Tim Bell advises using online classifieds (rather than newspaper ads) to find real-estate investors because they get better exposure and are often free. He gives a sample ad aimed at fix-and-flip or buy-and-hold investors: lists after-rehab value (ARV), estimated repairs, and current price to make profit math obvious and prompt calls. He emphasizes omitting extraneous details (address, square footage) so prospects won’t need to research and will instead phone the seller to verify the deal.
Chapters
Now, the next technique that we've got here is the idea of running ads on local newspapers and local class online classifieds. Now, I will tell you Honestly, in the 21st century right now, I do not use the newspaper to run ads. Why? Well, we've all seen the kind of the demise, so to speak, of newspaper advertising. Why? Because nobody reads the newspaper anymore. With the proliferation of electronic news, computers, cell phones and all tablets and all the other electronic devices that we have to get our news, including television, a lot of people don't even read the newspaper anymore. As a consequence, I suggest that your focus in running ads for properties should be online classifieds. The really big advantage of online classifieds is the fact that for the most part, they're free. There are some paid, but most of them are free. So not only are you going to get better exposure because many people are looking at online classifieds now as opposed to looking at the newspaper, but it also costs you less money because it's free. Now, here's an example of the type of ad that I might run, okay? This says, investor special, three bedroom, two bath, after rehab, value 200, repairs 30. Buy it today, 105, cash or best offer. Oboe. Then there's a telephone number. Now, a lot of people look at this and they say, wait a minute, Tim, what's the address of this property? Or what's the square footage of the property? Or how big is the lot? Or is there a garage or a carport or. I don't know very much about this property. And that's true, okay? But remember, the purpose of running this ad is very simple. The purpose of running this ad is to get that potential fix and flip investor or buy and hold investor to call you. That's the purpose. You want them to pick up the phone, dial your number and call you. Okay? Now, I maintain that there's everything that they need to know to decide whether or not they're going to call you in this ad, okay? Especially in the third, fourth and fifth lines down on this ad, you can see it says, after rehab value 200 repairs 30, buy it today, 105, cash or best offer. Now, anybody that has a calculator and has any sense of how to calculate and decide whether or not a property is indeed a good deal can figure this thing out. Anybody with a calculator and half a brain can see that there is a good profit in this transaction. Okay? Based on our formula, with a 200 ARV and a 30,000 in repairs, buy at 105, there's a $45,000 profit in this thing? Yeah. Okay. Is $45,000 a good profit for most fix and flip investors on a $200,000 ARV? Yes, it is. And they're going to recognize that. See, I could put all different kinds of details in here. I could put the square footage and the lot size and the year that it was built and the address of the property. I could put all different kinds of information in here. The problem is that if I don't put in those three bits that I've put in here, the after repair or after rehab value, the repairs and the current price, then at that point, if they don't know what the after repair value is and they don't know what the repair costs are, and I just advertise it in this example at 105,000, they're going to have to do some research to decide whether or not they're going to pick up the phone and dial my 10 numbers on their phone. I don't want them to have to do any research to decide. I want them to look at this and immediately pick up the phone. I mean, let's think about it. How are they going to do their research? How are they going to determine what, whether or not they want to call you if indeed you don't give them the after repair value and the repairs? Well, here's what they're going to do. They're typically in our current world, they're going to go online and they're going to look it up and they're going to do some research online to find the after repair value and possibly the repair costs on that property, but mostly the after repair value. Okay, so if they go out there online and they're looking on various websites and they're looking up the neighborhood and all different kinds of things. And is it possible that in the process of doing that Internet search, they will get distracted and find another property? And the answer is yes, it's very possible. It's likely. Think about it. Have you ever gone on the Internet with the intent of looking up something and then ended up completely different place than your original intent? Yes. It's cliche. It happens so often to us and modern human beings. And so I don't want them to have any confusion. I don't want them to have any to do any research before they pick up the phone and call me. Why? Because when they can see this information there, they now know that if I'm telling the truth about the after repair value and the repair costs, it's a good deal. Which means all they have to do is call me to verify that indeed, I'm telling the truth about the after repair value and the repair. Excuse me. The repair costs. So that's basically what we want to think about when we run this particular ad.
