in the middle of the action, and where the money is can have its perks. However, technology has also made it possible for real estate wholesalers to operate completely independent of location. If you’ve got internet and a decent cell phone signal you can flip houses from anywhere.

So as tech continues to develop and internet gets faster the best places for property investors to live might be where they do their best work, and enjoy the lifestyle the most.

For some this might mean a city center condo for doing business during the week and then retreating to a rural estate for the weekend. Others might set up in the burbs where the weather is better year round and living costs are lower thanks to cheaper real estate and tax breaks. This could make inspirational cities like NYC, new tax havens like Puerto Rico, and vibrant sunny escapes like South Florida standout.

Where will you move?

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

What’s the best way for real estate wholesalers and new websites to start blogging for great results?

Every real estate wholesaler, investor, CEO, and marketing manager knows that having a blog is essential. In fact, the blog has truly become the heart of the real estate business. A weak heart isn’t going to be pumping the healthy life giving blood, leads and dollars through the organization that a stronger one would. So what’s the best way to approach real estate blogging?

The biggest dilemma wholesalers face today is deciding how much to publish, and how much to invest in their blogs. Outsourcing blog writing continues to be the way to go, but costs of hiring great real estate content writers has risen. So how can investors find the right balance in cost and volume versus ROI?

The first step is successfully navigating this is recognizing the value and importance of real estate blogging, and how profitable it can be. A new interactive infographic from contently shows that the average flat rate cost per article for digital media in 2015 is $207. This surely beats the average for print articles at $384, but can seem daunting for some young startups on a tight budget. This data further digs in and shows that content mills that spin junk content average just $25 on average for articles, versus retaining professional freelance real estate writers or a brand journalist which might run around $230 dollars per piece on average. Fortunately; there are great deals on content and writers in between this range via both oDesk and Titanium Quill.

Still; look at it like this – if the average real estate blog post yielded 128 visitors and cost $320, that’s the equivalent of paying $2.50 per click via Adwords PPC. Most real estate sites pay as much as $25 per click for good clicks, or more. Or it would be the worth $3,200 in Adword leads. That’s a steal no matter how you do the math. If you pay $100, of $50 for a great blog post the ROI is going to be 3 to 6 times higher.

The second key factor here is remembering that will all the advice columns keep harping on about volume of blogging; consistency and quality is more important. It’s better to produce one awesome piece per week consistently, than seven weak pieces that will only get your real estate website penalized by Google, and turn off visitors and prospects.

Once you begin closing deals you can scale.

For those being extremely cautious with their real estate marketing and branding budgets consider a test. A viable test should at least consist of 2- 6 months of blogging at least once per week. Do that and compare your results to other channels and then recalibrate. So select a publishing schedule and cost structure that you can afford to blog once a week for at least 8 weeks.

Related: 7 Small Ways to Generate Serious Wholesaling Lead Volume

Quick Tips for Maximizing Your Budget & Blogging Results:

Don’t neglect keywords and SEO

Share each post via social

Reach out directly to others and get them to share your content

Email your contacts to notify them of each post

 

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

Why are savvy real estate pros sticking to this investment property loan?

Over the last couple of years we’ve seen investment property lenders and loan programs expand. Over time they should continue to soften requirements for retail buyers and higher LTVs ought to make it easier for investors to scale more quickly. However, many of the most experienced appear to be sticking with transactional funding. Why?

Separation From Personal Finances

Those that are really serious about investing and long term success know the advantages of separating business and investment income and assets from their personal every day ones. This can help insure income and preserve wealth when issues arise. Lenders like Best Transaction Funding will fund your business entity to facilitate this extra layer of protection.

You Don’t Need to Have Perfect Credit

Few came through the recent crises with their credit unscathed. This doesn’t mean that they aren’t normally responsible financially, or aren’t good borrowers. Most lenders and banks can’t overcome their broken systems to make common sense loans, even though Q4 2014 data shows the national average FICO score remains in the low 600s range. Transactional funding generally doesn’t have any credit score requirements, and can be exactly what new and returning real estate investors need to get going.

