investing – Valerie "The Coach" Adams

June 10, 2024

7 Steps to building your Real Estate Business Marketing Plan

In this article you will learn how to write your real estate marketing business plan in 7 steps.

The single biggest question I get from people getting started in real estate (and experienced for that matter) is “how to find deals?” They say, “I don’t know what to focus on in real estate. Should I focus on wholesaling, rehabbing or buy and hold? Should I focus on finding absentee owners, make offers from the mls? Should I focus on direct mail, text campaigns?”

Wholesaler’s, investor’s and acquisitions teams are confused about the whole operations of real estate investing, and the marketing plan behind finding the deals. I understand that you go to a three-day real estate training course, or you purchase a home-study course, and every angle of real estate investing is attractive. You can see the potential in all these different markets.

First things first, you have to get focused! Deciding on starting with just one area of real estate investing. Once you have made that decision. Key points, you should be adding these areas of focus to your formal business plan. As you are learning you can bookmark other areas you learn about that are interesting to you, but for now let’s focus on just one.

Second step, now that we know where to focus. We can set up a marketing plan that focuses on listening. This means you are in listening, learning, study mode. This is the only way to get good at overcoming objections and solving problems unique to different types of motivated seller markets. In order for this to be successful, always be in listening mode, or learning mode or studying mode.

Let’s simplify this whole real estate marketing game and boil it down to:

Who, What, When, Where, Why & How (And How Much)!

Who:

Who is that we are going to be talking to? Who are we going to be trying to purchase homes from? You may want to work in one or two of the following markets: foreclosures, absentee owners, our probates, divorces, for sale by owners, tired landlords. This is your market – the who.

What:

What are you going to say in your marketing? This may be a real estate marketing script that you follow, a direct mail postcard system that you roll out, or specific copy in your advertisement. Understand that you are looking for motivated sellers to take action. If you’re taking the time to write a letter, place an ad, etc. you want your prospect to do something like call you or text you or listen to a recorded message and send an email

When:

When are your prospects going to receive your marketing message? Timing and consistency is everything to your real estate marketing campaign. You need to be the single person (or company) they think of when the moment strikes at which they realize they are, in fact, a motivated seller!

Where:

Where are they going to receive your message? Obviously if you’re door knocking, you’ll meet them at their home. But if you are marketing to personal representatives of an estate, the attorney or relative may receive the letter and pass it on. It’s important to think about where your potential seller is going to “see” your message because this will affect the action they take.

Why:

This is where your real estate investing exit strategy comes into play. What are you going to do with the property once you’ve gained control? Are you going to wholesale it to another investor? Are you going to fix it up and flip it yourself? Are you going to hold on to it for rental? Are you going to set it up as a short term rental?

As you grow into your real estate business, you’ll have a number of options for each deal depending on what’s most suitable for the piece of real estate. You may have properties that you can assign, rehab OR rent. But, initially, decide where you are on your real estate investing scale and work within those parameters. If you are asking: “Should I focus on rehabbing houses or should I target probate?” you’re asking two different questions.

How:

The next thing is the communication method. That is ‘how are we going to talk to our potential motivated sellers? So let’s suppose your market is foreclosures or pre-foreclosures (the who). The next question is how? Choose 3-4 methods of communication so you can effectively measure your ROI. Here is an example of four methods that we can use to communicate with our target market.

1. Driving for Dollars (or door knocking)

2. Telemarketing with strategic focus…

3. Direct mail

4. Mass marketing – SEO/Ad Campaigns/Sales Funnels/Webinar/Social Media (Pick One, Focus and measure)

How Much:

I toss this in because this is going to affect your real estate marketing strategies. How much can you afford to spend? Understand for a few dollars a day, you can have an extremely profitable real estate investing business. It doesn’t take a lot of money to bring in home run deals!

Here’s a quick real estate marketing business plan that you can implement immediately using the; Who, What, When, Where, Why & How approach:

Who: Pre-foreclosures within 2 weeks of sale at the courthouse (note how specific this is)

What: Yellow letters – Direct Mail

When: Two weeks prior to the sale

Where: Prospect’s Home

Why: Seller is more motivated and has run out of options

How: Hand-written, hand addressed, first class postage and return address label

How Much: Based on a budget of $100/month, I will send 59.5 letters each week (remember to figure out your marketing budget down to the penny – stamps, ink, paper, envelopes, etc.)

Keep these 7 Simple Steps for your real estate marketing plan. Add them to your final marketing plan as a guide. If you want to schedule a one-on-one mentorship session to get personalized help with developing your plan. Text the phone number below with 3 days and times that work for you and be sure to mention this article.

