I’m trying to think of the best way to market to my monthly list of pre-foreclosures. From the time I get the list to the time they go to auction, I have about four weeks.
I could just send each name a letter, but that can be expensive, especially if you do more than one mailing.
I could just choose the houses where the loan in question is more than “X” years old, but that would leave out the houses where there might be equity if the buyer put a lot down or maybe just refinanced the house at a reasonable LTV (new loan, but still equity).
For those who market to pre-foreclosures such as this, how do you manage this?
I suppose mailing 2,100 letters is not that expensive if it generates even one deal, but I also know that these property owners are being bombarded with mail…
You can’t do everything. Pick an area and focus on it. You end up learning values quickly and helps you determine which ones are worth marketing to or knocking on their door.
Maybe this qualifies as advertising, but I pay my kid sisters a buck a letter total to print off the letter and handwrite the address, put a stamp on it, and get into the mail
14 and 16 year old girls always want to extra cash.
That being said, they live in MS and do my FL letters for me from over there, so its something you can “outsource”. I just send them address lists.
PM me if you want to have access to my “labor force”…ha ha.
Thanks for the responses, but in re-reading my post I see that I was not too clear about what I needed help with.
I was trying to figure out the best way to cull the highest-potential properties from the list of 2,100. Those 2,100 properties are in my target market; there are many, many foreclosures in this region, and I work all of the counties represented by that list.
I’m also pretty comfortable with the mailing that I use, even though it does not have a handwritten address (but it does use a traditional first-class stamp). I think my response rate is pretty good, and people often tell me, “I got a hundred letters, but I opened yours because…”
What I am trying to do is cut out the mailing that is going to be a waste. I guess that’s not possible with 100% accuracy, so better to overmail to houses that will not be profitable and catch the one or two that will be.
I suppose when you think about it, spending $1,000 to send out 2,100 letters is more than OK if you end up getting one deal from the mailing, which I probably will, if history is a guide. I’m content to spend up to $2,500 per closed deal on marketing, so perhaps I should just go ahead and mail everyone on the list and be done with it.
Thanks for the replies, though. I appreciate the effort.
Hey,
like the others I say focus in on a small ‘farm’ area. then expand it as your cash becomes available. A lot of us, including myself as new investors do not have a lot of money to market, so focus on a zipcode or 2 in your area. Get sucdessfully and expand your market. Remember, typically direct marketing gets around 1 per cent. So out of a hundred mailings you may get 1 or 2 phone calls which do not always means they want to sell at the time.
steve