100% Financing

Best Transaction Funding provides 100% financing for flipping houses. In fact, some are even able to finance in their closing costs for zero down deals and instant profits. With easy qualifying it’s really a no-brainer, and it sure beats investors trying to be overly creative and landing themselves in jail due to real estate fraud in an effort to get mortgage loans they shouldn’t.

Checks the Boxes of Golden Investment Principles

Transactional funding checks the boxes when it comes to sticking to several of the most important real estate investment principles. Perhaps above all it helps investors ensure they don’t deviate from making their money when they buy. Sticking to wholesaling in this manner they are virtually guaranteed a profit before they close.

No Long Term Debt

Building on the above; it means not taking on long term debt. While this may be a ripe time to scale and leverage, those that survived the recent downturn know not to fall for the trap of leveraging themselves up to the eyeballs.

Related: 4 Unique Advantages of Wholesaling Houses

Speed

One real estate startup recently claimed to be launching on the ‘uniqueness’ of being able to close mortgage loans in just 20 days. While that may be faster than some conventional banks right now, it’s still very lengthy. At least compared to this type of funding which can put cash in investors’ hands in as little as 3 days.

Reducing Liability

In addition to the separation of ‘business’ and personal interests, transaction funding reduces liability by keeping investors liquid, and enabling them to scale without depleting cash reserves. It can also help in negotiations and when there are hiccups with closings. This can be just as powerful as the benefits in making more gains.

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

What are the easiest, highest ROI ways to generate leads for real estate wholesalers?

Even though wholesalers have BIG goals, sometimes they only have the bandwidth for taking small steps in lead generation. New real estate investors can often find lead generation intimidating when they don’t have the time and cash to launch glitzy marketing campaigns, and are trying to break in to wholesaling while juggling a full time job or two. Even highly successful real estate investors sometimes run into cash crunches. Still, even when you have a sizable budget and plenty of spare time it still makes sense to demand the maximum ROI from everything you do.

Here are seven small, affordable real estate lead generation strategies that everyone can do:

Send Cards

Even if your marketing budget is virtually non-existent you can always find the time to send out a few pieces of mail each week. There are ‘yellow letters’, postcards, jumbo postcards, bi-fold and tri-fold brochures, and more. However, it doesn’t even have to be this complex. Simple thank you, holiday, and personal cards and letters can go a long way too. They don’t even have to be designed as sales pitches, as much as keeping in touch, and staying at the front of mind when people need your services.

Read: Smart Valentine’s Day Marketing for Real Estate Investors

Casual Networking

Wherever you live there is likely many nearby formal networking gatherings every quarter. However, there are also many ways to network directly with consumers and other professionals in a warmer and productive way while enjoying life a little more. This can be as simple as grabbing a round of golf together, hanging out at the yacht club, going for dinner, or hosting a BBQ on the weekends. Surprisingly you may find this is one of the best ways to generate leads.

Cruising Your Farm Area

We’ve all heard of driving through target neighborhoods and knocking on doors, but there are other ways to accomplish this too. In waterfront areas literally cruising in your boat might bring more connections. Or how about getting out of your vehicle and making it easier to spark natural interactions? Walk your dog, run, or dine in your target neighborhood every week.

Email Autoresponders

Email is still almost as close to free real estate marketing as you can get. It’s also one of the most effective for making sure every contact and lead you make eventually turns into a real deal. Whether designed as an email course, saying “Hi” a few times a year, or providing valuable alerts on local home values; everyone has time to pop a handful of emails into a system that will continue marketing for them even while they are sleeping, travelling, or working another job. If you don’t feel like a great writer, hire a freelance writer to craft them for you.

Related: Best Transaction Funding Reviews Trulia’s 2015 Marketing Plan

Show You Are Interested First

John Corcoran of Smart Business Revolution highlights that one of the best ways to build rapport and connect with power contacts is to show you are interested and are invested in what they care about first. This might be sending them referrals, buying something from them first, subscribing to their blog or social feeds, or donating to a cause they are.