Cheers,

Valerie Adams
Conversion Marketing Experts, LLC
951-268-4305 Text for Setting up Consultation

March 20, 2024March 20, 2024

Investment Property Financing Equals Equity Investment

The lending terms offered by banks and other financial institutions for investment property financing fluctuate with the real estate market. For example at the turn of the century, lenders were extremely competitive and aggressive with financing. Not only were residential borrowers receiving unprecedented terms for loans but investors were also getting great deals. Now since the banks have tightened the reins on residential lending, financing is much more conservative for investors as well.

For the first time investor, lenders will want to see some type of equity investment before making a loan. At a minimum they will want to see some kind of sweat equity. This is because if a borrower can no longer make the loan payments and the lender must foreclose the equity investment helps preserve the lender’s security and interest in the loan. To illustrate this point let’s consider a nice round loan amount such as a thousand dollars.

Now let’s assume that a tract of land costs $10,000. For a new investor, a lending institution may want to see an equity investment between 20 to 50% this means that you as the investor would need to invest $2,000-$5,000 before the lender would provide the investment property financing.

These terms are beneficial to the bank in two ways – first if the bank has to take back the property they only have to sell it for $5,000 to recoup their cost and since the property should be worth $10,000 or more, the bank sees this deal as an acceptable risk. Second, if you, the investor, have committed a portion of your own resources to the deal you’re less likely to walk away.

This example was very simplistic but helps illustrate the lending logic of a loan officer. For normal size investment property financing deals, your equity investment may not have to be in the form of cash. Depending on the structure of the deal you could offer additional property, life insurance policies or stocks as collateral or even JV Partnership deals. The bottom line is that your loan officer will want to see your financial commitment to the deal.

Also the larger your equity investment in the property, the lower your interest rate will be because of diminished risk of loss due to foreclosure. The amount of equity your lender may require for your investment property financing deal will depend on your credit score, financial statement and history with the lender. Although your stellar credit scores show that you’re responsible personally, most lenders will still require a financial statement showing your assets and liabilities and a cash flow statement showing your average monthly income. Any weaknesses in your financial statement and you can expect a higher equity investment requirement. A lender wants to know that you’re not living paycheck to paycheck and can afford to make mortgage payments even if the property is vacant for a few months. Learning alternative funding methods will also help you to purchase investment properties without the need for a bank.

If you want a better strategic approach to ensure you are on the right path reach out to my assistant Ashley at 951-268-4305 and let’s set up an appointment for you to meet with Coach Val Adams.

See you at the top,

CME Staff

951-268-4305

Offices located in: Atlanta, Chicago, Corona

Investment Portfolio and expertise since 2017

www.RecruitLikeVal.com

Visit us on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/valthecoach/

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March 16, 2024

Commercial Property Investment – Not Just For The Rich

If you are considering commercial property investment opportunities the following information may be of importance to you.

Commercial investment opportunities include those in retail, industrial, and office space each has its own unique set of circumstances you need to be aware of to compare opportunities and get the best deals.

You need to research these investment opportunities and get the vitals on rates for rent that are comparable to other rental spaces in the area. Offering good lease terms on a well managed property will attract the type of tenants you really want.

You will also need to take into consideration what it will take to run the property. Will the rent of the property cover the costs of maintaining the building? If other properties in the area are charging more for rent than you plan to, you need to ask yourself if the rent you are charging will offset the costs of maintenance. Carefully researched comps in the are should be your guide.

Other aspects of commercial property investment is location and availability of adequate parking. Is there adequate street parking or is there a parking lot? A business that is not easy to get to will not sustain a good customer base and will eventually fail. As an investor in the commercial property you need to make sure that the location is conducive to maintaining a successful business.

Along with the location and parking is the aspect of accessibility by public transportation. Is the property on a bus route so people without their own form of transportation can get to the property? How are the roads leading up to the property? Are they in good repair or do they need work? You could check with the county road commissioner and see if road construction is slated for that area in the near future or not.

Looks and functionality are important in investing also. The property needs to flow from the front door to the back of the store. Tenants will look for this functionality and if it is there it will attract them to signing a rental agreement with you.

If someone were interested in renting some commercial property and went to a brand new building. The owner offered to basically build to suit and said the prospective renter had to put up ten thousand dollars to finish the building. I do not think that is a proper way to conduct business. The building should have been finished and all that should have been negotiated was the rent for the space they were interested in. The owner lost a potential renter because what they were “offering” was not appealing in the least.

Before investing in a commercial property make sure the utilities and other amenities are in good working order. Update these services as necessary so they will stay in good working order. Also when purchasing commercial real estate property we also need to consider creating value add and those concessions that will give us cash in pocket at closing.

A commercial property investment is as risky as any other type of investment and these tips will ensure you make an informed decision as to whether or not you want to venture into commercial investing.

The best approach to ensuring the right investment vehicle for you, using statistical data from today’s market trends is to consult with a mentor who can walk you through these steps and pre-analyze deal construction with you. Book your appointment now.