Provide Broader and Longer Service

It’s crazy to see how so many wholesalers allow their offers to be shot down because they aren’t helping with the one main factor sellers care about the most, and how contacts are churned and burned, instead of being nurtured and multiplied into boat loads of warm real estate leads. Ironically it doesn’t even have to cost you a dime to do better in this area.

Expand your services, or bundle them to offer more value, and stay at the top of mind forever. Don’t just help motivated sellers get out of their homes. They might have to, but what they want and need is somewhere new to live! On the other side buyers need various services when moving in or fixing and reselling. Show you are invested in their long term success and keep following up. Partner with other professionals and companies that provide moving services, rentals, contractor services, financial planning, mortgage financing. They want the leads and your contacts need their help. In turn you’ll find loyalty, repeat business, and referrals.

Blog

Start or re-start a real estate blog, and blog every day.

Like this? Discover 6 Easy Ways to Spark Lead Generation here…

 

Authored by Best Transaction Funding BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

Few real estate investors love taxes, especially wholesalers pulling in large lump sums of cash. So how is it that savvy real estate wholesalers can effectively turn this factor which creates so much fear among others into one of their top performing areas of profit?

The Awesome Tax Benefits of Real Estate

Operating a real estate investment business offers plenty of tax breaks, as does direct investment in real estate. With the help of a good accountant, and smart tax planning wholesalers could well find they are paying a fraction of the income taxes of those making 10% of what they are each year.

Tax Free, Compounded Returns

Self-directed IRAs offer real estate investors tax deferred, and tax free returns. That mean the additional boost and high cash on cash returns of that extra net investment capital year after year. There are few real estate wholesalers that are going to be in anything less than a 25% income tax bracket. Many will be pushing 50%. A self-directed IRA can then deliver the equivalent of a 25% plus bump to net profits and gains.

Accept Real Estate Donations

Some real estate companies have found a way to leverage in-kind donations of property. For those still undervalued, or with properties they can’t afford to move, they could donate them and enjoy sizable tax breaks, while the receiving entity enjoys acquiring real estate at deeply discounted prices.

Catch the Windfall of Tax Rebate Cash

No matter how much money tax filers receive in their rebate checks this year you can bet they’d like more next year. Billions of dollars are going to be floating around in the next few months. That can be blown on frivolous retail items and entertainment, or invested in real estate. Those getting rebates can use that money to buy homes, set up self-directed IRAs, and invest in income properties. That is all business for real estate wholesalers that put themselves in the right position.

Catch the Windfall of Referrals

Consider working with tax preparers and accountants to gain more referrals. From December through April they are looking for strategic referral partners, and are spending a lot on advertising. Help them add value to clients and refer them business, they’ll send you deals and investors with cash.

Authored by Best Transaction Funding

BestTransactionFunding.com is the leading source of transactional funding and hard money loans for real estate wholesalers in the US, where 100% financing, and saying “Yes” is what we love doing all day long.

Where can you find the investment property financing you need to fund your real estate deals fast?

While consumer mortgage credit can still be tough to find for regular homeowners there are an increasing number of options for investment property financing. Here’s a quick break down of where real estate investors can find the funding they need for their deals…

Transactional Funding for Wholesaling Properties

For those real estate investors needing to close fast, and who are serious about wholesaling properties with the least risk, for the maximum returns, Transactional Funding is absolutely the answer. Best Transaction Funding offers rapid 100% financing that checks all the boxes for wholesalers.

Hard Money Loans

While transactional funding may be the most appealing option for savvy real estate investors today there are scenarios in which slightly longer holds may be justified. Perhaps there are appetizing must-have deals you just can’t pass up on but don’t have an end buyer for yet. Maybe there are substantial profits to be had from taking few months to fix and flip, or bring a property to performing before reselling or refinancing. In this case hard money loans can provide easy qualifying and fast funding. Yes, we do hard money too, just ask.

Bulk Portfolio Financing

Commercial mortgage lenders have opened up the doors for for bulk income property portfolios acquisitions and refinancing. Some provide non-recourse loans, foreign investors financing and even stated income options. Some of these new lenders include B2R Finance, FirstKey Lending, and Rental Home Financing.

Government Backed Loans

Investors acquiring new personal residences might find FHA, VA, and USDA government backed home loans the best way to go for low and no down payment mortgage loans. They can also be great resources for investors to refer their retail buyer clients to. Local governments also offer a broad array of assistance programs, including well into six figures helping buyers with down payments in high cost areas.

Real Estate Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding can be great for filling in the gaps and launching new developments. However, as the space grows increasingly crowded real estate crowdfunders need to be aware that successful fundraising through this medium can require extensive strategy, marketing, time, and budget.

What does an effective email auto-responder series look like for real estate wholesalers?

Having a real estate wholesaling website and strong opt-in magnet is great. However, all savvy marketers know that it can take several touches to convert new prospects, and especially in the world of flipping houses it can take recurring outreach to connect the right deals with your buyers list. So what do successful email campaigns and auto-responders look like for property wholesalers?

Right Expectations

Success in email auto-responders, and avoiding complaints and wasted time requires building a list with synergy, and setting the right expectations. Your opt-in needs to be relevant to what you’ll be emailing them about on a regular basis. Be transparent. Let them know if they should expect instant updates when you post a new real estate blog, weekly updates on new wholesale property deals, or something else.

Style and Design

There is no single right answer about what your emails should look like. The best look is really about who your list is made up of, and your branding. If you are simply messaging personal contacts and have a basic real estate website then a personal looking, plain text email message can be the perfect fit. In contrast; if you have a high profile luxury brand, in a high end market with a very design conscious database it may be wise to include visuals. New templates from AWeber and other email services can help wholesalers craft emails which mimic their website pages for a seamless user experience.

Content (What to Email)

What should you be emailing to your list? What you promised. It can be quarterly newsletters, daily real estate wholesaling blog posts, an email training series, or notifications whenever new wholesale deals come on board. There can be occasions to deviate such as holiday wishes and notable product or service changes, but don’t stray too far from what they are anticipating, or they’ll turn off, doom you to the spam folder, and cause issues with your email provider, regardless of how much value you think you are adding.

Length

Email auto-responders should never really end. Messaging should be ongoing once a name is added to the list. To get started new real estate wholesalers may want to launch with a set of 4 to 7 emails and then invest in more as their list takes off.

Length of individual emails can vary. Some of the most effective are just a line or two. At the same time, some very successful bloggers and email marketing experts claim that extremely long emails (running into multiple pages) have performed the best. Think about who is receiving them, why they want them, and what action you want. If it is clicks to site then make that as easy as possible.

Calls to Action

Don’t forget your calls to action. Use multiple links, social icons and URLs and your phone number if you want to generate live calls.

Want More?

Want more tips like this in your inbox? How about hot news on new investor funding for wholesalers form Best Transaction Funding? Use the link at the top of the blog post to subscribe to weekly blog updates for wholesalers and get notified first when we roll out new funding programs…

Can wholesaling houses be used to build passive income?

Is Wholesaling Really Real Estate Investing?

While real estate wholesaling is the only way many investors ever want to engage the market there are those that frequently forego the benefits in search of passive income investments. Some investors are taught by rental property gurus that buy and hold income properties are the only way to achieve passive income. Some have even been programmed to the point of proclaiming that wholesaling isn’t even real estate investing.

However, savvy individuals continue to see incredible investment returns from wholesaling houses. Many would never consider giving it up for lessor ROI, or inferior amounts of income.

While some property wholesalers may request quite modest returns, others have been earning an average of $45 to $100k per house flipped according to RealtyTrac.

Then total up how much more wholesalers make with multiple flips each month and year, and the compounding returns this creates. Ice this with the dramatically reduced risk wholesalers enjoy and it’s easy to see who is making the most money.

But Wholesaling Houses Doesn’t Produce Passive Income, Right?

More money is always great, but some are still adamant that in contrast to being a rental home landlord, wholesaling doesn’t produce passive income. Or does it?

For a start, anyone that has handle rentals as a DIY landlord knows that this is anything but a truly passive income source. Plus, it brings more hours, risk, and prevents location independence.

But you have to keep finding houses to wholesale right? Yes, but as a buy and hold rental property investor you have to keep finding new acquisitions, tenants, and worry about fixing properties and daily management and maintenance. Which is less work?

Besides the ROI and reduced time and risk in wholesaling property, there are also actually a number of ways streamline the process and generate passive income.

Creating Your Wholesale Cash Machine

Real estate investors can now efficiently leverage help through outsourcing platforms like oDesk.com to build a team. These assistants as well as other strategic partners can be leveraged for consistent streams of deals, and end buyers.

Investors that keep themselves out of the day to day hands on, and act as true business owners, or investors can then enjoy passive income proceeds. Real estate moguls like Sensei Gilliland of Black Belt Investors have even designed systems for this like The Ultimate Real Estate Cash Machine.

So with systems that auto feed in fresh deals, a good marketing system, and a strong buyers list passive income can be gained from real estate wholesaling. In fact, it is pretty easy to argue that this is a far more passive investment plan than being a landlord. With access to unlimited cash for funding deals from Best Transaction Funding there is really no limit on volume either.

Wholesaling houses has many obvious advantages. It also offers some unique and very powerful benefits many real estate investors at least seriously underestimate, if not completely overlook.

So what are these advantages of wholesaling compared to rentals or fixing and flipping houses?

1. Eliminating Disputes with Neighbors

When rehabbing homes to flip or hold as rentals neighbors can generate significant stress and become obstacles. Regardless of how well investors try to select tenants when holding properties, crazy and ignorant neighbors can cause all types of bizarre disputes which can lead to losses of income, property damage and more. Even in high end neighborhoods landlords can face the likes of Justin Bieber moving in next door and causing tens of thousands of dollars in damage by hurling objects at your investment property. This can all be avoided with wholesaling.

2. Compounding Gains Faster

Even the best rental homes, high performance mortgage notes, and rehabbing can mean sluggish returns compared to wholesaling. Not only can property wholesalers put down less money, which dramatically boosts cash on cash returns, but with lump sum gains being able to be reinvested and flipped multiple times per month on an exponentially growing basis that annual and lifetime returns on wholesaling can seriously put other investment strategies to shame.

3. Eliminating Holding Risks

Even house flippers fixing up and reselling properties in a period of weeks or months face major exposure to risk. From hurricanes and earthquakes to value dips due to neighboring foreclosures every hour properties are held means weathering a barrage of threats. Insurance is one of the necessary evils, but talk to a handful of residents in areas hard hit by hurricane Sandy or in storm prone South Florida and you’ll no doubt hear plenty of nightmare stories about how insurance companies fail to deliver.

4. Easy Access to 100% Financing

One of the really beautiful benefits of wholesaling houses as a real estate is easy and streamlined access to working capital and 100% financing. Via Best Transaction Funding wholesalers can finance their whole deals without asset verification, having great credit scores, or even having another job.

Will a new stock market, tech industry crash help or hurt real estate wholesalers?

Inman News has been in a flap since the stock market started to tumble last week. Whether a mere blip or the beginning of a new apocalypse it’s worth asking how another major deflation in the stock market and tech industry will impact real estate.

It’s coming. Whether it is now or a couple years from now analysts having been proclaiming the stock market is at least 60% over valued for a while, and the tech world is ready for its own shake up. So what effects are we already seeing, and what will the outcome of a bubble bursting look like?

While super hero day traders following a wholesaling style strategy might be hit less hard than Warren Buffett’s buy and hold followers or VCs betting on a wide spread of startups, or big elephants like Zillow which don’t have any net profit to prop up their valuations, there will be some major shifts for all.

This compares to the bulk of housing market which Trulia claims is still vastly undervalued. Inman notes that the market has immediately reacted to recent fluctuations by driving down mortgage interest rates, and spurring a spike in refinance applications.

Many real estate professionals and companies might be glad for a tech slow down. A little slower pace of innovation and a sucker punch to Zillow will not only mean more money coming to real estate, but a chance to catch up, and improve on the basics versus worrying about keeping up with next year’s tech changes.

A turn down in tech and stocks invariably creates more interest and need to invest in real estate. This comes in various forms from up sizing houses, and increasing direct investment, and more money put into mortgage markets. It will also drive more selling off of houses and real estate in some areas where owners have lost big in the stock market and tech companies.

The great news is that wholesaling real estate still works in all of these conditions and markets and is fueled by them. It creates great opportunities to help those needing to sell fast, and serve the others scaling up their buying activity. Fortunately, with access to plentiful capital from Best Transaction Funding wholesalers are only really limited in maximizing these opportunities by their own goal setting.

Which is the better type of financing for real estate investors today; transactional funding or hard money loans?

Are hard money lenders still relevant? Why might some property wholesalers opt for hard money loans even though they have been using transactional funding successfully day in and out for years?

New Hard Money Loans, New Applications

Hard money has changed a bit over the last two decades. The application process is a little different, and new regulations have made hard money loans slightly more challenging than they used to be. However, hard money mortgages are still the easiest mortgage loans to obtain and continue to be an essential tool for all types of real estate investors.

It was recently revealed that former fed chairman Ben Bernanke hasn’t even been able to refinance his own home despite being able to earn $250k in less than an hour for speaking engagements, and has a signed book deal. So clearly equity based lending like hard money remains absolutely invaluable in the market, for an even wider base of borrowers and buyers, and will continue to.

While hard money can still be used for flipping houses as in the early 2000s and before, prior to transactional funding making it to the mainstream, there are also new applications and reasons to use these loans.

This includes:

• Fixing and flipping houses
• Releasing pent up equity
• Speeding up property acquisitions
• Less paperwork
• When investors can’t pass up on a great deal but don’t have enough liquid cash or an end buyer in place yet
• Buying time to get properties performing again, to obtain better long term financing or resell at even higher prices and profit margins

The Advantages of Transactional Funding

When hard money lenders exited the industry as the market began to fall apart in 2006 lenders like Best Transaction Funding stepped up, and into the market to serve real estate investors in their greatest time of need.

Previously this type of financing was only available to a few very privileged real estate investors. Yet, instead of shrinking or tightening up guidelines transactional funding became one of the best, and virtually only ways to fund wholesale property deals.

Transactional funding does a lot of what hard money used to do, and private money has done with, but with organized transactional lenders offering ease, systematization, and scale for real estate wholesalers serious about scaling to substantial volumes of business.

It couldn’t be easier to use. Find your property, circulate the deal to your list, close with 100% of someone else’ cash, get paid, and repeat.

Transactional funding offers far easier qualifying, lower overall borrowing costs, and is great when you don’t want to deal with the additional paperwork and time of hard money.

Still, both forms of real estate investor financing are absolutely critical, essential and beneficial for investors at different times.

There now seem to be dozens of hard money lenders trying to force their cash on real estate investors every day. So why aren’t the most experienced investors biting on the offers?

Whether it is email, social media sites like LinkedIn, or online real estate forums like Bigger Pockets hard money guys seem to be everywhere, aggressively offering their cash. More and more are popping up, and are offering higher LTVs, with fewer requirements.

This is great for the overall market, and hard money has been a crucial crutch for investors for several decades. Even though many left, or essentially turned to conventional underwriting practices when wholesalers and rehabbers needed them most, there are good hard money lenders out there, and those that can add value, and be invaluable in the process.

Five reasons veteran real estate investors aren’t buying in:

Unattractive terms

Trouble separating the opportunists looking to skim deals versus real lenders

Investment strategies have changed

Access to cheaper long term money elsewhere

They’ve discovered transactional funding

Choosing the right type of funding for your real estate investment strategy

Wholesaling with the best transactional funding means just getting in out and paid for sure versus being locked into high rates, with high exit costs, high risk, and no guarantees.

On the other end, buy and hold investors are flush with cash, or have access to far cheaper private money form investors looking for long term yields. In markets like Miami, cash buyers accounted for over 40% of transaction in mid-2014, with almost 70% of foreign buyers paying all cash.

For those simply looking to flip instantly for fast cash and wholesale properties in 1-3 days keep Best Transaction Funding bookmarked in your internet browser and ask about our Proof of Funds to facilitate making more offers.

However, hard money still has its place and uses.

When to use hard money lenders

When refinancing to access and release pent up equity

For rehab projects and fixing and flipping houses

To capitalize on attractive investment opportunities when an end buyer is not yet in place

For taking non-performing assets to performing before resale for maximum profits, or securing lower rate long term financing

How hard money lenders can better serve the investment community

By providing faster approvals

Offering streamlined processes with less hassle and hoops

Developing a reputation for actually funding deals

Working relationships for scaling repeat and referral business

How can real estate wholesalers find simple ways to give back, pay it forward and make a difference every day?

Inman News just ran a feature on how real estate professionals are eager to give back, but often find it difficult to do it effectively and consistently.

Socially minded, caring real estate investors don’t want to give just to make themselves look good. They are often fearful of giving to the wrong charity that soaks too much in admin costs. It may not be practical for many to give away entire homes. And who isn’t crazy busy wholesaling houses today?

So how can wholesalers give more, fast, efficiently, and consistently?

Here are 7 tips from your Best Transaction Funding Lender:

1. Keep Cash with You

While no investor may enjoy being harassed by those with no intention of using handouts for anything worthwhile, it feels really bad when you do come across someone in need and all you’ve got is plastic in your wallet. Alternatively, consider stocking up on Wal-Mart or restaurant gift cards to giveaway.

2. Random Acts of Kindness to Neighbors

Wholesalers might be in and out fast, but their work can be stressful to neighbors worried about what is happening to their home’s value. Step out, or step back to the days when people brought gifts to their neighbors.

3. Put Someone Up for a Night

Okay, maybe not in your own home. But perhaps you have empty properties, or a cheap hostel nearby. In many areas there are no homeless shelters. You may even benefit from offering temporary housing while flipping a property to actually discourage unfriendly squatters, and vandalism.

4. Publish a Directory of Local Assistance Programs

Publish a directory of local assistance programs, put it on your real estate website, and print copies to give out. Sometimes all people need is to be made aware of available help for paying utilities, finding an apartment and putting up a deposit, getting fed, or access to the internet, shower and a change of clothes for finding a job.

5. Set Recurring Donations to 100% Pass-Through Nonprofits

More non-profits like charity: water which pioneered a 100% model which gives all donations right to aid are coming along. Set up a recurring donation, and put giving back on autopilot.

6. Amazon Smile

Amazon just rolled out its own solution for charitable giving on autopilot. Now by using the Smile.Amazon.com domain every time you shop on Amazon for real estate books, or supplies a percentage can automatically be given to one of your favorite designated charities like The Wounded Warrior Project.

7. California Charity Expo

Realty 411 Magazine just announced a November Charity Expo. Promoters are funding the event themselves so that 100% of VIP ticket sales can go right to feeding the hungry in LA.

New data highlights massive pool of wholesale properties available for investing…

While the US housing market has rebounded quickly, many real estate investors continue to seriously underestimate the amount of house deals available to them for flipping for quick, and sizable profits.

New real estate statistics firmly buck the media spin suggesting it is hard to find value and foreclosure properties in the US in the second half of 2014.

While thousands of American homeowners have been lifted above water thanks to rapidly rising home values and equity, millions more remain in distressed situations. 9,100,000 remain underwater according to the latest numbers.

Per figures from RealtyTrac over a third of Nevada homeowners still owe at least 25% more on their homes than they are valued at (even values are going up daily). This is only topped by one central Florida city.

Unsurprisingly Nevada remains one of the top 5 states for foreclosures in the US. The other top 4 states for foreclosure activity include; FL, MD, NJ, and IL.

RealtyTrac’s VP says the time it is taking lenders to foreclosure in Nevada has actually risen as of June 2014. It now takes 494 days to foreclose on average, versus just 420 days in 2013. That means many more foreclosure homes coming down the pipe.

In fact, the Las Vegas Review Journal reports NV foreclosure starts rose 56% year over year, and 66% month over month to June 2014. This puts 1 in every 138 homes in NV in the default process. Twice as many Florida homeowners in currently in foreclosure.

Still, home builders don’t appear to be fazed and are still rolling out new projects. The market is heading up, and great times for real estate investors are ahead. However, there are still millions of great opportunities now, for taking advantage of spreads, and rapidly rising home prices. It is just a matter of honing in on the best locations.

Armed with fast cash from Best Transaction Funding real estate wholesalers should find no limits on deal volume, expect what they can personally handle.

Are mortgage note investors now one of the best sources of house deals for real estate wholesalers?

Current market conditions are ideal for real estate wholesalers. Some real estate investors of course have been complaining about the decline of foreclosure homes and publicly available inventory, as well as the rapid rise in home prices in their local areas. So where can more deals be found? Could note investors be the gatekeeper to a new sweet spot, and source of discounted homes for flipping?

It’s no secret that banks and asset managers have both delayed starting the foreclosure process on thousands of delinquent home loans, and have continued to hold many properties off market. What many may not realize is just how many of these non-performing loans are being shuffled off bank books to note investors.

The U.S. housing market is healing, but new, and legacy defaults are still substantial. However, the statistics showing foreclosure activity dropping are largely in part due to bad loans being sold off to other investors, rather than the banks foreclosing, auctioning them of, or selling them as REOs.

A growing number of real estate investors have been buying non-performing notes in the hopes of bringing them back to performing again, and benefiting from high yields and discounts.

Of course, not all of these loans can be made to perform, even if they are modified. Some borrowers simply can’t afford to keep their homes, or have no intention of trying. In these cases note investors need to foreclose, or permit short sales in order to allow homeowners a way out, and to be able to recoup capital. Note investors like the benefits of paper, they don’t want to be stuck with real property. It just doesn’t fit their strategy.

For wholesalers that can connect and build relationships with these mortgage note investors the opportunities for tapping into a significant stream of properties ripe to be flipped is huge. It provides a valuable service to note investors and homeowners, while skipping ahead of those competing for wholesale deals on the MLS, at auctions, or in mailboxes.

With Best Transaction Funding wholesalers can take on virtually unlimited volume, and flip far more houses than their competitors. It is just a matter of finding them, and building relationships. Note investors can be found in online real estate forums, advertising in magazines, via Google, and at local Meet Ups.

The proof is in – real estate investing in creating a surge in new U.S. millionaires…

Research from Fox Business and the Spectrem Group’s Annual Market Insights Report 2014 shows a dramatic rise in wealth. So just how rich are Americans now and how are they making so much money in what is supposed to be a ‘tough economy’?

According to the stats the number of millionaires in America actually hit a record high in 2013, up almost 2.54 million from 2008.

More notable numbers include:
• ‘Mass Affluent Households’ seeing an increase of 500k joining their ranks in 2013
• 352k more Americans reach Ultra High Net Worth status from 2008 to 2013
• Those worth $25M or more rose by 10%
• These figures do not include personal residences

Considering real estate has really been the only horse running in the race over the last few years it is clear that much of this wealth is a direct result of real estate investing.

The really great news for those reading this isn’t just that there is a lot more cash out there and end cash buyers to flip homes to, but that the housing market is really just warming up.

This means plenty more deals to be done in the years ahead. With big private equity bowing out and turning to funding rental property landlords to help them rehab and expand those wholesaling houses will not just find more bargain house deals coming online but an eager audience to sell them to fast.

The only missing pieces of the puzzle left for those that aren’t members of the above high net worth groups, and for those on them that want to get to the next level is to build better buyers lists and to tap into Best Transaction Funding to crank up the volume and rocket their wealth while the stars are aligned.